Hoping for Purpose ...

Tuesday, Nov 8, 2011. Humans want to have some purpose in their life. What is our life without purpose? Without purpose we live just into the day. That might be even our ideal. But it cannot be maintained in the long run in a healthy way …! Humans need purpose.

How to find Purpose? …

We try to find purpose by various measures and steps. A very typical way of finding purpose is to do something for others. When we are important for others, we seem to have purpose. This is why people try to get into important positions. They want to be recognized. They want to have a life which is important for others, ultimately it is the quest for purpose.

I think that most things we do basically try to answer the purpose question. When we try to earn a lot of money, it is about purpose. People usually realize quickly that money alone is not of any value, but that they need to use it to gain purpose. So many try to establish a charity and earn their purpose by this. Others try to be innovative and change the path of human history - basically to gain purpose for their own life.

Imagine an artist, some musician. He also hopes for purpose, by giving something to his audience. He or she tries to give music, emotions, hope, beauty, creativity to the people listening.

Or think about a young mother. She is there for the baby and the family. The purpose of her life at least for some period of time is reduced to give, to nurture, to protect, to provide. This activities give purpose to her. Most things we do are related to purpose!

Purpose given by the Lord …

The bible also talks about purpose. Of course it needs to do so, since purpose is of key importance for humans. The key point of the bible is: God wants to give us purpose. He wants to put solid and sustainable purpose into our life.

What is the purpose God is giving to us? It is much more than the individual purpose we feel based on some particular activity. Activities will also play an important role for Christians. But first, there is another purpose!

The first purpose we get by the Lord is the purpose of creation. We have purpose, just because we are created by him, created by purpose. God made humans, since hi loves company. He made us, since he wanted us to live with him. He made us, since he wanted us to be. He wanted to love us. He wanted to help us. He wanted to provide all we need. That is a deep purpose, which every human has, independent of what we do, what we are, what we have. We have purpose, just because God made us and loves us!

There is more to say about purpose. We will come back to it. But it is important to see this basic purpose … and feel the joy of it when you accept it. God wants you, what ever you do, who ever you are. He made you. He loves you. You have a deep purpose which no one can take away! (Roland Potthast) ... more texts