Try to go a day without using any number. It’s almost impossible.
Look at a clock, there are numbers. Cook food and you’re setting a timer. Send a letter and you’re using an address. Make a call and you’re using a phone number. Buy something and you’re using a numbered amount of money. And on it goes.
It’s easy to start thinking of others and ourselves as numbers, because we’re treated like numbers so often. We don’t notice it, because it’s so pervasive.
Here are a bunch of numbers that are used to define you but which you should refuse to be defined by.
You are not the dollars in your bank account.
You are not your Social Security number.
You are not your phone number.
You are not your address.
You are not your grade point average.
You are not your employee number.
You are not your tracking code.
You are not your tithe.
You are not your vote.
You are not a population statistic.
You are not a credit card number.
You are not an Enneagram number.
You are not your sports team’s ranking.
You are not your blood pressure, heart rate, or any other health statistic.
You are not the calories you just ate.
You are not your salary or hourly wage.
You are not the bill that arrived in the mail.
You are not the square footage of your home.
You are not the steps tracked by your FitBit today.
You are not your age.
You are not your debt.
You are not the number of likes on your last post.
You are not the number of followers and friends you’ve added.
You are not your jersey number.
You are not your weight on the scale or the measurement of your height.
You are not the number on the scoreboard.
You are not your online metrics.
You are not the combination on a lock.
You are not the speed you drive (or the ticket you got for driving it).
Numbers have their place. There is a book of the Bible named Numbers after all — but only one. Numbers have their place, but it’s only a small place in the economy of God.
Where God places value is in relationships. In character. In kindness. In wisdom.
What counts isn’t counting.
We dehumanize people by numbering them. We reduce people to digits, to human capital, to statistics, to dollars and cents. Restore your own humanity by restoring that of others.
Refuse to be a number. Like Jean Valjean, cease to be 24601. Like Finn, cease to be FN-2187. Like a Holocaust survivor, refuse to be the number tattooed on your arm. Be human instead.
Learn names. Listen to stories. See faces. Hear voices. Embrace. Sing together. Pray.
Stop counting and just live. Just love.