A Meaningful Life

Well Dilbert isn’t the only person having trouble finding a meaningful life.

Meaning, purpose, fulfillment, achievement— from comics to movies to books to sermons our society seems to be filled with both bemoaning our lack of meaning and varied attempts at discovering or creating it.

But, it seems that in both the media and real life, meaning never lives up to its name.  Dilbert finds his xbox to be broken, Homer Simpson finds no beer in the fridge, one more celebrity ends up in divorce, one more scandal destroys the life of the famous (or not so famous), one more job falls through, one more teen runs away from home, one more promotion or house or vacation or publishing contract or marriage or ministry or conference or whatever else we had been secretly hoping to give us meaning turns up short.

With so many different approaches to a meaningful life turning to ashes before our eyes, have we ever considered that the reason every answer seems wrong is that we aren’t asking the right question?

No matter what you turn to for an answer to meaning in life, if your goal is meaning in your life then it has to do with you: either something you are doing or something that is being done for you.

We are asking “What is the chief end of man?” and answering it “To find meaning & purpose & fulfillment for me.” and if we are Christians we tack on “that is, by using Godly things like ministry and worship and books and conferences to find meaning and purpose and fulfillment for me.”

Wrong.  The chief end of man is the glory of God.  If we consume ourselves with the glory of God, then along the way we find that “personal meaning” and “a life of purpose” don’t even seem to be important anymore, just God, just His glory, just His kingdom, not as a means to our agenda or fulfillment, but His.