07 January, 2013

Pondering my purpose

Today is the sort of day that I question my purpose. What am I here for? What is the point of my days? Yeah, I know, sounds very depressing, quite the naval-gazer! But really, I'm not depressed, just on the reflective side of things, the way you can get when you don't have all your time taken up with the urgent and "important" things of life.

In the last few days my purpose was mostly to relax and to keep the boys in a balanced place.

Today they all left for school and that left me in a quiet house. My location didn't change, but what I could do in that location changed. It was "back to work". But I've also got a cold, and couldn't do as much as I wanted to (including going to meet a long-time Japanese friend). So, what's my purpose? What if I couldn't do "important" things? Does that mean that my life wouldn't have purpose? When I get philosophical about it I can see that it isn't the things I do that make my life purposeful, but in the midst of the usual busyness of life, it isn't so easy to see that.

Then, as I did some New Year cleaning out of my inbox, I found this short Max Lucado devotion. If I'm truly honest I'd say that a lot of my "working" is to please. However this little devotional reminded me that for the One who truly matters, I cannot please Him any more. I cannot make Him love me any more than He currently does. He loves me and that is the end of the matter.

So, even if I can't "do" anything much, my purpose is to live as one who's loved by God. And that could take me a lifetime to figure out how to do!

This year I'm reflecting on this text that was given to me at our New Year's Eve party:

Deuteronomy 6:5
Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.

It is something I sang as a Sunday Schooler, and have "known" all my life. It's a small challenge that I've given myself this year, to ponder and try to work on doing it. So today, I'm pondering the connections between being loved unconditionally, and having my purpose as loving God with all my heart, soul and strength. How does that work out in daily, practical, busy life? Interesting thoughts.

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