From His Heart

Show Intro Announcer: Today on From His Heart with Pastor Jeff Schreve, learn how to know your purpose in life.

Dr. Jeff Schreve: Hey, you want to glorify God? You want to fulfill your purpose? Why were you made? Why were you on the earth? Why are you here today? It's to glorify God, and it can start right now.

Theme Music: (Song plays)

Show Intro Announcer: Welcome to From His Heart, where today Pastor Jeff Schreve continues exploring another critical question of life, and one of the biggest ones: Why do we exist? Of course, the answer revolves around glorifying God. But how do we do it in the most effective way that pleases God and brings joy to us, and peace, and a realization that we are fulfilling our purpose?

Today we're going to hear part two of this lesson called "Why Am I Here?" It's from Pastor Jeff's six-lesson series, Life's Big Questions. If you want, you can go online and listen to or download a free MP3 of this broadcast or any broadcast. Again, go to fromhisheart.org and click the Listen Link. But now open your Bible to Isaiah chapter 43 as Pastor Jeff Schreve explores this question: Why am I here?

Dr. Jeff Schreve: Now I want you to notice some things about God that reveal our purpose. First of all, God is a purposeful God. He's a purposeful God. It says in Proverbs chapter 16, verse four, "The Lord has made everything for its own purpose, even the wicked for the day of evil." Everything God made, He made for a purpose. And He created us in His image so that we can know Him. Isn't that wonderful?

It says in Genesis chapter one, when God is creating and God comes to day six and God is creating everything that we see—and He's creating the fish and the birds and the animals—and then He comes and He says in Genesis chapter one, verse 26, "Let us"—God speaking in the Godhead, in the Trinity. There is one God, but the one God says, "Let us," because God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit. Elohim is a plural noun and God is Trinity. "Let us make man in our image according to our likeness." And when God created man in His image, He created man with a spiritual side.

See, man is really a house of three rooms. We're body, we're soul, and we're spirit. And the spiritual side of man is different than anything else that God created. See, a human being created in the image of God, we have a body, and with the body we know the world beneath us, the physical world. And we have a soul, and with the soul we know the world around us, the psychological world. But then we also have a spirit, and in our spirit, that's where we know the world above us, the spiritual world.

That's how God created Adam and Eve. They're created in His image and the spiritual side is the side that connected with God. And when God gave them and put them in the garden and gave them all these trees to eat from, He said in the midst of the garden there is the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. You can't eat from that tree, for in the day you eat from that tree, you will die. You will surely die.

Well, as we know the story, Eve ate from the tree, she gave to her husband with her and he ate from the tree, and they died just like God said. In the day they ate, they died. But they didn't die in their body. Adam lived to be 930 years old. He didn't die in his body that day in Genesis chapter three. He didn't die in his soul. Where did he die? He died in his spirit. In his spirit, in that part of him that connected with God, that's where he died. And Eve died there too.

Ephesians chapter two, verse one, "And you were dead in your trespasses and sins." We're all dead. And there's nothing—what do you do in here? You're dead in your spirit. That's why Jesus said, "Unless a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." You have to somehow get life in you to illuminate your spirit and bring your spirit to life. And that's what the Holy Spirit does when you pray and receive Christ as Savior and Lord. The Holy Spirit comes into the human spirit and life comes.

Hey, you're created, I'm created in the image of God. Listen, if we tell young people that they came from animals, pretty soon you're going to see them act like animals. But none of us came from animals. Nobody came from primordial soup. We came from God. God created us. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth, and God created man in His image. And He created us in His image so we could know Him. Because it's in the spirit where you know God.

Interestingly, Jesus said in John chapter 17, verse three, in His great high priestly prayer, He said this, "And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent." To know God. How do I know God? I know God when I receive Christ and His Spirit comes to live inside my spirit and He makes me alive spiritually and I'm born again, born from above, and then I can know Him in a real and personal way.

Interestingly, in Matthew chapter seven, when Jesus said about those on Judgment Day who are going to say, "Lord, Lord, didn't we prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?" then I will declare to them, "Depart from me, you who practice lawlessness, I never knew you. You were never spiritually alive. You never gave me your life. You just went through the motions of religion."

Hey, that's how we know God in our spirit. And that's why it's so critical that a man, a woman, a boy or girl be born again. God created you, He created me in His image. Imago Dei is the Latin that the theologians like to use so that we could know Him. And then God created you—specific answer to the question, "Why am I here?"—God created you for His glory so that you could glorify Him and honor Him.

Somebody asks you, "Why are you here?" Isaiah chapter 43, verse seven. It hits the nail on the head. The Lord says to His people who were exiled in Babylon, "Bring everyone who is called by my name, whom I created for my glory, whom I have formed and made." Isaiah 43:7. Why did God create us? We're created in His image so that we could know Him, but we were created for His glory so that we could glorify Him, so that we could give Him honor and praise and magnify God.

Now remember this about God: when you speak of the glory of God, the Hebrew word for that is kavod, K-A-B-O-D, but the B is pronounced like a V, kavod. And that speaks of the weight of God. It's His splendor, it's His majesty, it's who God is. When Moses wanted to see God's glory in Exodus, he said, "Lord, please, I beg You, show me Your glory."

