What are you worth? You are not merely saved from sin, but you are saved because God values you as one whom He has made to carry His Divine nature. (2 Peter 1:4). Your value is not in who you will be in the future; it is in how much value God has placed on you. While we were sinners, God valued us and died for us, not in hopes of future righteousness, but because of His love for us in the moment of His sacrifice (Romans 5:8). His love was poured out for us long before sin corrupted our view of God. (1 Peter 1:20, Rev. 13:8).

To think that we, in a beggarly fashion, are working to make ourselves worthy of God’s affection in the future means we are reducing God’s love to a matter of contingency on our behavior.
In response to His love, we should not allow feelings of shame and guilt to parade as humility. We should daily grow confident in the righteousness God has plastered on us because of Jesus’ sacrifice for us.
When we don’t celebrate in who God sees us as and allow thanksgiving to fuel our devotion, we essentially prefer our broken view of God’s atonement and our self-value above His truth concerning redemption.
You are valued by God; that is why Jesus died. His death wasn’t simply to “forgive you of your sins,” no, it was to pull you back into a relationship with Him.

Sin was the hinderance that the cross removed, not the reason for His death. We were the reason. God so loved the world that He gave his only Son for many more sons and daughters. (John 3:16, Romans 8:9, Colossians 1:18)