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Does Life Have Greater Meaning and Purpose?
Making Life Work
Does Life Have Greater Meaning and Purpose?
The foundation is shaken
What happened to shake this assurance man felt toward God? In the 19th century, in one of the major spiritual and intellectual shifts of history, scholarship began to view the words of Christ and the Bible with skepticism. “For thoughtful men and women, the Bible was no longer an unquestioned source of religious authority; it had become a form of evidence . . . that itself needed defending” (James Turner, Without God, Without Creed, 1985, p. 150). Belief in the Bible had given humanity a road map for life. People believed that, in effect, they had in the Bible an owner’s manual, a user’s guide for the human experience. The same manual informed man that God had specified a destination at the end of life for any who loved and served Him. Before the watershed changes of the 19th century, the Bible provided ultimate answers that gave satisfaction to humanity in general. The esteem in which it was held is illustrated in a conversation reported by Bible translator James Moffatt. The exchange took place between Scottish
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“A universal hunger pervades the world. It is the hunger to get more out of life . . . to be more involved, and to find more meaning.” historical novelist and poet Sir Walter Scott and his son-in-law, John Gibson Lockhart, about a week before Scott’s death. He said to his son-in-law: “‘Read to me from the Book.’ When Lockhart asked him which one, Sir Walter said, ‘Need you ask? There is but one’” (quoted by Bruce Barton, The Book Nobody Knows, 1926, p. 7). To capture understanding of the purpose of life, we must return to the Bible because it explains how to make life work. The two great principles iStockphoto
t is a paradox of our modern age that, although we have more knowledge and material possessions than at any other time in history, we lack a sense of purpose in life. A gnawing hunger for the meaning of life pervades our world. Harvard historian and author Oscar Handlin describes this lack of direction and meaning: “At some point, midway into the twentieth century, Europeans and Americans discovered that they had lost all sense of direction . . . Wandering in the dark, men and women in all Western societies, stumbling blindly along, strained unavailingly for glimpses of recognizable landmarks” (“The Unmarked Way,” American Scholar, Summer 1996, p. 335). That we find ourselves stumbling down the path of uncertainty is ironic. Our meanderings in the spiritual wilderness occur at a time when mankind has made many impressive gains. The quality of life is generally improved. Life expectancy has increased almost everywhere. The portion of the world’s population ruled by the fist of despots is shrinking. Though far from eradicated, the curse of poverty casts a smaller shadow. Yet humanity is troubled. We are plagued with a sense of drift and aimlessness. Counselors Muriel James and John James describe it this way: “A universal hunger pervades the world. It is the hunger to get more out of life . . . to be more involved, and to find more meaning” (Passion for Life, 1991, p. 7). One reason people hunger is they lack a sense of transcendent purpose. They don’t have the understanding that God is involved with mankind and that He has a plan for us. To be at peace, human beings must realize what God has in mind for them. In the past, Western man possessed the “certainty that history moved in a linear fashion from a beginning to a terminus.” Most people held the conviction that “nothing walked with aimless feet and not one life was wasted” (Handlin, pp. 336-337). Creation and life had explicit meaning. Society took comfort from Jesus Christ’s assurance that “the very hairs of your head are numbered” (Matthew 10:30). They noted that Jesus said God is aware of the tiniest details of His creation, even the tiny birds: “. . . Not one of them falls to the ground apart from your Father’s will” (verse 29).
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Jesus Christ showed that the essence and purpose of human life are accomplished through fulfilling two supreme principles: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all