Imagine a phone call from your child. As a parent, I’ve had a lot of these.

Here are 3 examples:

Dad, I really messed up. I went out after the game with some friends. We had some beers. As I was driving home I ran a light and hit another kid. I don’t know how he is. They took him in a helicopter. The car is totaled and they are putting me in a cruiser, they said I was DUI. Help me!

Dad, how are you? It’s Sunday and this is my weekly call. I’m fine and the kids are healthy. See you next week.

Dad, it’s been a wild week. We had a big problem at work. They told me to fix it……. and I did! They were so happy with me that I got a promotion and a raise. I want to thank you, because it was the things that you taught me and the example that you set that gave me the tools that I used to fix it. You’ve been a great father. Love ya’.

The relationship of a parent to his child is very much like the relationship between God and his children. This relationship is “written on our hearts”. When done well, the parent/child relationship is our best “window” into the heart of God.

Think of the 3 phone calls:

The first is a desperate cry for help. The second is a perfunctory “check the box” type call. The last is a call that didn’t have to be made. It is a grateful conversation between 2 friends.

Now….think of your conversations with God…….your prayers. We will all make call #1 and cry out in desperation from time to time. Unfortunately, many of us routinely make call #2…..a rote memorized prayer that requires no thought at all. For some of us, it is the only call we ever make. Call #3 is the real deal……a heartfelt conversation……it should be a daily thing. As a parent, imagine getting call #3. How great would that feel?

Think of these conversations from God’s side. He is going to field your desperate cry for help. He will listen to your mindless recitation and he’ll probably be just as bored with it as you are. But don’t you think he would love to hear from you when things are going great……..to hear a compliment and a thank you…….. to know that you value him and appreciate him………. his teaching, his example, and his leadership……….his gift of relationship?

God is not a sterile collection of rules, conditions, and punishments. He is your parent……….your Dad. He made you for one thing and one thing only……….relationship. We need to be sure that we are holding up our end.

I’m going to try to live my life as a grateful son……….to nurture and enjoy my relationship with my Dad.

I’m going to try to make call #3 a daily thing.

Eternity, Righteousness, & Perspective

Many of the problems people have with Christianity revolve around perspective.

We operate in a time perspective of about 80 years, give or take. God operates over eternity. When something bad happens today……..we get mad at God. Or, we say that we can’t believe in a god who would allow that. It was wrong, it hurts, and there is no remedy in our 80 years. And yet, God has promised to make it right……in his eternal time frame.

So, be patient…….trust that God will “fix” it…….but, on his schedule, not on yours.

We operate on a righteousness perspective that stretches from Adolf Hitler to mother Teresa. God operates on a vastly wider spectrum. It’s like the light spectrum. We see only visible light. But, there are vast frequencies of electromagnetic radiation that we cannot see. We look at the heroin addict shoplifting to feed her habit. We say, “I’m better than she is.” Well……..there’s some good news and some bad news. The good news is that you probably are better, that is, more righteous, than she is. The bad news is that, on God’s spectrum of righteousness, the difference between you and her is of no consequence. “All have fallen short.”

Sooooo………

Never allow yourself the luxury of believing that, in any consequential way, you are better that the other guy……..because you aren’t.

A great deal of our confusion about God, flows from our assumption that God operates within the same limitations in time, space, and righteousness that we do. This is not the case.

Lord

Throughout eternity past, I was an idea in your mind.

For a brief span of a few decades you put me in this place to perform a task……..whether I accept it or not……. whether I accept you or not.

After that I return to you for eternity future……..one way or another.

Help me to keep an eternal perspective.

Help me to accept the fact that on your scale of righteousness, there is no meaningful difference between me and Jeffrey Dahmer.

Amen

First, let me be clear………I am not smarter than God. The fact is that I spend a lot of my time trying to understand my world and what is going on in it. To paraphrase a not so famous politician……….”my ignorance is encyclopedic”. But, at least I recognize my limitations.

