Determine Value The Blue Chair Way

1 Chronicles1:6 - "...the sons of Gomer, Ashkenaz, Diphath and Togarmah"

"19 cents!"  The price of a gallon of gasoline when I learned to drive.  (Yes,  I am that old, that's why I have recently retired.)  In those days the best place to buy gas was named "Gomer's".  Now that I live in the same metropolitan area, I need to drive by Gomer's and see how it looks all these years later.

I remember my inflated pride, insisting I pay for my own gas.  I don't recall my parents insisting.  I believe they would have given me gas money if I'd asked.  Instead, I felt more grown up paying my own way, in 19 cents a gallon increments.  Perhaps I thought others would see my value as an adult when I shopped and paid for my own gas.

I've spent the last several months wrestling with determining value.  Early this year, I made the decision to retire from my job.  My husband and I decided to relocate near family so we embarked on an adventure to downsize.  Yikes, what an ordeal and a lifetime of lessons!

Here's just one of the lessons I learned from our adventure.  Who determines value?

I needed to find new homes for most of our furniture.  It was a hodge-podge collection of hand-me-downs and treasures I'd picked from the curbs of strangers.  I had a bit of emotional attachment to each one.  To display my valued treasures I created a Facebook page.  To my surprise many of my valued possession found new homes. 

Yet my grandmother's chairs never found a new home.  I loved the round tufted backs.  I loved the fabric which I'd had them reupholstered.  I presented them with a great price, so I thought.  Unfortunately,  even when offered up for "free", no new home was found.

I negotiated  with my husband to get them a spot on the moving list. They made the first move to the temporary apartment.  Then I saw my beloved chairs in new light, literally.  The new location of the chairs had much better light. I saw they were worn and shabby.  The dogs claimed them as their own.  I didn't fight too hard to reclaim them as I realized they were not that comfortable.

My husband breathed a sigh of relief when I announced "The blue chairs are not making the trip."  Instead, a friend delivered them to a thrift shop.

The blue chairs remind me that sometimes we value through distorted memory.  Too often our memory and emotions don't consider the reality.  I had to move those chairs to a new situation, with better light, to see their true condition and potential. 

Hallelujah, God not only sees our value and condition but He also overlooks our condition and He determines our value.  He chose us in spite of value and condition. No matter how adult I act or look or how proud I am of my independence, God sees my worth in His eyes and gives me my potential and purpose.  The blue chairs taught me not to value worth with emotion or the opinion of others but to look to God, and God alone, for worth.

Determine value the blue chair way.