In my last article I wrote about the second of five purposes for our lives. In the book "The Purpose Driven Life," Pastor Rick Warren asked the question, "What on earth am I here for?"
The first purpose is to worship God. We were planned for God's pleasure. God is pleased with true worship. Loving God is our first and foremost purpose.
Our second purpose in life is fellowship. As our No. 1 purpose is to love God our next purpose is to love God's family.
Our third purpose is to become like Christ or discipleship. A disciple is a whole-hearted follower of Christ.
Rom. 8:29: "For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son," Eph. 4:15: "But speaking the truth is love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head Christ. God wants us to grow up in the Lord and become more like Jesus. He has given us His word and placed His Spirit in us to empower us to grow and mature. He does not want us to remain babes.
God uses many different things to cause us to grow. Not that He is necessarily the source of our trouble, He can still use it to teach and mature us.
n God uses trouble to teach us to trust Him. Rom. 5:3-4: "And not only that, but we also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance; and perseverance, character; and character hope. Remember the reward!" II Cor. 4:17: "Our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all."
n God uses temptation to teach us to obey. We see that Jesus was tempted and because He was obedient He was delivered. Matt. 4:1,10: "Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by the devil." After He was tempted with many things He made this statement, "Away with you, Satan! For as is written, You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only you shall serve."
n God uses trespasses to teach us to forgive. When Jesus was being crucified He prayed that those who were beating Him, spitting on Him, whipping Him and those who were insulting Him would be forgiven. When we refuse to forgive we will not be forgiven. We tend to ignore the Scripture right after the Lord's prayer that most of us can quote. Matt. 6 14,15: "For if you forgive men their trespasses your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses."
Jesus was the greatest example of how to live our lives and He left us with wonderful instructions on how we are to accomplish it. Phil. 2 5: "Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus. I will close with the words of a simple song that we sing from time to time. I want to be more like you, I want to be more like you, I want to be a vessel you work through. I want to be more like you."
n Leo Kruger is a member of the Carson Valley Ministers' Association.
