Meaning of Life
It is another Saturday morning where my mind strangely has awakened at 2:30AM with a longing to write. I tried to resist for 1 hour only to lye there falling deeper into thought. What am I feeling that I feel so earnestly needs to be shared or further explored before my peers? Maybe it is just a health issue that often wakes me up early? I am awake, so I might as well write because it is what it is….
What is something we all started looking for at a young age, something that has lead some to religion, some to politics, some to wealth or the unsuccessful quest for wealth, even lead some to addictions? What have people sacrificed time, money, relationships and in some cases their sanity trying to find? What has led many people to be deceived… some for a moment and others for a lifetime? What keeps people awake at night and in some cases (like with me today) wakes them up early in the morning? What has become the lens that we all see ourselves and others through? What is the foundation for the kind of people, parents, friends, employees, and neighbors we are in our world? What is the cause for all the wars the world has ever fought? What have many people died trying to find it? Today I want to write about a simple word that affects every aspect of nearly all of our lives… Today I want to write about meaning.
Is meaning worth all the time, energy and trouble it creates? Is meaning something we find or something that finds us? Are any of us really qualified to define meaning to others or even ourselves? Does our search for meaning benefit us or in the end does it end up costing us? Do we lose more then we gain by searching for meaning? Do we hurt more people than we help when we believe that we have found meaning? Is meaning found in power or in resisting the desire to obtain power? Now I am not a Christian, but I believe in the teachings of Jesus. I believe Jesus was anointed and I see great truth in His words. Mahatma Gandhi successfully freed the nation of India by following the teachings of Jesus. Examine what Jesus said about John the Baptist below…
Matthew 11:11 “Assuredly, I say to you, among those born of women there has not risen one greater than John the Baptist; but he who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.
When I look up close at the lives of others and even my own life I see a tricky search for meaning. Meaning is like the search for water in the midst of an endless hot and dry desert. There are many stories about people who thought they found meaning only to find out later they were wrong. There are many people who like to pretend they have found meaning. One thing for certain is the fact that few have stopped searching for meaning because clearly they have yet to find it. Those who pretend to have found meaning have sleepless nights, private moments of doubt and great despair. I have seen many arrogant preachers of meaning fall to what they define as sin. WHY? Because even they do not really believe in the meaning they preach. Has anyone really found meaning? When we all physically die at some point will we look back on our lives and find meaning? What about people who have stopped looking for meaning? What about the people who don’t believe meaning exists?
Does looking for meaning distract us from the most important aspects of live? Do we miss out on precious things right under our nose when we look outside our lives for meaning? Marriages and children are often destroyed by those who look outside their lives to find meaning. The search for meaning can often be summed up in the term “if only”. Many people live their entire lives saying if only I was, if only I had and if only I could. Our endless search for meaning seems to be designed to wear us out, leading to walls and countless dead ends. As quickly as we think we have found meaning is as quickly as meaning turns into a mirage in this dry desert we call our world. How do most find water in the desert? Most people stop their search at some point digging a deep hole and finding water right below where they are standing. The idea of a well reminds me of when Jesus broke through the barriers of Jewish racism to speak with the Samaritan woman at the well. This woman sought to find meaning in men only to end up relationally bankrupt.
John 4:9-18 Then the woman of Samaria said to Him, “How is it that You, being a Jew, ask a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?” For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans. Jesus answered and said to her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, ‘Give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water.” The woman said to Him, “Sir, You have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. Where then do you get that living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well, and drank from it himself, as well as his sons and his livestock?” Jesus answered and said to her, “Whoever drinks of this water will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.” The woman said to Him, “Sir, give me this water, that I may not thirst, nor come here to draw.” Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come here.” The woman answered and said, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You have well said, ‘I have no husband,’ for you have had five husbands, and the one whom you now have is not your husband; in that you spoke truly.”
In conclusion I believe our quest to find meaning is the most destructive path we can follow. I believe our search for meaning takes us away from everything that truly matters. I believe our search for meaning often becomes an open doorway to the manipulation of preachers, politicians and corporations. The elite actually become wealthy by exploiting our search for meaning. TV commercials, infomercials and every form of advertising known to man are designed to remind us of our search for meaning. As our children become the victims of our frantic quest to find meaning, this dreadful disease spreads through history repeating itself over and over again. The search for meaning has spun like the black hole of history devouring peoples’ entire lives. I leave you with more words from Jesus….
Matthew 6:25 “Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing?
Matthew 7:14 Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it.
Matthew 16:25 For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it.
Matthew 19:15-24 (Jesus Counsels the Rich Young Ruler) Now behold, one came and said to Him, “Good Teacher, what good thing shall I do that I may have eternal life?” So He said to him, “Why do you call Me good? No one is good but One, that is, God. But if you want to enter into life, keep the commandments.” He said to Him, “Which ones?” Jesus said, “‘You shall not murder,’ ‘You shall not commit adultery,’ ‘You shall not steal,’ ‘You shall not bear false witness,’ ‘Honor your father and your mother,’ and, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’” The young man said to Him, “All these things I have kept from my youth. What do I still lack?” Jesus said to him, “If you want to be perfect, go, sell what you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me.” But when the young man heard that saying, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions. Then Jesus said to His disciples, “Assuredly, I say to you that it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. And again I say to you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.”
Luke 8:14 Now the ones that fell among thorns are those who, when they have heard, go out and are choked with cares, riches, and pleasures of life, and bring no fruit to maturity
Luke 12:15 And He said to them, “Take heed and beware of covetousness, for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of the things he possesses.”
John 6:27 Do not labor for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to everlasting life, which the Son of Man will give you, because God the Father has set His seal on Him.”
John 6:63 It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing. The words that I speak to you are spirit, and they are life.
John 6:68 But Simon Peter answered Him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.
John 8:12 Then Jesus spoke to them again, saying, “I am the light of the world. He who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life.”
John 10:10 The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly.
John 17:3 And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.