And the Lord, remember, He hid him there in the cleft of the rock and He covered him with His hand and He just showed Moses the back side of His glory. This is how God revealed His glory to Moses: He spoke His name. "The Lord, the Lord God, compassionate and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in lovingkindness and truth, who keeps lovingkindness for thousands, who forgives iniquity, transgression and sin, yet He will by no means leave the guilty unpunished, visiting the transgression of the fathers on the children and on the grandchildren to the third and fourth generation."

That is God, His glory, His majesty, slow to anger, and He's abounding in lovingkindness and truth. And God says, "I created you for my glory so you would glorify me," because God is glorious. Now remember this: whether you glorify God or not by an act of your will, God is glorious. Everything in God's temple says glory because God is so glorious.

"Holy, holy, holy," Isaiah six says, "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God of hosts, the whole earth is full of His glory," because the earth is full of the weight of who God is. "The heavens declare the glory of God, the expanse shows forth His handiwork." God is glorious. So you and I, we can't really give God glory from the extent that He doesn't have glory and then I'm going to somehow give God glory. No, God is glorious.

What we can do and what we're commanded to do is show to the world that God is glorious. Reveal God's glory to the world in the way that we live, in the way that we respond to God, because we live a life that is glorifying to God. See, the question comes, well, how do I—if that's my purpose to glorify God, if that's what I'm here for, if I'm created for His glory and He says that I'm supposed to glorify Him, First Corinthians 10:31, "Whether then you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God," if that's my job, then how do I do it?

Well, first of all, you glorify God by loving Him and obeying Him. How do I glorify God? I love Him and I obey Him. Pretty simple. Jesus said the greatest commandment is to love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind. This is the great and foremost commandment. The second is like it: you love your neighbor as yourself. So obviously the greatest commandment is glorifying to God when I love Him.

And how do you do that? How do you love God? You love God by receiving first His love for you. We love, the Bible says, because He first loved us. Some people say, "Well, I'm just going to grit my teeth, I'm going to try harder, I got to love God, man, I got to love God, I'm just going to"—what are you doing? "I'm trying to love God, trying to love God." That's not how you do it.

The way you love God is by going to the word of God, going to the cross of Calvary and seeing how much God loves you, and it does something to your heart and you just want to love Him back. One of my favorite songs, Chris Tomlin says, "I am loved by the King, and it makes my heart want to sing." Every time we sing that song, I just kind of tear up because I think, man, the King loves me. The God who spoke the worlds into existence loves me.

You know, it says in the book of Isaiah that all the nations are as nothing before God. They are regarded by Him as less than nothing and meaningless. If you put them all on the scale, they'd be a speck on the scale. That's all the nations. So if all the nations are nothing before God, then what am I? I am a speck on a speck on a speck on a flea. That's how big I am to God. And yet He loves me. He knows all about me. He created me, and He loves me.

I'm loved by the King and it makes my heart want to sing. It makes me want to love Him back. And see, when I really love God, the way you can tell if you love God is this: look to see how you're living. Because Jesus said, "He who has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me. And he who loves me shall be loved by my Father, and I will love him and will disclose myself to him."

Hey, talk is cheap. If you say you love God and you're not walking with God, and you're not living for God, and you're not obeying God, you don't really love God. That's what Jesus said. Hey, if you really loved me, you would obey me. You're not obeying me, therefore you must not love me. You know, our command is to love God and to obey God. And when we do that, we glorify God.

But you can live your life glorifying God or you can live your life as a reproach to God. And you can be a Christian who can live like that, a reproach to God. And you can even be a man after God's own heart and live like that. You know who did that? David. When David sinned sexually, sinned with Bathsheba, and then tried to cover it up through murder and had her husband Uriah the Hittite killed in battle.

And it just gives this one little line: and the thing that David did was evil in the sight of the Lord. And then in Second Samuel chapter 12, we have Nathan come on the scene. Nathan the prophet, God sends Nathan the prophet to David. And Nathan the prophet calls David out. And the Lord says through Nathan the prophet, "David, you despised my word, you despised me. And because of this deed that you did, you have given occasion for the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme."

You know, many of us, because of the way we're living, we give occasion for the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme because we're hypocrites. It says in Romans chapter two, the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you. Because you're not walking with the Lord. You're not obeying the Lord. You're participating in the same sins as the world, and then you try and say, "Yeah, I'm a Christian."

And listen, if you're a Christian, you name the name of Christ, then you're going to walk with Him and you're going to walk in the light as He Himself is in the light. But if you walk in the darkness, the Lord says, "Hey, if you say you have fellowship with me and yet walk in the darkness, you lie. You don't practice the truth." A Christian doesn't walk in the darkness. Have to walk in the light.

You walk in the darkness and you're a reproach to God. You're not shining the light on His glory, you're not glorifying him, you're reproaching him and the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles when we live like that. Good news is David, who reproached God and God's name was blasphemed because of David's sins, David got right with God and he started walking with God again and he could please God again and glorify him once again.

