More Than a Number

In Victor Hugo's Les Misérables, Jean Valjean has been defined by a number for nineteen years. Prisoner 24601. That is all he is — a convict, a thief, a dangerous man. When he is finally released, the number follows him. His yellow passport marks him as former prison stock. Every inn turns him away. Every face confirms what he already believes about himself: he is nothing more than what his worst moment made him.

Then Bishop Myriel opens his door. Valjean steals the bishop's silver and is dragged back by the police. And here Hugo gives us one of literature's most stunning moments of grace. The bishop tells the officers the silver was a gift. Then he presses the candlesticks into Valjean's hands and whispers that he has bought his soul for God.

In that single act, Valjean's identity cracks open. He is no longer 24601. Someone has named him differently — not by his crime, but by his worth.

This is what the Gospel does. The world hands us labels — failure, addict, fraud, worthless. We carry them so long they feel like skin. But the Almighty looks at us the way the bishop looked at Valjean. He does not see our rap sheet. He sees a child bearing His image. As Paul writes, "If anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come" (2 Corinthians 5:17). God does not simply improve our old identity. He gives us an entirely new one.