What I’m angling toward is this: do you believe that you are smarter than God? Do you believe that we, as a species, are smarter than God? Don’t laugh yet……..If you believe that there is no God, then by default you are answering yes. If you find yourself saying……”I can’t believe that God would (fill in the blank)” then you are answering yes. If you are angry with God because of something that has happened to you or somebody close to you, then you are answering yes. If you reject “organized religion” then you are answering yes. If you believe in God but also believe in Darwin then you are saying yes…….by proxy.

One of my sons used to say that he was the smartest man alive. He was, in fact, very smart…….so smart that it was sometimes scary. He was, of course, wrong. However, just for the purposes of argument, let’s assume that he was right. Let’s go one more…….. let’s assume that you are as smart as he was.

How much, out of all that there is to know, do you have command of? If you are honest, you must say that you understand a tiny fraction of the universe. In reality, you rely on the understanding of others to extend your reach. This brings us to the next question.

How much, out of all that is out there, do we communally……..as a species…….know?

All of it………most of it………some of it………….or have we just scratched the surface. If you consider how much we learn each year……..if you look at the increasing pace of scientific discovery………you must conclude that there is a vast reservoir of knowledge that is beyond our current understanding. Either that or we will soon learn the last thing that is to be learned and our knowledge will be complete and perfect.

I’m asking you to place your personal knowledge and, as a species, our communal knowledge on a scale between hubris and humility. This is going to be hard. As humans, we like hubris a lot more than humility. Hubris is a lot more fun. Furthermore, and far more importantly, hubris allows us to do whatever we want. After all…….as smart as we are……we must be right……….right?

If you believe that we pretty much know it all, then you will no doubt find Darwin appealing. On the other hand, if you believe that we have just scratched the surface………. that we have the understanding of children…… then you are open to possibilities beyond what we, as a community, can explain…….today.

As I said at the top, I am not very confident that I have reached the highest levels of understanding. I am willing to accept that there are things that exist, that are completely beyond my comprehension, beyond our communal comprehension. As a corollary, I will not exclude the existence of God because I cannot see, touch, measure or understand him.

To reject God, you must believe that you are……. that we are…… close to the top of the scale of understanding. This, in spite of the fact that we, as a species, are well on our way to destroying this beautiful planet.

And that is a good working definition of hubris.

I have struggled for years to find my way through some of the difficulties that lie in the borderland where my faith and the Bible meet the realities of this beautiful…….yet broken ……world. My hope has been to find explanations that would resonate with my secular friends and acquaintances………to find the words that would spread the peace, hope, and joy that I have found. I believe that these explanations exist…….and I have found some answers……..but there remain unresolved conflicts. There is a lot that is just beyond my comprehension.

Here is a partial list of the problems that I………that we…… haven’t yet resolved.

Justice vs. Mercy
Free will vs. God’s sovereignty
Creation vs. Evolution
Heterosexuality vs. Homosexuality
6000 year old earth vs. 600 million year old earth
Judeo-christian government vs. Secular government
Right to life vs. Right to choose
Self defense vs. Turn the other cheek
Open borders vs. Restricted immigration
One world government vs. Nationalism
Environmentalism vs. Economy
Taking care of my family vs. Taking care of the world

And finally……….at the heart of it all:
Who is in charge here…………me or God?

I have listened to both sides. I have studied books from both sides. I have read and reread the Bible. And still, I cannot resolve these conflicts. It should not be too surprising that……… if you look at them……..the items on the list account for most of the rancor in our current politics……..and most of the conflict among Christians and between Christians and the secular world. At best, watching them play out on the news each day feels like a bad dream.

In trying to find my way through this forest of conflict, I have come back to an idea that I often hear from my friends.

“Think globally……act locally”

In a way, Christianity, when done well, has a similar focus…….. though we, especially Christians, tend to get lost in the details. We tend to miss the forest for the trees.

“Think globally” is the easy part. It is what I tend to do by nature. I wrestle with these “global” ideas. I struggle through the old testament. I try to intellectualize my way through it all.

But how to “act locally”?