Hey, we glorify God when we love him, and love is revealed through obedience. And then we glorify God by abiding in him and bearing fruit. That's what Jesus said in John chapter 15, "I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in me and I in him, he bears much fruit; for apart from me you can do nothing. By this is my Father glorified, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be my disciples."

Abide in me. That's the job of a Christian. We just stay connected to the Lord. We're just a branch. He's everything, we're nothing. Apart from him we can do nothing. And so how do I glorify God? I glorify God obviously by loving him, by obeying him, and I get my power from him. So I just abide in him. Just like a branch in a tree, just like a branch in a grapevine, it just abides. It just stays connected to him. It just abides. As Jesus said, "Abide in my love."

And when I do that, then his power flows through me. His life-giving sap flows through me. And just like if you look at a grapevine with branches, there's fruit that comes off of the branches because of the vine. Branch can't produce any fruit by itself. You and I can't produce fruit by ourselves. We have to stay connected to the Lord. If we stay connected to the Lord, we do bear fruit, and He is glorified.

What is the chief aim of man? It says in the Westminster Catechism, it hits the nail on the head: the chief aim of man, the chief goal of man, the purpose of man—why am I here?—is to glorify God. But it's not just to glorify God. It's to glorify God and enjoy Him forever. So God created you in His image so that you could know Him.

And God created you for His glory so that you could honor Him and glorify Him. And God created you for His pleasure so you could enjoy Him, here and now, and enjoy Him forever. The Bible says in Psalm 149, verse four, "For the Lord takes pleasure in His people." He enjoys His people. God has a lot of fun being with His people.

Do you know what the most special time was for God in Genesis, in the early days of Adam and Eve, when He would walk with them in the cool of the day? God looked forward to that. Why? Because He enjoyed being with His children. He enjoyed being with them. And God says, "Hey, I enjoy that, and I want you to enjoy me." In His presence, the scripture says in Psalm 16, is fullness of joy and in His right hand there are pleasures forevermore.

You know, some people get the idea that walking with God, obeying God, loving God, abiding in the Lord, that's just boring. Boring. That's a real yawner. I mean, your relationship with God's like taking bad cough medicine to get better. You know you have to take it, but you're like, "Ugh, I got to plug my nose and just somehow get it down because it's awful." Listen, if that's your view of Christianity, you don't understand Christianity.

Christianity is wonderful. Christianity is awesome. It's the living water that Jesus talked about in John chapter four. And when the woman understood that, the woman of Samaria, she left her waterpot and ran and said, "Come see a man who told me all the things I've ever done. Is this the Christ? Could this be the Christ?" Man, it wasn't bad medicine for her, it was wonderful.

When the prostitute was at Jesus' feet, weeping over her sins, it wasn't bad medicine that she had to take to get better. It was such a joy for her to come to the Savior. Man, have you ever experienced that, coming to the Lord and experiencing a joyful relationship with Him? Do you know why in prayer sometimes it takes so long and it's like God's not answering my prayer? "Why isn't God answering my prayer? I'm praying about this, praying about this, praying about this."

God could answer just like that if He wanted to, but He doesn't. Do you know why? One of the big reasons why God doesn't do that, just answer like that, is because God wants more than anything, not to answer the prayer, but to spend time with you. Spend time with you. If God answered our prayer just like that every time, we would spend seconds with God. We would treat Him like He's some kind of heavenly bellhop.

He's not. He's King of kings and Lord of lords. But He is slow to answer so much of the time because He's like, "I want to change your heart. I want you to spend time with me." Martha in the kitchen doing all the work, Mary seated at His feet listening to His word. Martha all upset, "Lord, tell her to come help me." And Jesus said, "Martha, Martha, you're worried and bothered about so many things, but only a few things are necessary, really only one, for Mary has chosen the good part, which shall not be taken away from her."

Man, if we would choose the good part, to spend time with God and enjoy Him. Enjoy Him in this life and then enjoy Him forever. What is heaven like? Is heaven a place where you sit on a white fluffy cloud, you have a white robe, somebody gives you—you have some kind of rusty halo—and somebody gives you a harp and you're bing, bing, bing all eternity? "What song did you learn today?" "Bing, bing, bing, that's all I got."

Well, who wants that? That's not heaven. In His presence is fullness of joy and in His right hand there are pleasures forevermore. And heaven will blow your mind as you get to experience God and see Him face to face. Hey, you want to glorify God? You want to fulfill your purpose? Why were you made? Why were you on the earth? Why are you here today? It's to hear about your purpose: to glorify God. And it can start right now.

You know, every single person that God has made is one day going to declare His glory. One day. But here's the thing: you can do it by your own will and your own volition, or you can be forced to do it. The scripture says of Jesus that every knee shall bow and every tongue shall one day confess—of those in heaven and on earth and under the earth—they will one day confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.

And I want to invite you, if you've never done this before, today to bow your knee to the Lord Jesus Christ. What is it mean to walk with Him? It means you surrender to Him and you say, "Jesus, You're Lord and I surrender my life to You. And not my will but Yours be done." And if you live life like that, you will glorify God. You will fulfill your purpose and you will enjoy Him, now and forever.