Word of Salvation – Vol. 40 No.15 – April 1995

 

What Is Your Real Aim In Life?

 

Sermon by Rev. M. P. Geluk on Westminster Shorter Catechism Q/A 1

Scripture Reading: 2Corinthians 4

 

Dear Congregation.

Most of us are familiar with the opening words of the Heidelberg Catechism.  They ask: What is your only comfort in life and in death?

The answer is precious:
That I am not my own, but belong – body and soul, in life and in death- to my faithful Saviour, Jesus Christ.  He has fully paid for all my sins with his precious blood, and has set me free from the tyranny of the devil.  He also watches over me in such a way that not a hair can fall from my head without the will of my Father in heaven; in fact, all things must work together for my salvation.  Because I belong to him, Christ, by his Holy Spirit, assures me of eternal life, and makes me wholeheartedly willing and ready from now on to live for him.

But now the Heidelberg Catechism is not the only Confession that our Churches have.  Another Confession of the Reformed Faith is the Westminster Confession, which is also in our green Book of Forms.  This Confession was written in London in the years 1643-48 by an Assembly of Christians who were very much influenced by the Reformation of the 16th century and its understanding of Scripture.  They also produced the Larger and Shorter Catechisms and the first question goes like this: What is the chief end of man?  The answer is as follows: Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever.  It is this answer that we want to examine now.

The Heidelberg Catechism begins by drawing the attention of the Christian believer to the wonderful comfort he possesses as a result of belonging to Christ the Saviour.  The Westminster Shorter Catechism starts off by saying that man’s aim and purpose must be to glorify God and to enjoy God forever.

What do we think about that?  If you were asked to seriously reflect for a few moments as to what is your real aim and purpose in life, how would you answer that?  Yes, what is your real objective in life?  What is mine?  We might say that it is this or that, but upon deeper reflection we might even say: yes, that is what I would like it to be right now, but when I really think about it, then I think that in the long run it ought to be something deeper, something more meaningful, more substantial.

Let us, then, give our attention to this question: What is our real aim in life?

In the first place, we consider how some would answer this question.

Secondly, we will consider the claim that we must glorify God.

And thirdly, we see that the glory of God is to be enjoyed by us.

I.  HOW SOME ANSWER THIS QUESTION

We are saying that this deeper, this more meaningful, more substantial objective should be us glorifying God in all that we do and think, and to enjoy God always.  In fact, we believe the Word of God is teaching us that when a human being begins to make the glory of God his highest objective, then he/she will be the closest to that kind of person God wants all of us to be.  It is when we glorify God that we will experience our true dignity as human beings and enjoy God the most.  Once we are clear in our minds that the glory of God should be our real aim and purpose, then everything else about the Christian faith will fall into place and make sense.  But as long as we are uncertain or unwilling about God’s glory having to be our highest objective, then we will continue to have problems with the Christian faith.

Now that is precisely what is happening with many people.  Many things about the Christian faith do not sit easy with them.  The way God is and what He does often upsets them and they are a long way removed from enjoying God.  If anything, there are things about God which actually bother them.  And how can one glorify God when you have these hang-ups about God?

Take, for example, the people who just want to enjoy life.  Perhaps they just live for the weekend.  It’s then they can enjoy their sport and leisure, have time to pursue their interest in art and culture.  Travelling to and from work during the week, and work itself with its responsibilities and duties, occupies nearly all of their time.  But the weekend, yes, then one can live for one’s self.  Or take those people who feel that it is only by working that one can get ahead in life.  If you want to have that up-market house, car or boat, or be able to afford that overseas holiday, then don’t waste time by not working and therefore not earning money.  Or those who love their work and are happy to spend all their waking hours at their job.  It gives them great satisfaction to achieve their objectives and any difficulties along the way are simply challenges that can be overcome by working a bit harder.  Or those who seek to find life’s satisfaction in love, in marriage, having a family and seeing their children grow up.

