The purpose of your life is far greater than your own personal fulfillment, your peace of mind, or even your happiness. It’s far greater than your family, your career, or even your wildest dreams and ambitions.
The search for the purpose of life has puzzled people for thousands of years. That’s because we typically begin at the wrong starting point – ourselves. We ask self-centered questions like What do I want to be? What should I do with my life? What are my goals, my ambitions, my dreams for my future? But focusing on ourselves will never reveal our life’s purpose.
Many people are driven by materialism. Their desire to acquire becomes the whole goal of their lives. This drive to always want more s based on the misconceptions that having more will make me more happy, more important, and more secure, but all three ideas are untrue. Possessions only provide temporary happiness. Because things do not change, we eventually become bored with them and then want newer, bigger, better versions.
It’s also a myth that if I get more, I will be more important. Self—worth and net worth are not the same. Your value is not determined by your valuables, and God says the most valuable things in life are not things!
Without a purpose, life is motion without meaning, activity without direction, and events without reason. Without a purpose, life is trivial, petty, and pointless.
A pretentious, showy life is an empty life; a plain and simple life is a full life.
Without a clear purpose, you will keep changing directions, job, relationships, or other externals – hoping each change will settle the confusion or fill the emptiness in your heart. You think, Maybe this time it will be different, but it doesn’t solve your real problem – a lack of focus and purpose.
Life on earth is just the dress rehearsal before the real production. You will spend far more time on the other side of death – in eternity – than you will here. Earth is the staging area, the preschool, the tryout for your life in eternity. It is the practice workout before the actual game; the warm-up lap before the race begins. This life is preparation for the next.
One day your heart will stop beating. That will be the end of your body and your time on earth, but it will not be the end of you. Your earthly body is just a temporary residence for your spirit.
When you live in light of eternity, your values change. You use your time and money more wisely. You place a higher premium on relationships and character instead of fame or wealth or achievements or even fun. Your priorities are reordered. Keeping up with trends, fashions, and popular values just doesn’t matter as much anymore.
Life is a test, life is a trust and life is a temporary assignment.
Character is both developed and revealed by tests, and all of life is a test. You are always being tested. God constantly watches your response to people, problems, success, conflict, illness, disappointment, and even the weather. He even watches the simplest actions such as when you open a door for others, when you pick up a piece of trash, or when you’re polite toward a clerk or waitress.
When you understand that life is a test, you realize that nothing is insignificant in your life. Even the smallest incident has significance for your character development. Every day is an important day, and every second is a growth opportunity to deepen your character, to demonstrate love, or to depend on God. Some tests seem overwhelming, while others you don’t even notice. But all of them have eternal implications.
God keeps his promise, and he will not allow you to be tested beyond your power to remain firm, at the time you are put to the test, he will give you the strength to endure it, and so provide you with a way out.
Every time you pass a test, God notices and makes plans to reward you in eternity. “Blessed are those who endure when they are tested. When they pass the test, they will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him.”
At the end of your life on earth you will be evaluated and rewarded according to how will you handled what God entrusted to you.
In God’s eyes, the greatest heroes of faith are not those who achieve prosperity, success, and power in this life, but those who treat this life as a temporary assignment and serve faithfully, expecting their promised reward in eternity. All these great people died in faith. They did not get the things that God promised his people, but they saw them coming far in the future and were glad. They said they were like visitors and strangers on earth. They were waiting for a better country – a heavenly country. So God is not ashamed to be called their God, because he has prepared a city for them.
Your time on earth is not the complete story of your life. You must wait until heaven for the rest of the chapters. It takes faith to live on earth as a foreigner.
yan, ur summary after reading this book ar? I like this "Life is a test, life is a trust and life is a temporary assignment." and i truly believe in this "Every time you pass a test, God notices and makes plans to reward you in eternity. “Blessed are those who endure when they are tested. When they pass the test, they will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him.” Live this life to the fullest!!!
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Yeah, i do the summary immediately after reading the book..wei always introduce good things to us..^ ^
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