Do You Know How Valuable You Are?

Part 5: The Father’s Voice

“And behold, a voice from heaven said, This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.” Matthew 3:17

“See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are.” 1 John 3:1

“The Lord your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save; he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing.” Zephaniah 3:17

Before the Work

There’s a moment in the life of Jesus that gets overshadowed by everything that came after it — the miracles, the sermons, the cross, the resurrection. But I think it might be the most important moment of all. Because it’s the moment that set everything else in motion.

Jesus walked down to the Jordan River to be baptized by John. He hadn’t healed anyone yet. He hadn’t preached a single sermon. He hadn’t called a single disciple. He hadn’t turned water into wine or fed five thousand or raised the dead. He hadn’t done ANYTHING yet. And as He came up out of the water, heaven opened, and the Father spoke: “And behold, a voice from heaven said, ‘This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased'” (Matthew 3:17).

BEFORE the work came the identity. Before a single miracle, before a single step of ministry, the Father declared who Jesus was. Beloved. Son. Pleasing. Not because of what He’d accomplished. Because of WHO HE WAS. Let me tell you, that changes everything. The world says you earn your identity through performance. God says your identity comes before performance. The world crowns you by what you’ve done. The Father speaks over you before you’ve done a thing. The world laid garments at Saul’s feet and called it authority. The Father spoke over Jesus at the Jordan and called it LOVE. Which crowning are you chasing?

Sons and Daughters

And if you think that was only for Jesus, you haven’t been reading your Bible closely enough. The Apostle John — the one who leaned against Jesus at the table, the one who called himself “the disciple whom Jesus loved” — wrote something so staggering that he practically begged his readers to stop and take it in: “See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are” (1 John 3:1).

See what kind of love. John is WAVING HIS ARMS. He’s saying, “Do you understand what I’m telling you? You’re not servants. You’re not employees. You’re not outsiders looking through a window. You are CHILDREN OF GOD.” And so we ARE. That’s not future tense. That’s not “someday you might be.” You ARE. Right now. Today. In the middle of your mess and your questions and your doubts — you are a child of God.

Paul told the church in Rome the same thing, and then took it even further: “For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, ‘Abba! Father!’ The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs — heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ” (Romans 8:15-17). HEIRS. Not guests. Not charity cases. Heirs. Everything that belongs to Christ belongs to YOU. Not because you earned a seat at the table. Because the Father adopted you and pulled out a chair with your name on it. And that word — Abba — that’s not formal language. That’s a child crawling into their father’s lap. That’s “Daddy.” The God who spoke the universe into existence invites you to call Him Daddy. HOW COOL IS THAT?!

A Chosen People

Peter — the sifted, restored, loudmouth-turned-rock Peter — wrote a letter late in his life to scattered believers who were being persecuted, marginalized, and made to feel like they didn’t belong anywhere. And he told them exactly who they were: “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light” (1 Peter 2:9).

Let me tell you, the fact that PETER wrote those words makes them hit even harder. This is the man who was sifted like wheat. The man who denied Jesus three times. The man who failed as spectacularly as anyone in Scripture. And HE’S the one who writes “you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood.” Peter isn’t writing theory. He’s writing from the other side of his own destruction and restoration. He KNOWS what it means to be called out of darkness, because he spent three days in the darkest night of his life — and Jesus came for him anyway.

The Voice That Matters

We’ve walked a long road through this series. We started with Jesus on a hillside, speaking blessings over broken people. We sat with David in Psalm 139 and learned we were knitted together before we drew our first breath. We hid in the cave called Refuge and watched God turn four hundred broken men into mighty warriors. We saw the stutterer, the runt, the sifted loudmouth, and the persecutor who stood over bloody garments — and we saw God choose every one of them.

And now we’re standing at the Jordan, watching heaven open, listening to the Father’s voice. And the question that’s been running underneath everything comes down to this: whose voice are you listening to? The voice that called you a bum? The voice that said you’d never amount to anything? The voice that measured your worth by what you produced or what you looked like or who approved of you? Or the voice of the Father — the one who spoke before you did a single thing, and said, “This is my beloved. I am well pleased.”

Because the Father says the same thing over you. Not because you’ve earned it. Because He decided it before you were born. Your value isn’t up for debate. It was settled at the cross and declared at the Jordan and written in a book before time began.

He Sings Over You

I want to leave you with one more verse. And if you can receive this one, it will change the way you hear God’s voice for the rest of your life. The prophet Zephaniah wrote: “The Lord your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save; he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing” (Zephaniah 3:17).

He REJOICES over you. He QUIETS you with His love. He SINGS over you. Let me tell you, I can barely get through that verse without weeping. The God of the universe — the one who spoke galaxies into existence, who parted seas and raised the dead — that God looks at you and SINGS. Not because you’ve performed well. Not because you’ve got it all figured out. Because you’re His. And His love for you makes Him sing.

Do you know how valuable you are? You are valuable enough to make God sing. That’s who you are. That’s whose you are. And no voice — past, present, or future — gets to tell you otherwise. Now go live like it.

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A Moment Before You Go

Lord, I have listened to so many voices. Voices that told me I was nothing. Voices that told me I wasn’t enough. Voices that told me I had to earn my place at the table. Today, I’m choosing to listen to Yours. You say I’m Your child. You say I’m chosen. You say You sing over me. Help me hear Your voice above all the others. Help me live like the person You say I am. In Jesus’ name, amen.

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A.W. Tozer wrote, “What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us.” If the first thing that comes to mind is a distant judge keeping score, the enemy has been at your theology. God is a Father who sings over His children.

C.S. Lewis said, “The son of God became man to enable men to become sons of God.” That’s not a metaphor. That’s a job description. And the position has your name on it.