Sentilong Ozukum
Believe it or not everybody thinks.
Thinking is related to asking questions. Everybody asks questions in life. If you ever have any slight of doubt, try spending an evening with a five-year kid. Our lives are always filled with wonder. As a child I’m sure you have also asked hundreds of questions to your parents. Ask my mom and she will tell you that I was the question box of my family. In school we ask questions to our teachers. Actually schooling at present is all about Questions and Answers. Everyday I’m flooded with questions from my friends and students. Sometimes I succeed in answering them, sometimes I don’t. I also love asking questions. So what I’ll do in this article is – I’ll ask you some questions. Not ordinary questions but questions, which will determine how you live your life both on earth and in eternity. I call them Life’s Basic Questions. They are-
1. Who am I?
2. Where did I come from?
3. What is the purpose and meaning of my life?
4. Where do I go after I die?
I want to share my views on a couple of these questions.
Who am I? Why do I exist? What is the purpose of my life? What on earth am I here for? Where am I going? How can I define the Meaning of our Life? Life will never make sense unless we find the answers to these questions. Where should we go to find the answers? I want to suggest where you should search for the answer. Everyone today is seeking for meaning and purpose in life. Unfortunately many people are searching in the wrong direction and places. Music, Fashion, Money, Power, Relationship, Sex, Alcohol, Drugs and you name the rest. You have also tried that, haven’t you? You know these things don’t satisfy. You are left tired, confused, desperate and starved. You cry. You shout. Get angry. Get mad and feel exhausted.
Rick Warren in his sensational book The Purpose Driven Life writes,
If you want to know why you were placed on this planet, you must begin with God. You were born by His purpose and for His purpose... You were made by God and for God and unless you understand that, life will never make sense. It is only in God that we discover our origin, our identity, our meaning, our purpose, our significance, and our destiny. Every other path leads to a dead end.(Warren: Rick Warren, The Purpose Driven Life. Zondervan,2002, page 5)
That’s it. We must start with God. We are made in the image of God. But we should remember that the image has been defaced and marred. We are lost in the wilderness. Our Soul craves for God. Our Soul yearns for eternity. The humorous part is that we are angry when we don’t find God in a bottle of Old Monk or in the VH1 channel.
Picture this.
Take a fish and place him on the beach. Watch him. Watch his gills gasp. Watch his scales dry up. Is he happy? I don’t think so. Then how do you make him happy? Do you cover him with a mountain of cash? Do you bring him sun goggles? Do you bring him a glass of imported champagne? Do you bring him cd’s of Britney Spears and Black Eyed Peas? Do you bring him a Playfish magazine? Do you wardrobe him in double-breasted fins and people skinned shoes? Of course not. Then how do you make him happy? You put him back in his element. You put him back into the water. He will never be happy on the beach simply because he is not made for the beach.
We will never be happy with the worldly things because we are not made to be worldly. We will never be satisfied unless we have a relationship with the one who made us. So the next question is- How do we connect ourselves with God? Or in other words- Who connects us with God? Before answering that, let me ask another question. Suppose you want to know something about your neighbor who happens to be the father of one of your classmate. How would you try to know him? Would you switch on the television and skim through the news channels? Would you go to the library and scan the books? No! Then, would you go to his native village and start interviewing the villagers? Would you ask his colleagues and friends? What would be the easiest way? Yes- The easiest way is to ask your classmate. The easiest and surest way is to ask his son. And that is exactly what we need to do with our heavenly father. We have to approach the Son.
So the question again is - Who connects us with God? The answer- Jesus Christ. And that is the reason why God sent His one and only son. To reconcile us with him. It’s no wonder Jesus said in John 14:6, “I am the way, the truth and the life; No one comes to the Father except through me”. (NIV)We cannot reconcile with God through Moses, Confucius, Buddha, Mohammed, Krishna or Bin Laden. Moses could mediate on the law. Confucius could offer wise sayings. Buddha could give personal counsel. Mohammed could brandish a sword. Osama Bin Laden could attack the World trade Center. But none of them can reconcile us with the Father. None of them was qualified to offer atonement for the sins of the world. Jesus was telling the truth when he said that he is the only way to God.
When I was in the fourth standard, my father bought a 17 inch black and white television. It was indeed a dream come true for me and my siblings. I no longer had to run to my friends’ house to watch Chandrakanta and Jungle Book. But my happiness was short lived. There was a serious problem with our television. Or at least that is what we thought. The pictures displayed on our television screen were fuzzy and shaky. The sound that came with the shaky pictures resembled that of buzzing houseflies and mosquitoes. We could never get the picture and the sound clear however hard we try. I at once became was the home electronic engineer. I pressed every visible button on the television set. I tapped gently at the back of the set. I tinkered with the connection wires and cables. Nothing worked. Frustrated and confused I inquired my next door and learnt that we had to first install an aerial. We needed an antenna. My father soon bought the required antenna. He fixed it at the end of a very long metal pole and through some complex processes fitted the wires to our television. At once the shaky and fuzzy pictures subsided. We got clear and distinct pictures and sounds.
Today as I pause and think about these moments I realize that our life works like the television set. Life without a relationship with God through Jesus Christ is like the television set without an antenna. Once we have a spiritual antenna the purpose and meaning of our life becomes clear.
You know, it’s a very bad idea to create a password in your computer when you have a very poor memory and especially when you are using an XP operating system. I made the terrible mistake of making one last Christmas to prevent my brother from playing unrealistic games without limit. The result- I never made my way to the desktop ever since. Do you know that God too created a password in the human soul when He fashioned us? I’m not kidding. It’s a six letter word. You’ve often heard it. It rhymes with t-h-i-r-s-t. The password is spelled as C-h-r-i-s-t. He alone can bring us to the desktop of life. He alone can bring us meaning and purpose in life. He alone is the way, the truth and the life. And remember- God does not have a poor memory.
A couple of year’s back I was one of those hapless teenagers who struggled with much on the inside but did not know where to turn for answers. For that matter, I did not know if answers to my deepest hungers ever existed. No one who knew me would have ever suspected the depths of emptiness within me. Putting it plainly, life to me just did not make sense. I doubted all that was in the Bible. I doubted the existence of God. Then I started to search. And thank God, I searched in the right places. I have studied a lot of things. I have questioned a lot of things. I have read a lot of books. My conclusion is that the God of the Bible is the only true God and that Jesus of Nazareth is what He claimed to be. He is the Son of God who came down to earth. He was crucified on a Cross. He was resurrected on the third day. And He is coming again. Committing my life to Christ was the most sensible and the best thing that ever happened to my life. I came to Him because I did not know which way to turn. I will remain with Him because there is no other way I wish to turn. I came to Him longing for something I did not have but now I have something I will not trade. I came to Him unsure of the future and now I remain with Him certain of my destiny…”
Personally I have found nothing that satisfies my mind, my heart and the deepest longings of my soul like Jesus does. He is not only the way, the truth and the life but He is my way, and my truth and my life- just as he can be for anyone who reaches out to Him.
