Elisha was ploughing his field when Prophet Elijah, who later was his mentor, called him out to follow him. Esther’s parents were no more and she was brought up by her cousin, Mordecai, and she was chosen to be the queen of king Ahasuerus, whose empire extended from India to Ethiopia. Lord Jesus chose the fishermen to be His disciples and equipped them to be fisher of men. In all these and many other cases in the Scripture, one turn in their lives, changed everything for the better. What is the real purpose of one’s life on earth and how do we work out that?
Understanding the purpose of God for our life – The basic purpose of life for every human being is to reflect the glory of God in his works and this is to be a sum total of all his actions and deeds. However, beyond this also, a person’s life has a purpose in relation to his family and circumstances of his birth. Most people keep struggling with the circumstances and fail to achieve anything much in their lives. Elihu, a young man spoke to Job and his three friends about life, saying, ‘God may speak in one way, or in another, yet man does not perceive it’ (Job 33:14). The voice of God is not heard in the noise of this world but in the quiet solitude of the heart. It is Satan who is heard in various cries of people seeking gifts.
Joseph had a dream about his supremacy over his brothers and told them about it (Genesis 37:4-10). His father Jacob loved him, for he was the firstborn child of Rachel, his beloved wife, and in his love, he made a coat of many colours for Joseph. ‘But when his brothers saw that their father loved him more than all his brothers, they hated him and could not speak peaceably with him’. Joseph being young, 17 years old, was either unaware or pretended that he did not see the hatred of his brothers. The coat of many colours and his dream widened that rift more and they sold him into slavery.
Joseph reached Egypt as a slave and his master’s wife cast longing eyes at him, but Joseph refused to ‘do this great wickedness, and sin against God’ (Genesis 39:7-12). One day, Joseph went into the house ‘to do his work, and none of the men of the house was inside’. His master’s wife tried to catch him and he fled, leaving his ‘garment in her hand’. As per Jewish legend, Joseph went with the intention of committing the immoral act but the face of his father appeared to him and he fled. Joseph suffered for 13 years as a slave and in prison before he could be chosen by the Pharaoh and made his Prime Minister for rightly interpreting his dreams and also providing the solution to the problem. God’s plan for Joseph was much bigger than he could have ever entered into on his own. After Jacob, their father’s death, Joseph’s brothers feared for reprisal from him for their evil deed (Genesis 50:19-20). Joseph had, by then, fully understood the way God had worked in his life to say to them, ‘Do not be afraid, for am I in the place of God? But as for you, you meant evil against me; but God meant it for good, in order to bring it about as it is today, to save many people alive’.
A retied man bought a house near a school, and the children while leaving school would kick everything lying on the road, thus creating a lot of disturbance. The old man decided to end this and offered them five rupees for each can they would kick around. After a few days he told them about the delay in the coming of his pension and offered only two rupees per can. After a few more days he again told them about the costs of living having increased and offered them only one rupee for each can, which the children refused, finding it degrading. The old man sorted out his problem of disturbance but some people think the purpose of their life is just kicking around things and moving in no direction and then they eventually start blaming God.
The LORD God had struck the Egyptians with the nine plagues and Pharaoh permitted Moses to leave with his people to go and worship the LORD (Exodus 10:24-26). But he laid a condition, ‘only let your flocks and herds be kept back’. Moses replied, ‘Our livestock also shall go with us; not a hoof shall be left behind. For we must take some of them to serve the LORD our God, and even we do not know what we must serve the LORD until we arrive there’. Moses’ statement ‘we do not know how we will worship God until we arrive there’ is significant, for we cannot know what purpose God has for our life, until we know the full picture. We tend to create our own printouts for our life, but our life situations lead us to the way of God for our life, for He expects something very different from each one of us. Even our small actions and victories that we consider are not important add up to great results when combined with others and it remains unknown to us.
Lord Jesus, while teaching about the good works to earn salvation revealed a world that is upside down where, ‘many who are first will be last, and the last first’ (Matthew 19:30). In the kingdom of heaven what is great here may be totally valueless and we will never know the importance of a single thought, word or deed that may be pleasing to the Lord. Neither Miriam, Moses’ sister, nor Pharaoh’s daughter could have known the eventual effects of pulling out the child from river Nile and bringing him up as her son. She named him ‘Moses, saying, ‘Because I drew him out of water’ and he came to be the great leader and prophet with whom God ‘spoke face to face’. And God, recognising her good deed, allowed her name given to the child to remain. We must use what God has given us in the best possible manner for the benefit of others for that is what God expects of us as managers of His creation. His purpose for our life will then automatically get fulfilled.
Fulfilling God’s purpose for our life – Lord Jesus while stating the purpose of His becoming Man, ‘to save that which was lost’ (Luke 18:11-14). And then he narrated the parable of the one lost sheep and the shepherd leaving the other ninety nine to go look for the one that went astray. And then He expressed the joy of finding that one lost sheep over the other ninety nine that did not stray. Our Lord is an absolute perfectionist and all His creation is absolutely flawless. In like manner He is not satisfied with a ninety nine percent result but desires all to be saved. In His way, every act counts and it is all about our intimate relationship with God.
Abram was chosen by God with a command to leave his people, for God will make him a great nation and that ‘in you all the families of the earth will be blessed’ (Genesis 12:1-3). Abram was renamed as Abraham by God and he would have probably never realised the way the whole world will be blessed and transformed by the coming of the Messiah in his people. The ways of God are difficult for man to fathom but God uses various ways to convey His message to His people. ‘God may speak in one way, or another, yet man does not perceive it. In a dream, in a vision of the night, when deep sleep falls upon men, while slumbering in their beds, then He opens the ears of men, and seals their instruction’ (Job 33:14-16). Most people dream about their own plans that they have been thinking about but God does try to reveal His purpose even to them, for their life.
