From earliest childhood we find ourselves searching for an affirmation of value. “Look at me” we cry. “See how high I can jump!” We all want to matter.
Organizations have surfaced over the years to raise the value of certain people groups by the changing and enforcing of laws, which can be good. But it can also be a slippery slope because when human value is measured by the metrics of an ever-changing culture, it is only as secure as the next election cycle, military coup, or rising power of influence.
During the dark days of the African slave trade, white lives mattered more than black. Yet black lives who profited white lives by selling their fellow Africans into slavery did matter and were rewarded. The killing of nearly a million in the Crusades was fueled by the church’s contempt for the lives of Arabs, Turks, Muslims, and Jews: they didn’t matter. Under the rule of Hitler, the master race of Aryan lives mattered, but other lives—Jews, homosexuals, the disabled—didn’t because they were of no benefit to the state. Who mattered was determined by those in power.
Many years ago I found myself standing before the Mona Lisa at the Louvre Museum in Paris. As a non-art-appreciating youth, I wasn’t all that impressed and was ready for a sandwich. But my uninformed opinion didn’t matter: the Mona Lisa was—and is—the most valued painting in the world. Why?
While my appreciation of art hasn’t improved much, one thing is now clear: value is connected to the creator. His name—Leonardo da Vinci—is what gives the painting its value. His handiwork, skill, creativity, and style are everywhere on the canvas. It’s a masterpiece.
Governments, creeds, and controlling powers are not the source of human value. While they can—and should—protect it, they can never assign it. That comes from its creator, God, and His handiwork, skill, creativity, and style are everywhere on the canvas. It's a masterpiece.
As followers of Jesus, we should be the first to promote the value of every human life. While our minds easily go to the unborn, abused, and under-resourced, there’s another group we have a harder time with: those who practice, promote, and support a shift from moral and cultural values.
There is no question we should resist destructive ideologies in the marketplace of ideas and fight like junkyard dogs to preserve God-honoring values. But hate is never an option. Slander is never an option. Devaluing is never an option. God has called His followers to love the very ones who proudly promote wrong as right and right as wrong. If we fail at this, we will find ourselves on the wrong side of history…and God.
Our mantra must always be that every life matters: Black, White, Brown, Yellow, Red, and every blend of color and ethnicity. But that value reaches beyond color to include LBGTQ lives, WOKE lives, politically divergent lives, and those who venture outside moral and ethical boundaries. Navigating this rutted terrain is challenging and perplexing, yet the redeeming and restoring of broken lives has always been the story of God and the one He calls us to join.
So let’s raise the flag of human value as we stand in the gap as lovers of God and lovers of those He created and loves.
All of them.