Does Life Have a Meaning?
by Tatiana Velitchkov © 2009

Even though human beings have acquired more knowledge and material things than it was during the pre-historic era, they still lack a sense of purpose in life. We struggle to understand the meaning of life everyday, but it seems that the more we try to unravel the true meaning of life – the more we plunge into extreme uncertainty. This should not be the case especially during this era when humanity has made many impressive gains. This is the time in which the quality of our lives needs to have improved. Nowadays, life expectancy has increased in almost every corner of the earth even though poverty still casts a smaller shadow.

Despite all this, humanity is still troubled because it is plagued with aimlessness and a sense of drift. Counselors John James and Muriel James describe these happenings as saying that the world is pervaded with a universal hunger. They say that people are hungry to get more from life so that they are more involved into finding the meaning to life. One major reason why people hunger is that they lack a sense of purpose in life. They fail to understand that God is involved with humanity so He has plans for our being. In order for one to be in peace, we must realize what God has in mind for us. Some time back, the Western man possessed a feeling that history moves in a linear fashion right from the beginning to the end. Majority of the people had the conviction that nothing walked with feet alone aimlessly and that there is no life that has to be wasted.

There are explicit meanings to life and creation. Jesus Christ teaching that your hairs are numbered was an assurance to most people. They agreed that God is aware of even the tinniest creation, the tiny birds included. This assurance was, however, strong until the 19th century when there was major intellectual and spiritual shifts in history leading to many scholars viewing the teaching of Jesus and the Bible with skepticism.

The roadmap of life had been granted to humanity by believing in the Bible. According to the Bible, Jesus Christ showed that the purpose of human life is pegged in two supreme principles; one is that of loving the Lord with all your heart, soul and mind. The other one is loving your neighbor as yourself. Jesus reiterated that it is love that will make our lives worthwhile. He further explained that we should first direct our love towards God, then towards one another. It is love therefore that is making our lives what it is. Unless we learn to love, there is no meaning to our lives.