What is your life worth?
Sunday 14thSeptember 2025
No one can redeem the life of another or give to God a ransom for them –
the ransom for a life is costly, no payment is ever enough –
so that they should live on and never see decay.
Psalm 49:7-9 (NIV)
What is your life worth?
Have you ever tried to put a value on a human life, or even thought of doing so? That may seem an impossible thing to do, and even distasteful. How can we possibly do such a thing?
I learned that NICE (the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence) has done just that. In 1999 they set a figure of around £20,000 to £30,000 for every year of ‘good-quality human existence.’
It’s a way of calculating whether a particular medical treatment should go ahead. So, if a medicine adds a year of ‘perfect’ health to a person’s life for less than £30,000, NICE is likely to authorise the treatment.
It may sound rather mercenary, and it seems strange that the figure hasn’t changed since 1999. However, with limited funding available, someone has to decide which treatments will go ahead and which won’t. And there has to be some measure to help them make that decision. Naturally, if we’re funding it as taxpayers, we’d like the figure to be much lower, while if we’re the ones needing treatment we’d like it to be much higher.
Does the Bible say anything about the value of a human life? Yes it does. From the very beginning, without putting a financial value on them, we’re assured that human lives are of great value. Each one of us is, after all, made “in the image of God.”
That value is emphasised when God tells Noah that, “Whoever sheds human blood, by humans shall their blood be shed, for in the image of God has God made mankind” (Genesis 9:6). In other words, a human life is so valuable that the only thing that can ‘pay’ for a human life is another human life.
And then we learn from Psalm 49 that “No one can redeem the life of another or give to God a ransom for them – the ransom for a life is costly, no payment is ever enough.” So such a ransom seems impossible, and then we read in verse 15, “But God will redeem me from the realm of the dead; he will surely take me to himself.” So is a ransom possible after all?
We don’t find this tension resolved until the New Testament, where we read that “the Son of Man [came] … to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45). That ransom is of priceless value since “it is not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed … but with the precious blood of Christ” (1 Peter 18-19).
So it seems a value can be put on a human life after all, but it’s somewhat higher than £30,000 per year. In fact, it cannot be measured financially at all. It’s nothing less than the sacrifice of the Son of God, “the precious blood of Christ.” That’s how much you’re worth!
There are no doubt many ways of measuring the value of a human life, but here is God’s measure of that value. Did you realise you were worth that much?
Prayer
Lord, thank you for paying the ransom for my life, shedding your own blood for my soul, so that I might live on with you and never see decay; help me to value my own life and the lives of others by the same measure. Amen.
Yours warmly, in Christ,
Chris Hobbs (Senior Minister)