Today it hit me……..the answer is at the very heart of Christianity………the answer is at the heart of the new testament.

Love God……love your neighbor. If you were to distill Christianity down to 5 words……….these are the five.

I can keep thinking about all of our “global” conundrums……..even though I will probably never resolve them. But, most of my problems…….most of our problems…….will fade into the background……..will fall into their proper place…….. if I prioritize “Love God…..love your neighbor”.

If we can defer fighting over our list of conflicts until we have perfected “Love God……love your neighbor”…….it is unlikely that we will spend much time fighting. It is unlikely that we will have any energy left for the conflict list. I know that I will have my hands full, because I’m a long way from living up to these 2 primary commands. If I can grow into them, I might find more of the peace and joy that God built me for.

So…….”act locally”.

Love God and love the person who is standing right in front of you right now. Only after you and I reach those two goals…….and we probably will never fully realize them……… then we can slug it out over the conflicts on the list.

If you read the bible, you will run across 3 faces of God: father, son, and holy spirit. The best way to think of this is 3 aspects of one being. You’ve heard this before. Today, I want to talk about the father and son. The old testament is where we read about the father and the new testament is where we read about the son. They are quite different…….. so much so that it can be hard to reconcile them. It is hard to buy into the idea that they are even related………much less that they are the same being. But, in order to see the big picture, you have to deal with both of them.

God (ver. 1.0)

In the old testament, God is the creator. He then sets up a long list of rules, some of which are hard to understand. He periodically punishes his people for breaking the rules. He seems a bit distant. He is very intimidating…..not a really warm, fuzzy type. Later he spends a lot of time telling his people what to expect. The God of the old testament doesn’t read like somebody that you’d get a hug from. A great many people dislike this version of God. I am reading “The God Delusion”, by Dawkins. I hate to put words in the other guy’s mouth…….but I suspect that he despises the old testament God based on the adjectives that he uses. I have noticed that most people who dislike God…….or object to God…….. are reacting to the God described in the old testament. The God of the old testament seems focused on rules, justice, and punishment. He’s just not much fun.

God (ver. 2.0)

In the new testament, we see an entirely different face of God. Jesus is much more like us……..in a word, he is human. He has experienced our pain. He has experienced our temptations. He has been mistreated. He has been let down. He has been abandoned by his friends in his hour of need. And yet, he is kind, generous, and forgiving. He can laugh……….and he can cry. He embodies our highest aspirations. But most of all…… he is approachable. I can see him holding a child’s hand. I can see him hugging somebody…………I can imagine him hugging me. I can imagine that I may have had a conversation with him in a crowd somewhere along the way.

How do we reconcile these two faces of God?

I think that the old testament deals with God’s ideal expectations of us and his hopes for us. The new testament deals with his love for us. It is a lot like our parents (at least the good ones). When we were young, they spent a lot of time laying down the rules and their expectations of us. We spent some time sitting in “time out”……… and yes……..heaven forbid………..we got paddled. Our parents loved us but they had a job to do………. they socialized us. They taught us how to function in the household that they had built. They taught us how to operate in the family that they had created. Sometimes they did things that really made us mad. Sometimes they did things that we just didn’t understand. When we grew older and more mature, our relationship changed. We became more like friends. With a firm framework to build on, we came to relate to them differently. No more time out and paddling……..now we get emotional support when we are in trouble. We get good advice. And when we screw up……hopefully not too often……….we know that we can count on their love and forgiveness. Our parents didn’t change. They are exactly the same people. Their objective from the start was to lead us into adulthood …….to mold us into happy complete people and to build a deep satisfying relationship with us. Because we grew, they began to show us a different face. They nudged our relationship into a new, more mature phase.

To those who object to the God of the old testament: I say don’t dwell on the paddling that you got as a child. You should focus on growing into mature adult relationship with a father who loves you.

You need to focus on Jesus……….God (ver. 2.0).

