The Purpose of Events of Life

UV 687/10,000 The Purpose of Events of Life “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose.” Romans 8 v 28 The purpose of life is not human happiness. If we pursue happiness, it will be like a mirage in the desert- the closer we move towards our goal of happiness, the further it will recede. When some thing happens in the life of someone who does not believe, he or she welcomes it if it is something good. But if it is something unfortunate, he or she attributes it to fortuitous circumstance or fate. People everywhere think that the purpose of life is to be happy. As a result, God and man are out of sync with each other. When something good happens, we will take the credit and say we are fortunate people. When something bad happens, we shrug it off saying we had a bad day. When something terrible happens, we will blame God and say, “ He has not been kind to me.” But, when we are called according to God’s plan for mankind, when we are called to enter into a personal and covenant relationship or commitment to God through His son Christ, we can understand a pattern in the things that He allows to happen in our lives. The words, “ in all things” implies that every little thing or significant thing that happens in our lives, every conversation, every acquaintance, every person we come in contact with, every opportunity and every difficulty, every success and failure, every source of joy and disappointment in our lives is in accordance with His express will and sovereign purpose. Our response should be to submit to His plan and purpose with trust, faith, hope and thanksgiving. God does not allow pain in our lives willfully to harm or sadden us. He would rather that we be joyful but sometimes it becomes inevitable even for Him to allow some pain that we might learn from it. All things happen for good- nothing is unplanned or wasteful or purposeless. This belief produces trust in God and trust in God produces lasting happiness or God ordained blessings. God ‘s priority and purpose is similar to that of a master sculptor. Day after day, as the latter shapes the masterpiece he has in mind, he patiently chips away at rough patches and corners to make these smooth and well shaped. It is also similar to a landscape gardener who prunes and shapes the hedges into precise shapes and sizes. Similarly, the purpose of God is to make us conform to the image of His Son Jesus Christ. Hence, He allows both what we consider good or happy events to happen to us as well as the not so happy or painful events to happen in order to shape and mould us into His likeness. Every event has a purpose and is part of God’s plan for our lives. Everything happens for our ultimate good. He allows certain incidents to happen to prove us or to elicit what is in our heart towards Him- to deepen our understanding of His love and nature, to increase and strengthen our faith and hope in Him, to make us mature and fruitful, to remove our other dependencies so that we depend solely on Him, to prove the truth of His Word and His promises to us, to fulfill prophecies. His ultimate purpose is to shape us into people who are worthy to be part of the Family of God, with Jesus as the first born Son. Some things happen in our lives that make us think: “ This cannot possibly be from God- it is not for my good.” For instance, Joseph was sold as a slave and imprisoned on false charges. It might have seemed evil at the time but God turned it to long term good when Joseph won the favour of Pharaoh by interpreting his dreams and thereby became the right hand man of the most powerful person in the then known world. Learning about that turns it into eternal good for us who believe. I was drowned to death and revived. Again I was battered and bruised in a bomb blast. It might have seemed evil at the time but God turned it into long term good in terms of disciplining me, increasing my faith and increasing the world-wide influence of my testimony. Prateep V Philip See this image: http://www.google.co.in/imgres?hl=en&biw=1137&bih=565&tbm=isch&tbnid=2tvQyuFl31E1JM:&imgrefurl=http://www.facebook.com/Yinka.Ayefele.Fans/posts/433249826706906&docid=_pOmyRb38M2_YM&imgurl=http://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-prn1/s480x480/556627_10150954093767114_2033139011_n.jpg&w=480&h=373&ei=_5w6UazhEMK8kgWjpoCQCA&zoom=1&ved=1t:3588,r:50,s:0,i:239&iact=rc&dur=2206&page=4&tbnh=166&tbnw=213&start=39&ndsp=14&tx=149&ty=79 Listen to this Blessong: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNeOeuyVpvI