Bible Truth for Today about PURPOSE
( Why am I here ?)

For many people, life consists of being born, growing up, getting a job, getting married, having children, growing old and then dying. Yet, many have never even consider why they were created. They have no idea what their purpose in life should be, and they have no idea where they are headed in life (or afterwards!). Perhaps you are in this group.

Others seemingly do have a purpose in life - but it is the wrong purpose! Many seek success, fame, popularity, power, pleasure, or some other purpose. For people such as this, life is often an anti-climactic experience - like a mountain climber who finally reaches the top and then is disappointed because there is nowhere else to go, or perhaps like the pro football player who becomes depressed after winning the Super Bowl when the "high" wears off. This is NOT ultimately what life is all about. Perhaps you are in this group of people.

When your life ends, what should you have accomplished? You CAN know the meaning of life - the purpose for which you were created. But, you cannot find it by looking to yourself, within yourself, or to your own opinions about life. You must begin with God and with His revelation of why He created you. The Bible tells us that God created all things that were created and that all things were created BY Him and FOR Him (Colossians 1:15-20). We were created in God's image for a relationship with Him. Being in a proper relationship with Him is the only thing that will ultimately satisfy your soul. You absolutely cannot answer this critical question of life apart from what God has told us in the Bible. Jesus gave the simple but profound answer to the question when He said: "You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself" (Matthew 22:37-39). Included in that answer are: serving God, worshiping God, pleasing God, and fellowshipping with God. We read in Ecclesiastes 12:13 "Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God and keep His commandments. For this is man's all." We find these words in Deuteronomy 10:12-13: "...what does the Lord require of you, but to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all His ways and to love Him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, and to keep His commandments..." The Westminster catechism asks the question "What is the chief end of man?" and gives this answer: "To glorify God and enjoy Him forever."

Before you can fulfill God's purpose for your life, you must establish a proper relationship with God. In other words, you cannot know the meaning of life until you know the One Who gives life meaning. Jesus said, "I have come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly." (John 10:10)

Would you like to know how to enter into a right relationship with God, the One Who created you, and not only know the meaning of life, but fulfill God's purpose for your life? Jesus said, "I am the Way, the Truth and the Life. No one comes to the Father except by Me" (John 14:6).

Though we were alienated from God and under the sentence of death because of our sin, yet God loved us, and did not want us to be separated from Himself. So He sent His Son, Jesus, to come to this earth to live a perfectly sinless life, then to die on a cross in our place. "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life" (John 3:16). When Jesus shed His blood on that cross, He paid the penalty for the sins of all mankind, and completely satisfied the demands of a holy God. Three days after His death on the cross, Jesus rose bodily from the grave and now lives with the Father in heaven.

Because Jesus is the One Who paid the penalty for us, God has made Jesus the key to life. "He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son does not have life" (1 John 5:12). We must believe that Jesus is the Son of God, that He is able to save us from sin and give us new life and accept His gift of eternal life.

When we repent of our sin and trust fully in Jesus as our Savior, we enter into a relationship with God. The Bible tells us we are then regenerated, or born again, and given new, and eternal, life. We are adopted into the family of God and truly become His children. This is the first step to a life of purpose and living for God - a life of joy and fulfillment!

Now that I know that,
How Then Should I Live?