Thursday, August 14, 2003
One football team owner calls it "the single most impressive symbol of being a champion in all of sports." Well, he's talking about the National Football League's Super Bowl ring. The rings on the most recent Super Bowl champions are worth $5,000 each! Can you imagine losing something that valuable and irreplaceable? Former Raiders champion Gene Upshaw can. Oh, yeah, to keep his Super Bowl ring safe at home, he put it inside a bank that looked like a Pepsi can. Problem: he forgot to tell his housekeepers. They mistook the bank for an empty pop can and tossed it out, ring and all.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Trashing The Treasure."
That was a costly mistake - trashing treasure because of the container it was in. It's a mistake many people are making. Except the treasure is themselves. And maybe we needed to talk about this today because you may be throwing away a treasure - called you.
Now you may not feel very valuable right now. Maybe you're not feeling very good about how you look, what you weigh, how plain you feel you are, or the fact that you're still single. You're not sure how much you really are worth. But you're making the same mistake those housekeepers made when they threw away that ring - judging the worth of what's inside by the container you come in.
It could be that you feel pretty worthless because you've been passed over, put down, rejected, maybe abandoned, maybe abused. And the tragedy is that you may have been throwing yourself away because you don't know how valuable you are. There are lots of ways to throw yourself away: sexually, socially, by the people you hang out with, chemically, alcoholically, just by giving up or withdrawing, or even thinking suicide.
But you have worth that you'll never see just by looking in a mirror or basing it on how other hurting people have treated you. If you want to get an evaluation of your worth, you have to go to the One who created you - He's the one who knows your value. In our word for today from the Word of God in 2 Corinthians 6:16, your Creator says, "We are the temple of the living God. As God has said ... 'I will be their God, and they will be My people ... I will be a Father to you, and you will be My sons and daughters,' says the Lord Almighty."
Now, did you hear what the God of the universe says about those who belong to Him? They're His temple that He lives in, His people that He walks with, sons and daughters of the King! If you don't feel like you are priceless treasure, it may be because you are without the One who gave you your value, the Creator who made you His one-of-a-kind creation. You're missing the love you were made for. And that's because, well, we've chosen over and over again to turn our back on God and do things our way.
But the Bible says God values you so much that He thought you were worth having His Son die for! Picture Jesus hanging on that cross. That was to pay for your sin so you could belong to Him. You'll never know how much you're really worth 'til you're in His waiting arms.
Jesus won't make you give yourself to Him. It's your choice to finally end the self-directed, wasted years and to stand at His cross and say, "Jesus, the 'me' years are over. You love me. You died for me. I'm yours." If you'd like to begin this love relationship with Jesus Christ, I'd love to send you the booklet I wrote about it called "Yours For Life." Just let me know you want it.
You've believed that you really don't matter much, and you've thrown yourself away long enough. You mattered enough to Jesus that He poured out His life for you. It's time you belong to the One who loves you most.