God's Purpose And Destiny For Our Lives

In our first lesson, we talked about how important it is for us as intercessors and prayer warriors to know our purpose and destiny. It is also important for us to understand how destiny and purpose effects those who we are praying for.

We talked about three questions that a lot of people ask, that are related to destiny.

1. Why Am I Alive?
2. Does It Matter?
3. What Is My purpose?

We looked at the first question in our last lesson. Now it is time to tackle the second one.

Question 2: Does My Life Matter?

The second 'big' question is: "Does my life matter?" This is really a question of significance. Well, that's not a new question either. Isaiah asked the same question. In Isaiah chapter 49, Isaiah said he was looking at his life, and looking at the things that he'd done and said, "my work all seems to be useless. I've spent my strength for nothing and for no purpose at all. "

There had been a lot of water under the bridge for Isaiah to this point. When you look at all that Isaiah had done up to this point, he had done a lot, he had accomplished a lot. But throughout those times, regardless of where you are in your life, have you ever sat back and you ask, "Have I done anything?" I'm looking in the back my own life--I'm what you call in a 'midlife crisis.' You get to the halfway point and you think; it's half over. You look at the back, and you ask: "Did I do anything with that?" Then you look at the front and you go: "Am I going to do anything with that?" I think Isaiah was having a midlife crisis here. Sometimes that's how we feel. Does my life matter? Does my life have significance?

When people go through life, they go through one of three levels. The bottom level happens to be the lowest level--the survival level It is simply doing enough to get by from day-to-day, where you think, "I simply want to get through. I'm just going to live from paycheck to paycheck, from day-to-day. I just want to get through today so I can get to tomorrow, and then tomorrow I get through it so I can get to the next day, and then to the next day. I might advance to where I'm just looking forward to the weekend, or I've got a couple of days before I have to go back to work. I have a life of drudgery." For a lot of people in the world, that's where they live.

The next level up would be the success level, and most of us may fall in that category. It's like "I'm just going after success, I just want to be an overcomer." Many of us have achieved that and most of you live in someplace mostly decent. You may not drive the best car, but a lot of you do. You do well, you have a good job. Many of you have a good income; in comparison to the rest of the world, we're rich. Even the poor in this country are rich. And if you don't believe that, you need to visit some other parts of the world and you'll know that's true. That's the success level.

But there's a higher level, and that's the level of significance. It is higher than survival, and it's higher than success. It is significance; it's living a life that is significant. How do you know that you are there? Well, one thing is that you know the meaning of life and that brings significance. You know how much you matter to God--and if you know that, that gives you significance. You know God's purpose for your life, and you're living that out. When you do that, it gives you significance. If you want to know how much you matter to God, look at Isaiah 44: 2, He says: "I am your creator. You were in My care even before you were born." God thought of us before there was an "us."

Now look at Psalm 139. This is the Psalmist talking to God, and he says, "You scheduled each day of my life before I began to breathe. Every day was recorded in Your book." God didn't just look down on earth one day and see you, and say, 'Where'd you come from? I've got to pull out My book here and see if your name's in there." God doesn't do that. God thought about you and He planned you--before you were born. Before the earth was even created, God was already thinking about you. You are not an accident, you are not some divine joke. God didn't say, "I think I'm going to play a joke on the world" and then create you. That is not God. He has a purpose, He has a plan.

God said, "Okay, I know this person. I planned him and I designed him. These are the parents. I'm going to bring this person into being because of My purposes in their life. Then He put you on this earth, and He chose the time that you're going to be born. He put you here, and He did so with purpose and with intention. God thought a lot about you. You need to understand that you're going to be on this earth for a long time and then you are going to be in eternity for a longer time. God created you. He created you to be eternal beings.

Part of your time is here on planet earth, and the rest of the time will be with Him in eternity. God created you for a purpose. Does Psalm 33:11 say that His plans endure a week or two; or that His purposes last for a month? No, it says that His plans endure and His purposes last forever!

Does His purpose for you stop when you die? No, they do not. His purposes last for an eternity, and that means His plans for you and His purposes for you do not stop when you die. God's plans and purposes for your life not only include this time on this earth, but it includes eternity. And what you have on this earth is simply preparation for eternity. You are going to be on this earth 60, 70, 80 years, some of you 90--some of you longer, some of you shorter. You're going to be on this earth for a small period of time, but it's just a small measure (a small unit) in comparison to eternity.

For example, if you measure from here to the moon, and you take that measurement there as a measure of eternity, your life is like the first millimeter there. It's just the beginning part of it. Scripture says that it's like a breath of air, like breathing, or it's like grass. Psalm 90:5-6 says, "It is like grass that grows up and then it dies, or a flower and that bloom, and then they're dead." Life is like that. If we understand the measure of our life in light of eternity, we're just a whisper, we're just a breath, and we're here for a very short time.

But, remember God made you for eternity. The purposes of God do not stop whenever you die. The purposes of God last forever and ever and ever. What God is doing on this earth? He's getting you ready to spend eternity with Him. Now I don't know what eternity looks like because I haven't been there--but it's there. We may have a concept of what it will be like, but it is probably wrong: wings, harp, sitting on the clouds. No, it's not going to be like that. I don't know what it's going to be like, but all I know is that God didn't bring you this far in building your stature just to go up there and sit on a cloud. Sometimes I think, 'why did God go to all of this work to do stuff and bring you to maturity and full stature now?' I mean, it's a lot of work, isn't it? Why does God do that?

He goes to a lot of effort to bring you into maturity in this life, and I believe this: what you carry from this world in the way of stature, you will carry throughout eternity. Once you get into eternity, you don't get a second chance to become mature. Do you understand that? You might go to Heaven. The Bible says that in Heaven you're going to have knowledge like He has knowledge. 1 Corinthians 13:12 says that we will know as we have been known. We will know a lot. The way God knew us--we will have that knowledge in Heaven. But knowledge isn't maturity, and knowledge is never stature. It is not how much you know, it is your character--and God is working stuff in us for eternity.

I don't know how that thing works, all I know is that this is the only chance you get in order to be mature--and if you don't get it now, you are not going to get it there. This is it, and God's going through a lot of work to get you built up and get you mature because He has something on the other side that He hasn't even filled us in on.

So how are you handling it on this side? God says that He made you to last forever. This life is nothing but a preparation for eternity; it is only the first step. 2 Corinthians 5:1 says when this tent we live in, our body, on this earth, is torn down, we will have a house in heaven for us to live in, a home He Himself, has made, which will last forever. So God wants you to live this life with meaning and purpose. He says in Proverbs 9:6, "leave or forsake confusion and live and walk up into the freedom of life with Me."