You are loved.

YOU are loved. You are loved beyond measure.

The worth of who you are is not based on things you wish you could change. It is not the sum of your mistakes, your failures, your should-haves or should-not-haves. Your worth is not found in your flaws, your weight, your financial or relational status. It's not your secrets, your decisions in your solitude, your thoughts, your unspeakable anguish. You are not all your critics say you are. Your value is not lessened by your deepest fears, regrets, and losses.

Similarly, the measure of your worth is not the sum of your achievements, awards, successes, your right decisions. It's not  earned by your career path, your grades, the pats on your back. Your importance is not heightened by good hair days, or your health. You are not the causes you support, your bumper-stickers, your facebook page, your religious affiliation, your political party.

Dear reader, the worth of YOU is not granted and improved upon by your merits or lessened by your failures.

Tonight, our nation is mourning the loss of lives in Boston, Texas, and cry out against the injustice of murdered babies by a man who forgot that doctors are to save, not snip away life. As a nation, many of us do not know the people who lost their lives this week (or in the anniversaries of columbine or Oklahoma City)—yet each of us is saddened by these losses. We call them tragic, horrific, stolen lives by atrocious acts and accidents. Why?

Why are we compelled to mourn for those we never met—why do I, thousands of miles from each of the towns, find myself mourning? Why—because life is valuable. Those people were loved and purposed because they existed. We mourn because every life has worth—intrinsic worth that starts at conception and is eternal. Babies are celebrated because they are—not because of their works, their achievements.

Tonight, remember that you are loved and valuable because you are. Your worth is not derived from your achievements or diminished by your closeted fears and failures. You are loved because you are—your life has purpose because you exist. You are not an accident—you were planned by the Creator who calls you—who beckons us in tragedy to remember that human life is valuable—from the unborn fetus to the bed-ridden elderly and disabled. Our worth is that we were created in the image of God. You are significant because you mirror the creator who has the acceptance and answers you seek. He frees you from the rat race of achievement to a life that knows it is valued because it exists.

You matter.