For years now I have wanted to read Richard Dawkins’ book. “The God Delusion”. But, I kept putting it off………the fact is that I was a bit reluctant……..what if he presented an unassailable argument against my faith? Well, I finally bit the bullet……and I have just finished reading it. I was expecting a scholarly and fair academic analysis of the presence or absence of God. After all, Dawkins is a professor at Oxford. What I found was quite different. The first sentence in the second chapter is Dawkin’s description of God.

“The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully.”

Wow……. certainly gets your attention. This line pretty much sets the tone for what follows.

These are not the words of an honest academic inquiry. They are not the description that you would expect of someone whom Dawkins says doesn’t even exist. Rather, they are words that come from somewhere between anger, hatred and malice. The book is more of a “hit piece” than a dispassionate quest for truth.

I have often said that you don’t have to say something that is factually untrue………to tell a lie. The book is loaded with quotes and citations……..all of them, I have no doubt, accurate. But Dawkins presents only the facts that support his position. Anything positive about God is dismissed as myth…….or completely ignored. Anything that he interprets as negative about God is treated as fact. He dwells on the old testament and essentially ignores the teachings of Christ. He completely ignores the central theme of the Bible……..”love God/love your fellow man”. Publishing this book would be a bit like publishing a biography of Mother Teresa…….a book that contains a list of her parking tickets and overdue library books, a description of a tantrum that she threw as a child, and a falsehood that she once told……..and nothing else (all of it completely factual and true…….and yet, as a biography………a complete lie).

He treats Darwian evolution as an all encompassing explanation. He calls it a “crane”……..I’m not quite sure what that means. And yet he offers little justification for it and little or no defense of its failures. He dedicates chapters to developing fairly contorted “workarounds” to human characteristics that are clearly non-Darwinian.

He includes one chapter that compares the act of raising your children as Christians to child abuse. This chapter dwells on the molestation of children by Catholic priests. His concludes this chapter by quoting himself…….. that raising your child as a Christian is worse than sexually abusing a child.

“the damage (from sexual abuse) was arguably less than the long-term psychological damage inflicted by bringing the child up Catholic”.

If this book had been a balanced, honest, scholarly investigation, it might have been damaging to my faith. Instead, what I discovered was a biased, dishonest, hostile (Dawkins’ word) hatchet job.

In short, I was terribly relieved by the book. It is clearly an attack on God in general and Christianity in particular. It is not, however, fatal. If you are a Christian, I think you will be saddened by this book. You may be offended…… you might even be angry. If you are agnostic or undecided, you will find it highly biased. If you are an atheist……or if you actively despise Christians………you are going to love it.

Take a look around………. at the amazing world that we live in. Blue skies, sun, rain, snow, and the incredible variety of life.

If you ask a statistician to calculate the probability that this world could happen, he would consider the size of earth, its distance from the sun, the temperature of our sun, the presence and size of the outer planets, solar radiation and thousands of other variables to calculate the probability of a blue planet where life is possible. Then he would multiply in the chance of the accidental assembly of billions of strands of DNA(one for each species), each unique, each with hundreds of billions of chemical bonds. He would then multiply in the probability that somehow………….life just happened. He would come up with a number that would represent the probability that our world, and the incredible variety of life in it, happened, all on it’s own…….by random accident. I don’t know what that number is, but my reading says that it is a vanishingly low probability……low enough that it is statistically impossible.

If you ask a creationist how we got to where we are, he would say that an omnipotent supernatural creator operating outside of the constraints of our understanding did it all. The statistician would reply………..”that’s impossible too!”.

So, based on our current understanding, we……..and the world we live in……. are impossible.

And yet, here we stand.

How do we deal with this impossible reality that we live in?

We come up with ideas to bridge the gap between what actually is……….and what is possible. These ideas, out of necessity, are based on assumptions. The two leading ideas are Darwinian evolution and intelligent design. For now, I’m ignoring ideas that are further “out there”…..like “it’s all a giant communal hallucination……..we are all avatars in somebody else’s cosmic video game”. Watch “The Matrix” some time.