Now there are many people like that.  Their lives are completely taken up by what they believe is important to them.  Most of the time God does not even come into the picture.  They can live without God.  Whether He is there or not makes no difference to them.  But among those who do sometimes think about God because they might just happen to hear or read something about Him, well, they might well ask: what business is it of God for Him to demand that all the things you do in life are to be done sin such a way that they glorify His holy name?  What gives God, and those who are on His side, the right to push His laws on to others expecting them to be obeyed?  Let people live the way they want to, as long as they obey the civil laws.  Whatever they want to do is up to them, isn’t it?

What this means, of course, is that such people have no real interest in glorifying God.  They may even be very kind people who will do anything they can for others.  But the glory of God is not their aim or objective.  And if it was said to them that they ought to reckon with God, if it was pointed out to them that God’s commandments should be considered and obeyed, then it may well draw immediate objections on their part, especially if it will require changes to their lifestyle, which it undoubtedly will, but which they are not prepared to make.

Now when people do not want God to intrude into their thoughts or their way of life, then very quickly people will think things up about God which to them are not right.  For example, if God is so good and loving, how come there are earthquakes, floods and fires?  And how can a loving God send people to hell?  And if God is almighty, then why doesn’t He prevent wars?  Yes, why didn’t He prevent sin from entering the world in the first place?

So you can see when people live for themselves, or for other people, and cannot get themselves to glorify God, then they will always find something objectionable in God or about God which then is their excuse to keep on ignoring God.

Now when I am mentioning God, then, of course, I am not referring to just any god.  I am speaking about God who has made Himself known in the holy Scriptures and who has come into the world through His Son Jesus Christ, who died on the cross, rose again from the dead, ascended into heaven and will return at the end of time to judge all men.  I am referring to the one, only true God, the Maker of heaven and earth, with which historic Christianity is associated.

There are, of course, people who are religious without being Christian.  If you were to ask them as to what life is really all about, then they would immediately answer that their god satisfies all their spiritual needs.  In fact, to many it doesn’t matter a great deal if you are Muslim, Hindu, Hari Krishna, or Christian.  As long as your religion gives you spiritual satisfaction then it’s good for you and others should respect that.  Truth is whatever people perceive it to be.  The glory of God does not really come into it.  It’s the well-being of people that is at stake.  And if the god of Islam, or Hinduism, or whatever the religion, is glorified at all, then it is only by what this god is able to do for those who follow him.

And what troubles the Christian church at this time is that many Christians have been led to believe that God is really there to help them.  The happiness of people, especially those who are saved through Christ, is supposed to be God’s main occupation and interest.  God is often described as One who will help us overcome any difficulty, do anything to keep us out of trouble, get rid of that illness we have, help us pay the bills, find the right marriage partner for us; in short, it is believed that God is there to serve us.

But the truth of the matter is that God has not revealed Himself in the Bible that way at all.  What the Scriptures do teach is that God serves Himself.  God is certainly interested in our well-being but it is only when we glorify God that we experience that well-being, and that may well be from a sickbed, or in poverty, or in a tough marriage, or in singleness.  In short, we are here to serve God.

II.  OUR REAL AIM IN LIFE MUST BE TO GLORIFY GOD

We have to be quite clear what is meant by this.  The Bible doesn’t only say that God deserves our praise and glory because He has done marvellous things for us.  It also teaches that we are to glorify God in whatever He does because God glorifies Himself in all things.  So whatever we experience under God’s hand of providence, be it rain and drought, fruitful and lean years, food and drink, health and sickness, prosperity and poverty, yes, in all things we are to glorify God.

As mentioned earlier, we are going through a period in the Christian church where it has become popular to refer to God as though He is merely there to be good to us.  There is much enthusiasm and praise for God when one person after another speaks of God doing great things for them.  Many like the praise songs more than the psalms, more than the hymns of repentance and those where in deep humility the Christian sings of God’s mysterious ways which may have resulted in grief and sorrow.

