What is our chief purpose in life? Is it to make money? To become famous? To be popular? To be more powerful than other people?
I hope you said “no” to each of those answers.
Having money, fame, popularity, and power can benefit us, but we could acquire each of them and still be miserable. If they are wrapped around living for ourselves, then we will never be happy and fulfilled.
We need something larger than ourselves for which to live. To understand our purpose in life, we can refer to Revelation 4:2-11. There, St. John gives us a picture of Heaven. God is sitting on his heavenly throne, and all the creatures of heaven are surrounding it as they praise God. Also, the 24 elders, symbolizing all of God’s people on earth, are worshipping.
They lay aside their own glory and say, “Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honor and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created” (Revelation 4:11, KJV).
So, why were we created? The answer is to give pleasure to God. Going all the way back to Genesis 1, what did God say each time he created something? He said, “It is good.” When he created people he said, “It is very good.” He took pleasure in creating us. Now, he takes pleasure in re-creating us through redeeming us from our sins in Jesus Christ that we might live in fellowship with him.
God wants us to be in right relationship with him. To use human relational terms, he wants us to be his friends and family. God’s nature is love, and when we love God, we are living in right relationship with him and our love for him gives him pleasure.
Someone once asked Jesus which is the greatest commandment. He was quick to answer, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul, all your mind, and all your strength” (Mark 12:30). God loves us, and the proper response to that love is to love him in return. We express that love through joining the 24 elders in the Book of Revelation in worshipping God. We worship, not because we are scared of God, but because we love him for loving us.
God isn’t some powerful ogre demanding our subservience, he is a Father longing for his children to love him like he loves them. Worship is our proper response to God’s love. Worship is our giving back to God. He gives us salvation and the true riches of Heaven, like forgiveness, renewed lives, healing, and hope. In return, we love him passionately “with all our hearts” and “all our souls.”
We need some heart and soul worship. The first time I typed “heart,” I accidently wrote “heat.” We need a little heat — a little passion that comes from the depths of our hearts and souls. We are not God’s frozen chosen, we are his new creations, chosen and destined for great things in God.
I have heard some people say that worship is dead in their churches. Wait a minute, take a little ownership of the quality of worship in your church. If you worship with a little heat yourself, others may catch fire and join you in passionate worship. Our job is not to judge the worship of others, but to worship God from the depths of our own hearts and souls.
We are also called to love and worship God with “all our minds.” We are called to intentionally direct our minds to worshipping God and telling him how much we love him. We can intentionally take time at home on a daily basis to tell God how much we love him in our prayer times. We can intentionally discipline ourselves to make corporate worship a priority in our lifestyles on at least a weekly basis as we attend church and bow before God with the 24 elders in heaven and all God’s people in our congregations.
There is nothing more thrilling for God than to have all his children come home and celebrate. God is relational and we are relational, for we are created in his image. We need to celebrate our mutual relationship with intentionality.
Finally, we are called to love God through worship “with all our strength.” Every aspect of our lives ought to be an act of worship. The Westminster Shorter Catechism in Modern English asks the question, “What is man’s primary purpose?” and then gives the answer: “Man’s primary purpose is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever.”
We should give all our strength to glorifying God with our daily actions and words. Motivated by hearts of love, we are called to give our all to the Lord. I was rooting for the San Antonio Spurs in the NBA finals last week, but I could not help admiring the New York Knicks captain, Jalen Brunson. His personal mantra is, "The Magic is In the Work," and he lived by it in the NBA finals.
In one game, he brought his team back from a 29-point deficit to win the game. In the last game he personally scored 45 of the Knicks 95-point total to come from behind and win the final game. He was determined, passionate, and relentless. He played the game with all his strength. Do we owe God any less? Let us live to glorify God, to worship him with all that we are, that we might enjoy Him forever.
Dr. Dan Darby is a retired United Methodist pastor.