The creationist and the Darwinist begin with different assumptions. Both require us to accept things that are unproven. In a word……..both require acts of faith. In a way, both are religions.

The creationist assumes the pre-existence of a very powerful creator who is not constrained by what we call science. The Darwinian assumes the pre-existence of an inhabitable earth and the pre-existence of life. Creation doesn’t address where the creator came from. Darwin doesn’t address where the earth came from and where life came from. By any analysis, both ideas leave huge gaps. Each side says that the other side’s gaps are fatal.

And so, we are free to choose. But we have to either fill in the gaps………or ignore them. Sadly, almost to a man, we choose to ignore them. Creationists ignore the question of where God came from. Darwinists ignore the questions of how a cloud of interstellar dust became inhabitable and how life began.

Why? Because there is no clear answer to these questions based on our current understanding. We have no universally accepted guidance to go on.

So……….ultimately, we decide based on what we want.

The creationist wants an orderly world that doesn’t end in the grave…….and accepts the creator and the rules that go with it.

The Dawinist wants a world where he (or she) is at the top of the intellectual ladder…….a world where no other being can tell him what to do…….and is willing to accept absolute death after 75 years to get it.

The creationist wants paradise and will subject himself to the dominion of a vastly superior being to get there.

The Darwinist wants to BE the supreme being and will accept physical death with nothing beyond her death as the price for dominion.

In a word, we choose between eternal existence, subservient to a creator and a temporary existence where we are the boss.

But what is the truth?

I choose creation and specifically Christianity because, it works. It requires humility, generosity, and love. If we all follow the two central rules of Christianity: love God and love your neighbor, this world will be much improved. If we choose Darwin, we all get to do whatever serves us best. We can help our fellow man or we can kill him…….whatever gets us and our progeny ahead. Whatever spreads our DNA the furthest.

We are a long way from a pure Christian society. But, as a goal, “love your neighbor” appeals to me more than “spread your DNA as far as you can”.

I’ve been dealing with our purpose in life. I believe that deep in our core……… that purpose is to relate to God…….a God who is real and present in our lives.

But…….. how in the world do we go about it? In a way, today I shift from theory to practical application.

Here are some steps to consider:

Know God
Speak to God
Listen to God
Praise God

Step 1…….Know God

You may be surprised; but, this step has already begun. You were “hard wired” with some basic building blocks. These are things that you sense but cannot explain…….see last week’s post, part 2. (A sense of infinite time…..a sense that there is more to you than the physical). That sense, that is “written on your heart”, is a start. But, you need to build on it. “When in doubt read the instructions” is good advice. In this arena, the owner’s manual is the Bible……….it’s big and it can get a little thick. It is a bit intimidating. In fact only a minority of people who identify as Christians have ever read it cover to cover…….so you are not alone. There is no doubt that there are many committed atheists who have spent more time studying the bible than the average Christian. I use a smart phone app called “Bible in One Year” by Alpha Int. Each day there are 3 passages. It takes about 20 minutes a day. If that is too much, just read the new testament passage……maybe 6 minutes a day. If you find something interesting or confusing……… or troubling, Google it and head down the “rabbit hole”. Another tool to know God, is to find and attend a good church. Spend some time shopping around. For me, when church shopping, I find that about 1 church in 10 interests me. These tend to be the large “mega-churches”, but that may just be my style. If you don’t learn something and feel good after a visit……if you don’t feel love there, keep looking. Finally, seek out a “small group”. This is a group of 5 or 10 people with whom you are comfortable……. people who will share your joy……..and your pain. They will become like family. These are people who will love you and care for you right where you are. Same rule as the church………. if you don’t feel joy and love……… if you don’t feel safe……. move on.

Step 2…….Speak to God.

He really does want to hear from you……..every day. And don’t worry about bothering him………….he’ll be up late. This is prayer. You can use a memorized prayer. But, you’ll get more out of it if you treat it as a conversation where you can unburden yourself, the kind of conversation that you had with your Mom or Dad when you were young. You will get more out of it if you are completely honest………happy, mad, scared, hurt, in doubt……..it doesn’t matter. If you need something, ask……… he knows anyway.