Of course it is not wrong to praise God for deliverance.  Let’s continue to praise and thank Him when all seems well.  The Bible has many psalms for such occasions and there are also many beautiful hymns of praise and thanks.  But God is also to be glorified when there are no deliverances and where things do not go well.  Job received many hard knocks from God when he lost his possessions, his children and his health.  And when his wife, who also suffered in all this, said: “Curse God and die!”, then Job replied: “Shall we accept good from God and not trouble?” (Job 2:10).  In his many troubles, Job continued to glorify God but his wife was more inclined to curse God.

Why these different reactions?  Well, unlike his wife, Job hung onto God’s goodness and holiness.  He knew and believed that all God’s actions glorify Him.  It’s not that believers like Job can understand God in all He does.  There are many times in life when God’s actions are as incomprehensible to the believer as they are to the unbeliever.  But where the unbeliever rejects God, the believer confesses that God knows what He is doing in His eternal, wise plan, and that God is to be trusted in all that He does.

So when, for example, you go to the nursing home to visit your loved one, when you see him or her becoming increasingly incapable, when you just want to take them back home, back to all that is familiar but can’t because you are unable to provide round the clock care, then you know as a believer that life can be hard.  Yet, you commit all to God and in whatever circumstances He places you.  And you say, “Lord, help me, strengthen me, provide for me, comfort me, and may your name be glorified.”

When we creatures look at the more difficult things in life, then we must not think that things are as they are because God cannot help it.  God is behind everything.  He is the Almighty One.  He created all things and upholds all things.  He will bring all things to pass according to His eternal plan.  We are mere mortals, but God exists forever.  He gives life and breath; we are dependent on Him.  He determines the day of our birth, the time of our death, and everything else in between.  And in all He does, God is perfect, holy and just.

Now does all this sit comfortable with us or does it repel us?  Do we draw near to God to back away?  Do we worship God or do we criticise Him?  Do we want to know, trust and believe God as He is, or do we want to re-write the Bible and modify God to our expectations?

The authors of the Heidelberg and Westminster Catechisms wrote about all the main teachings in the Bible concerning God.  About God creating all things, God ruling over all things, God saving some and not others, God’s coming in Christ, God’s judgment, God making all things new, and so on.  They had not written their catechisms in order to please man but in order to be true to God.  But then what should be their first question?  How should they begin their catechism?  Well, they did not begin by way of an apology.  They did not say: look, there are some wonderful things the Bible teaches but also some hard things and we hope these will not put you off.  Quite the contrary.  The one catechism begins by stating what a great comfort it is to belong to this Almighty, sovereign God.  And the other starts off by saying that man’s main purpose is to glorify such a God.

God says to all people: the only way you can truly worship me is by acknowledging my purity and holiness.  It will have to be on my terms, says God.  God is the only one who can say this without being arrogant about it, because all His ways are just and perfect.  But why then, many will ask, did God permit sin?  Could God not have prevented Satan from rebelling, and Adam and Eve from disobeying?  Yes, God could have done that.  But He did not.  Why not?  The answer is: for His own glory.  God made the angels and Adam and Eve in such a way that they could freely and spontaneously worship and glorify Him.  But this, of course, opened the door for them not to do this.  And God permitted that.  By creating all things good, He allowed for the possibility for things to go bad.  To have done it differently means that God would have had to make robots and puppets, but such would not have been able to freely glorify Him.

What followed, of course, was God’s wonderful plan of salvation.  Through God’s amazing love and mercy, He wins back transgressors through the suffering and death of His own Son.  In saving sinners, God has acted most gloriously.  But we would not have known that side of God’s nature had sin not been permitted first.

Why did God bother to save anyone at all?  He didn’t have to.  When man in paradise rebelled against God, then God could have said: well, that’s it then.  But He didn’t.  God opened a new chapter in the revelation about Himself.  He showed that He even loved sinners and was willing to save them.  Now, that’s all grace.  It was a choice that He didn’t have to make.  But He did it to show us His glory.  Ephesians 1 speaks about the election and salvation of sinners through Christ, and this takes place according to God’s “pleasure and will – to the praise of his glorious grace…!” (cf.vss.5,6,12,14).

