WHY ON EARTH ARE YOU HERE?
“But the God in whose hand are your life-breath and ways, you have not glorified.” Daniel 5:23
I remember taking a test in my college history class where I misread the essay question. I wrote and wrote and wrote … and it was all wrong. UGH! I got a low “D” on that exam – thank God there were other test questions I didn’t blow – the worst test grade I ever made in college. My problem was simple: I missed the point of the question. I spent a good portion of the allotted test time writing lots of information I had learned that was inconsequential to the question the teacher posed. No wonder I got a “D.” I was a dummy for missing the obvious!
ARE YOU MISSING THE OBVIOUS IN LIFE?
I spent an hour of my life missing the obvious, and I paid for it when the grades came out. But, can you imagine the tragedy of spending the hours of your entire life missing the obvious? Can you imagine the horror of getting an “F” in life … with no chance of a do-over?
Why are you here on this earth, anyway? To make money? To get married and have children? To enjoy the finer things? To slug it out, Monday through Friday, in a job you don’t really like so you can live it up and party like a rock star on the weekends? Why did God make you and put you here? What is your purpose for being?
God made you to glorify Him. Isaiah tells us that fact – “Bring all who claim me as their God, for I have made them for my glory. It was I who created them” (Is. 43:7 NLT). To glorify God means you honor and exalt Him, you live your life to please Him.
Belshazzar, the king of Babylon, was told by Daniel the prophet in October of 539 BC that his number was up. God was calling in his loan on life. Belshazzar had chosen to spend his years on the earth living for sin and self. God had graciously given him life and every single breath, yet Belshazzar chose to spit in God’s face. He did not acknowledge God, nor give Him the honor and thanks that He is rightly due. How terrible. How tragic. How costly.
GETTING IT RIGHT
If you want your life to count, if you want to spend your days on the right path, answering the right question, then spend your life glorifying God. Make each day a day where you honor God and give Him thanks for His goodness and grace. Make every choice with God’s glory in mind. You see, He doesn’t owe you or me anything. All He does for us is an undeserved gift of His love. Each breath you take comes from God … so, be grateful, thankful, and mindful of it.
Paul said, “Whether, then, you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God” (1 Cor. 10:31). As you work your job today, work for His glory. As you go about your household chores, labor for His glory. As you go through school, study for His glory. It doesn’t matter what you do, as long as you do it to honor Him. Martin Luther used to say, “A dairy maid can milk cows to the glory of God.”
May you and I get this thing called “life” right. May we live out all our days “to the praise of the glory of His grace” (Eph. 1:6). He alone is worthy. Living for any other glory is answering the wrong question.
Love,
Pastor Jeff Schreve,
From His Heart Ministries
