Pursuit of Purpose

03. The Person and the Perfect Purpose

11"I know the plans I have for you', declares the Lord, 'plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." Jeremiah 29:11, NIV

Have you ever taken a walk just to pass time? Or ever found yourself at a place where you have no reason for being there? Think of a time when you ended up doing something you never planned to, just to make yourself useful. Or of a case when someone asked you to accompany them only to wait for them in a car because you have no business to do and no part to play in whatever they had gone to do there? Stay long enough in that car and you will start sleeping if the place around you is boring or you will beat boredom by looking at other people dong their thing.

So many people are bored, living their lives in a cage or spending it looking at others doing their thing; pursuing their life purpose. A number of people live life on lack of knowledge and understanding of the purpose for why they are here and consequently, they don't use their lives for the purpose for why they exist. Many are simply taking a walk with their lives and engaging in anything to keep themselves busy and useful as they pass the time of their existence. As if doing 'window shopping' at Century City's Canal Walk Shopping Complex in Cape Town, many live life in a state of canal walk; without a sense of purpose. Yes, purpose!

As with everything else in existence, human life is a product of purpose. It finds its true value, worth, meaning, expression and explanation in purpose. Purpose is one of a few things in life that are true about every human being, irrespective of who we are or when, where or how we were born. Apart from those things that you wish or want to live for, there's that one specific thing that you were called to live for, and that's the one thing that you must desire and strive to live for because that one thing is God's great and perfect purpose for your life!

God is not a vain creator. He's a God of purpose and therefore everything He created serves a purpose for which He created it to fulfil-an area of need He created it to meet and to serve, ultimately for the sake of displaying His glory.

GENERAL PURPOSE VERSUS PERSONAL PURPOSE

GENERAL PURPOSE
In creating human beings, God had a why, a reason, a purpose for doing so. This purpose was and is true to all human beings. Thus, this purpose of God for the human race is general and universal; true to all human beings. This purpose is the purpose for which all human beings were created as revealed in God's purpose statement for the human race. In His general purpose statement, God made it categorically clear as to what purpose human beings would serve in relation to the rest of His creation.

26Then God said, "Let Us (Father, Son, Holy Spirit) make man in Our image, according to Our likeness [not physical, but a spiritual personality and moral likeness]; and let them have complete authority over the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, the cattle, and over the entire earth, and over everything that creeps and crawls on the earth." 27So God created man in His own image, in the image and likeness of God He created him; male and female He created them. 28And God blessed them [granting them certain authority] and said to them, "Be fruitful, multiply, and fill the earth, and subjugate it [putting it under your power]; and rule over (dominate) the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, and every living thing that moves upon the earth."-Genesis 1:26-28, AMP

God's general purpose for humanity encompasses fellowship, leadership and stewardship. We are all custodians and signatories to this universal purpose of God. God's general purpose for humanity is what identifies us as human beings and is expressed in the qualities that are true to all human beings. Though this purpose and role was lost to satan through the fall of the first Adam, it has been restored to us through the grace of God made manifest in the Person of Jesus Christ, the last Adam.

PERSONAL PURPOSE
We not only have a general purpose as human beings. Each one of us has a purpose that is true, unique and specific to them. I refer to this as a Personal Purpose. Personal not in the sense of being one we have given ourselves but as in one that is unique and and specific to us. This Personal Purpose is God's call for your life as an individual. In this book, this Personal Purpose is also referred to as your Life Ministry or your Life Office.