How to find our way and purpose in life

MANY PEOPLE have lost their way in life, their purpose in life: What is my life all about?

The purpose of life is to know God (John 17:3) and to know God we really must spend time with God. “Where do you come from?” is the question we often ask when we meet someone for the first time. It was the question about Jesus that puzzled everyone.

During his public life Jesus tried to answer the question. To those who followed him, he gave this answer: “I came from the Father and have come into the world and now I leave the world to go to the Father” (John 16:28).

It is important to realise that in their teachings

Jesus and the Jews had very much in common. The rift between them developed only gradually, as Jesus’ claims became clearer. For Jesus was not just laying down a set of laws for entry into the kingdom of God. Rather, he was claiming that his presence is the kingdom of God among men and women. Jesus came from his Father in heaven, and his coming creates, quite literally, a heaven on earth.

The condition for sharing in this “heaven on earth” is to believe in the One who the Father has sent; to believe in his Son and what he tells us. In Christ’s own words this means, “changing and becoming like a little child” (Matthew 18:3). Christ is the “Way” to the Father because his life taught us how to become “children” of the Father. This is not a “way” which can be reduced to rules and regulations. It is a life of love.

But of course the closer the intimacy between the Father and us, his children, the greater our longing to respond to all that we experience in life in the way of love, the “Way” that Jesus showed us.

Father Richard Lindsay