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 I was just three months old when my parents adopted me. Lying in a motel dresser drawer that very first night, I looked up at my new parents with distrust and suspicion, as if to say, ‘You just try to control me!’ My ornery streak was obvious from day one, but incredibly, I was now in a home where firm and loving parents would put me in touch with my Maker.
Thanks to my new parents, I wasn't very old by the time I understood that life is short. After that comes an eternity in one of two places, heaven or hell. It was easy enough to decide which was the better place. When I learned that receiving Christ was the only way to heaven, I knelt with my father, and asked Jesus to forgive my sins and give me eternal life.
I lived smugly in the safety of this newfound ‘fire insurance,’ because that was all Christianity was to me at that point, until a certain question began to haunt me: What is the purpose of life? It haunted me because the only answer I had carried alarming implications. I believed that life was basically meaningless. What are we here for anyway—to live, make babies and then die? Simply perpetuating the human race did not appeal to me. Nor was I interested in chasing after material riches only to leave them behind in 70 years. There just wasn't a good reason for living anymore. Nothing I could do was going to matter in a hundred years anyway, much less for eternity.
Surprise! When I was 14, I learned at a summer Bible Camp that there was a purpose for my life. It came from God. After all, He made me, so who would know better than Him what that purpose is? I learned from the Bible that God made me to relate personally with Him, to know Him and to love Him. I learned that completely giving my life over to Him for His purposes was the key to an abundant and meaningful life. Suddenly, my life had purpose and significance. I was created to know God and to glorify Him for eternity.
It was only minutes after realizing my purpose that I also discovered the plan that would bring eternal significance to my life. I was to share the truth and meaning that I had found in Christ with others. I realized that pointing people to Christ helps to change their destiny for eternity, just like my adopted parents helped to change my eternal destiny. Now that's making life count in a lasting way!
My nature is to be selfish and proud, so I have a natural tendency to continually take the steering wheel of my life away from Christ. Inevitably, that's about the time I end up in a ditch or down a blind alley. Thankfully, He is always forgiving, and graciously resumes control when I give Him back the wheel. In my life, Christ has replaced the meaningless races and goals I could be chasing in this world with one that has an eternal significance. Christ also wants to give you life in all of its fullness. With Jesus, you can find the meaningful life you were meant to have.
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