Step 3……..Listen to God.

I suspect that none of us are very good at this. I know that I struggle with it. And no……….I don’t see a giant face in the clouds and hear a Charleton Heston voice. Sometimes, I get a sense of knowledge that is new to me. Often it is a gentle nudge to act. The key to “hearing God” is to allow a few minutes of quiet time each day…….and listen. I often sit down in a quiet peaceful place and begin with “Here I am”. Then I just shut up………and listen.

Step 4……..Praise God.

The fact is that God really doesn’t need your praise…….or mine for that matter. I’m sticking my neck out here…… but I suspect that God has a pretty solid self esteem. After all…….he is God. Still, I bet he’d like to hear a good word from you every now and then. Just as important, the praise is good for you. It is a reminder of the nature of your relationship with God. Your relationship with God is not a relationship of equals. God is not your personal “Gofer Guy”. Although you might think so if you listen to many Christians, myself included, giving God his daily “to do” list. Your job is not to critique God’s performance. Rather, your relationship with God is more like the ultimate parent-child relationship. Finally, praise is a way of evaluating how you are doing with steps 1-3. If you have no praise for God, then you may need to revisit Know, Speak, and Listen.

So……. there you have it………. a formula for building a relationship with a creator who is real, who loves you, and who wants a relationship……..with you. If you pursue it, if you pursue him, you will find joy, satisfaction, and peace……… commodities that can be hard to come by in our “modern”, “scientific”, “me centered” world.

If we are to live out our purpose, having a relationship with God, we must first settle another foundational question.

Is God real?

Pretty scary question. Whether you believe……..or not. It is so scary that Christians generally avoid it. We generally begin with God as an assumption. I worry that I may not handle this well……. but I’m going to try.

It’s scary because of the consequences of being wrong.

If you are a Christian, and the answer is no……… you’ve been tricked into wasting your time and money. Even if you live a life of kindness and generosity………somebody has made a fool of you.

If you are a non-believer, and the answer is yes………. at best, you miss out on paradise…….. at worst, you face something unspeakably horrible.

Atheists begin with an assumption too. They assume that science is complete. Anything that can’t be seen and measured today cannot be “real”. They focus on the lack of hard measurable “scientific” evidence of God……even though the scientists concede that they have only detected 5% of the universe…….(Google “black matter” & “black energy”). Do you ever wonder about what…….or who…….. is in the 95% of the cosmos that state of the art science just can’t find? Beyond that, how do you categorically rule out the existence of anything or anyone when you are 95% blind? Is it intellectually honest to confidently deny the supernatural in this setting? In a way, isn’t this giant “blind spot” the current definition of “supernatural”?

Christians focus on more intangible things. Things that science does not measure well. Hope, love, faith.

There is knowledge that we are born with……..every last one of us…..though some of us suppress it. The love of a parent for her child. The idea of a family. Our need for relationship. Our desire to be connected.

The Darwinist will say that these ideas are “positively adaptive” and therefore are supported by blind evolution. But, there is also some inborn knowledge that Darwin doesn’t deal with well. The sense that time is infinite. The sense that there is something after physical death. The sense that there is a part of us that transcends our physical bodies. The sense that we have a soul. The sense that our soul is somehow connected to infinite time. The sense that something is missing…….that someone is missing. In a word……….we feel a void……..we are incomplete. We try to avoid this thought because it is uncomfortable.

If you deeply search your heart (not your smart phone…..and certainly not your TV), you will find these ideas, though they may be deeply buried. Our modern, “scientific” (95% blind) culture suppresses them. Late night comedians laugh at them. The really smart people ignore them. They laugh at me too. But, deep down…… if you search your heart…….you can find them. If you look at somebody who is running his life well (his life……not his possessions) you will find that he is in touch with these ideas.