A young boy attempted suicide but was saved and the counsellors tried to tell him about the love of God for him, to urge him to not attempt that again, but he refused to listen. A Rabbi was called and upon entering the room, was told by the boy to not tell him about God’s love. The Rabbi told him that maybe God does not love him and immediately the boy turned to listen. He was then told about the fact that God needs each one in His creation for He has sent all with a purpose for their life. Our life is part of a large puzzle in which all parts must play their part for the next one also to fit in. Every trial, sickness or painful situation is a pointer to some other point in our destination and is part of our training in His plan.
The Jews refer to the first of the three sections of the Old Testament, the first Five Books, as ‘Torah’ and this Hebrew word means ‘teachings’. Thus the Scripture is a blueprint for living and a spiritual map for the difficult and complicated journey of every man on earth. Everyone has been given certain talents/resources to fulfil his assigned role on earth and it keeps getting supplemented as we move along the way. Being spiritually aware of the hand of God in every area of his life, King David could say, ‘Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed. And in Your book they were all written, the days fashioned for me, when as yet there were none of them! How precious are Your thoughts to me, O God! How great is the sum of them!’ (Psalm 139:16-17). In today’s world people delight in being called by a leader into his presence and boast about being an acquaintance of such important persons. David recognised with humility the knowledge God has of him in the past as also everything about his future. Before the great I AM the past present and future are all open and nothing in our life can surprise him.
The widow of one of the prophets told Prophet Elisha about the debt left by her husband and the creditor wanting to take her two sons as slaves as payment
(2 Kings 4:2). Elisha asked her, ‘What can I do for you? Tell me, what do you have in your house?’ God asks each individual to search within himself to identify the gifts that he has been already given by God, to add on to that. Apostle Paul has endorsed this blessed state of every believer for God the Father ‘has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ’ (Ephesians 1:3). Everyone is born with certain inherent gifts from God at birth and these could be in the form of place and family in which one is born or some special spiritual gifts. As one uses what is already there with a sense of gratitude, more and more get added through life experiences to direct the life of the individual in a particular God-decreed direction.
It is said that the great scientist Albert Einstein was rejected by his school and his mother had confidence in her child and taught him at home. A situation that could have turned either way was turned into a blessing. The widow told Elisha about some oil in her house, and oil does not mix with other elements. Deep inside each one of us there is a part of us that remains untouched by life’s turmoil. We look into our inner being to strip off the subconscious layers to reach it and like the widow when we start pouring it out, it has no limits. When we start pouring out that into our empty vessels that are the deeds performed without any passion or commitment, great results start coming out and we are propelled into our destiny. One has to deliberately focus and develop inherent inner potential to get to one’s purpose for life.
Miraculous ways of moving in the right direction – How many people are there who are willing to lay down their lives for others sake? Lord Jesus not only became Man but a bondservant to suffer death of the cross, a curse as per Scripture, ‘therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name’. In His glorified state in heaven He has authority over everything in heaven, on earth and below the earth and every knee must bow before Him in all these three realms. The fruit or result of His sufferings is the innumerable souls that have been redeemed and made children of God.
God blessed Adam, ‘be fruitful’ (Genesis 1:28) and Lord Jesus also laid down the way to glorify God the Father, ‘that you bear much fruit’ (John 15:8). What is this fruit that the LORD God expects from His people? Apostle Paul has listed out the ‘fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self control’. Though there are a total of nine traits listed, yet these are referred to as fruit, in the singular for the effect of the Holy Spirit in an individual is a changed life of submission to God and a blessing for others. The fruit bears certain characteristics; first, it reveals the tree and its nature for a good tree brings forth good fruit; second, it is visible and not hidden; third, it is for others’ benefit and not for the tree and finally, the fruit bearing is dependent on the soil in which the tree is planted.
A believer has the indwelling Holy Spirit in Him to ‘teach all things and bring to remembrance the words of the Lord (John 14:26). When we are rightly grafted into Lord Jesus, the Holy Spirit starts the work of our transformation from within. What causes God to bring about miracles in our life? We do, when we break our sinful nature to turn to Lord Jesus’ righteousness, His brokenness turns to us and miracles of change in our life occur. Like the Greek culture many do not believe in a single loving God and then struggle to achieve greatness without any purpose for life.
Lord Jesus gave the world hope for we are created in the image and likeness of God, in His love and He leads us to fulfil our purpose for life. Lord Jesus has classified every believer as ‘the light of the world’ (Matthew 5:14-16) and this is after He has revealed Himself as ‘the Light of the world’ (John 8:12). We bear His light and then He has commanded us, ‘Let your light so shine before men, that may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven’ (Matthew 5:14-16). In our life we fill our homes with the joy of the Light of Divine presence in us, and before others we bring the light of hope and joy in Lord Jesus by living our faith in public. We can either live while cursing the darkness around us or light a light in others hearts and spread cheer. The miracle cruse of oil is in us which starts pouring out the oil of God’s kindness, when we attempt to fill up the empty vessel of someone’s life. Within us that oil will benefit us when we realise its value by sharing with others and that is the real purpose of life!
The real purpose of our life can never be fulfilled nor measured by the heights that we achieve in our personal, professional and spiritual spheres but can only be gauged by the number of people we helped to achieve those heights with us. Life is not about self but about many others to be taken along the journey to salvation and eternal life through faith in Lord Jesus Christ as Saviour and Messiah. Only then can we be termed as real disciples of te Lord, who suffered unimaginable pain to redeem us from the pit of sin and darkness.