God is glorified even when He does not save all sinners, that He leaves some in their fallen state and punishes these wrong-doers with everlasting punishment.  We are inclined to say: oh, God, if you are going to save sinners, then why not save all of them.  But God chose to put a limit on the number He saves and by so doing He made the saved see the wonder of His mercy when they realise there is also God’s wrath and just punishment on the unsaved.  God is glorified in His judgment of those who have rebelled and sinned against Him.  He is even more glorified when He shows His mercy to some and saves them through the death of His own Son (Rom.9:22ff).  At the conclusion of this biblical teaching about election and rejection in the letter to the Romans, there is this statement about God: “For from him and through him and to him are all things.  To him be the glory for ever!” (cf.Rom.11:36).

God’s glory stands out again when the bulk of the saved are from among the lowly, those whom the world despises and considers foolish and weak.  Why does God do that?  Why not have a majority of Christians who are highly intellectual, powerful and influential?  The answer is that God in this way prevented the saved from taking false pride in their abilities.  With their limitations and weaknesses the saved are now forced to fall back on God again and again for all their needs.  God makes them experience His grace and mercy.  This God is glorified once more (cf.1Cor.1:26-31).

Sometimes we think that it would be wonderful if God would root out all inclinations to sin in the saved, from the moment they became Christians.  If only God made us incapable of sinning from the very first time when we began to believe, just like He will at the Christian’s death and on the hew heaven and earth.  Why does God make our becoming like Christ such a slow progress?  Now we are troubled by sin and temptations and we fall many times.

Well, again, God does all this for His glory.  He leaves us exposed to weaknesses and imperfections so that we may learn to depend on God’s grace and the limitless resources of His saving power.  The apostle Paul wrote that “…we who are alive are always being given over the death for Jesus’ sake, so that his life may be revealed in us (our mortal body)” (2Cor 4:11).

III.  ENJOYING THE GLORIFICATION OF GOD

The psalmist urges us to “ascribe to the Lord glory and strength.  Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name…!” (Psalm 29:1-2).  And elsewhere in the Bible it says: “Whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.” (1Cor 10:32).  The question is: will we have to force ourselves to do this or is it something we want to do from the heart?  It depends on whether or not we have come to love God because He is truly great and wonderful; not in the first place because of what He has done for us but for what He is in Himself.

To enjoy glorifying God we need to know God from His Word.  That means having to know about God’s Son, Jesus Christ.  Christ and the Father are one, Christ is God and God is Christ.  He is the one, only true God.  Beside Him there is no other.  But we can’t very well glorify God when we really haven’t a clue of what His Word teaches about Him and all His works.  But once we do, once we begin to discover that God is great, that His commandments are good, wise and most helpful, then we will also see that in our endeavours to glorify God we also find our true dignity.  When we glorify and praise God, then we are on the right track with our own lives.  Then we find the right kind of glory and praise for ourselves.  It’s when we live for God that we find life worth living.

One of the best examples of how to enjoy glorifying God is found in Psalm 73.  The man who wrote this psalm was struggling.  He had tried to live pure before God but came up against the perplexities of life.  The wicked were prospering, the arrogant were healthy, and those who were in contempt of God were carefree and popular.  It wasn’t until he began to learn about God that he saw what their final destiny would be like.  In fact, learning about God also made him realise that he had been senseless and ignorant.  When he finally began to trust God and all God’s ways, then this is what he said:

“I am always with you;
you hold me by my right hand.
You guide me with your counsel,
and afterward you will take me into glory.
Whom have I in heaven but you?
And earth has nothing I desire besides you.
My flesh and my heart may fail,
but God is the strength of my heart
and my portion forever.
Those who are far from you will perish;
you destroy all who are unfaithful to you.
But as for me, it is good to be near God.
I have made the sovereign Lord my refuge;
I will tell of all your deeds.” (Psalm 73:23-28)

This person glorified God and enjoyed all what God is and does.  May you and I be that kind of person.

Amen.