If these ideas were outliers…….only found in a few people…….we could dismiss them (religious nut jobs). The fact that they are almost universal suggests that they are real…….. that they are true. I believe that these ideas, ideas that are at the very core of our being, are evidence of a supernatural world……..a world above and beyond the small slice of reality that current science can see and measure………evidence of God. I won’t dive into specifics today.

So………. is the supernatural real?

Is God real?

Yes.

Because ……if we honestly and deeply search our hearts…… we can sense these intangible ideas. We can sense God. We can sense that science……that Darwin……… hasn’t explained it all. We are born with this knowledge………..even if the scientists cannot find it.

As a people, we keep asking a few fundamental questions.

Where did I come from?
Why am I here?
Where am I going from here?

Individually and corporately we ask these questions over and over again. Given the amount of time and effort we spend on them, they must be important.

I would propose that how accurately we answer these questions has a profound effect on how we live our lives and how much joy and satisfaction we draw from it.

I would propose that how happy YOU are……..right now, depends on how well you have dealt with these questions.

Today, I’m thinking about question #2. “Why am I here?”

Look at somebody you know who is miserable and has been that way forever. Odds are, he either hasn’t considered the question at all, or has answered it badly. An example would be the guy who believes that he is here to accumulate “status and stuff” (I’ve been there). He may be wildly successful in pursuing what he sees as his purpose (I was). And yet, he cannot seem to grasp that evanescent thing that he is after……deep down. Satisfaction……..joy………. they just seem to elude him. He keeps accumulating more stuff and still isn’t satisfied. He buries himself in his work. Then, one morning, he wakes up………old, tired, alienated, unhappy, and unfulfilled. This dynamic is behind a lot of “midlife crises”…….and, ladies, it’s not just limited to men.

Look at somebody you know who is filled with joy……..all day, every day. (OK maybe not every day…… but most days). Odds are that she has found the place where she just “fits in”. She has gifts, talents, some great, some small. But, here’s the main thing. She uses them to make things better for everybody in her world. She may not have “stuff”……she may experience setbacks; but, there is something about the way that she uses her gifts that gives her joy and satisfaction. Sounds a bit like “love your neighbor” doesn’t it? 

How will you know these people when you see them? They will either radiate joy…….. or sadness. And here is another key feature….. their joy or sadness will be relatively independent of their situation. I often tell people that I have a fairly rare skill set…….I have figured out how to be happy. And yet, 2 of my 3 sons died in their 30’s. My one living son was crippled in a motorcycle accident.

What’s the trick?

The trick is to know the answer to the question……”why am I here?”. 

I know the answer……. for me.

You have to figure it out ……… for you.

Or you could just ignore it………. you might get lucky. You might just stumble into the very special place that you fit into.

Here is some help in figuring out the answer to the question “why am I here?”

The answer is permanent……….it cannot be taken away from you…….by natural disaster, by financial ruin, by being put in jail, by the death of a loved one, by divorce, by disease or injury, by betrayal, by mistake.

The answer is not something that you get to choose. It is something that you have already been given……… you were born with it. It is “written on your heart”. If you are science oriented you would say that it is instinctive. If you are feelings oriented, you would call it your destiny. This really goes against the “mantra” of our age: “I am the center of the universe…….. the captain of my fate………my self fulfillment is the ultimate goal…….it’s all about me”.

The answer will lead you to the special place where you need to be.

The things that the answer leads you to do are not directed toward you. Paradoxically,   they are directed away from you. This is what makes finding the answer so hard……especially in our “me centered” culture. The benefit to you is indirect. You reach out…… you give……..without preconditions. There is no “quid pro quo”. Satisfaction and joy come back to you………again, without preconditions.

You already know the answer. If you deeply search your heart, you can find it……though you may have been resisting it for your entire life.

You will know when you have found it………because you will suddenly experience a deep abiding sense of satisfaction and joy………peace that transcends your situation.

So………why am I here?

I am here…….I was created…….. for relationship with God……….Abba………..my Dad. Sounds like “love God” doesn’t it? 

On the days when I pursue that relationship well………I am joyful……….other days……… not so much.

So……… why are YOU here?