The value of a person cannot rest on their usefulness.
No one must prove to be a cornerstone of their community, a pillar of their people, a positive net worth, to be a whole person or to be treated as one.
A person who contributes is pouring out of an abundance of resources they were given in an environment they did not choose by generational accomplishments they did not earn. A person who contributes is worthy of acclaim, but not inherently worth more than others, and not to be rewarded for passing on the blessing they received.
We have value apart from what we do. We are not tethered to our gifts, our purpose, our utility. We bear permanence. An image of grace.
We are called to do good, but not because it makes us good. Not to earn a point value. The good we do is an extension of the grace we were gifted. To do good is simply good in itself, just as you are too.
I have sat with so many patients who are disabled, had their livelihoods taken by disease and disaster, who cannot produce or create or move the way they had wanted.
Is there no hope for them?
Do they have no value simply because they cannot bear the metric of what the world demands as “useful”?
Are they doomed to a second rate life, a fate of failed dreams, a perpetual plan B?
I believe they matter. They feel joy, pain, heaven, and heartache as much as you or me. They have worth apart from the world’s demands and deadlines. They are more than everything that has happened to them.
It is a bonus to be able to live your dream.
It is a blessing to create, contribute, lead.
But to achieve or fail these things does not make you gold or glass.
You are marked by grace, by glory, by an image not of what you do, but simply you.
blakekathryn
dailybridgerton
andulkaphoto
yousharknotpass
ellievsbear
prguitarman
theartofmadeline
janainaart
