The Life Project
The Life Project is something I've been working on for a very long time- in fact, I've been through more than one complete draft over the last several years. Up until now, I have just not quite gotten it right.
Here's the idea: What is life all about? What is our purpose for being here? How can we be happy, productive and fulfilled in this life? These questions, and many more along this line of thought are what The Life Project is all about. My intention is to answer questions, sugggest solutions to problems, and help people to discover not only their true potential but their value to the cause of Christ... all from a Biblical perspective. This survey of life will go from a very basic level on through to full Christian discipleship in a practical, Biblical and easy to understand way that can become a guide to living for everyone from teens to seniors.
Here on this page, I will be posting notes, observations and chapter drafts as time goes on, and I hope that you will check back and look them over as we go. I'll be sure to post each new addition to this page in the what's new column on the home page... I hope you enjoy it! 8/13/10
Why The Life Project?
You may wonder why you should care about The Life Project. Fair enough, find the answer by clicking here
Here are the subject that The Life Project will explore:
Chapter Outline
Section One: The Nature of Life
1. God created Man for a purpose
2. Man violated the restriction God had placed on him.
3. From Genesis 4 onward, the Old Testament tells the story of God attempting to re-establish a relationship with Man, and how that relationship fared.
4. The Ministry of Jesus, the Christ
5. Conclusion
Section Two: Basics of Christian Living
1. The Importance of Your Decisions
2. Getting Right with God
3. Prayer
4. Goals and Planning in Life
Section Three: Christian Relationships
1. Your Attitude and Your Outlook on Life
2. Christian Relationships
3. Christian marriage
4. Serve God, Serve Others
5. Rule and Love
6. Love and submit
7. Range of Service
Section Four: Fitting into the Big Picture
1. The Church is the Ball Game
2. Become a full disciple of Christ
Section 1 Sample
1. God created Man for a purpose
If you were to ask most pastors why God created Man, you would probably be told that God created Man for fellowship. If you are like me, you would always be a little disappointed in this answer because ‘fellowship’ is a term that is used for an awful lot of things in churches; in fact it’s used for so many things it is sometimes unclear what the term actually means. For example, we might say that there is a ‘fellowship dinner’ next Friday, or we might have a potluck after church for fellowship. We could also say that we saw Jim and Tom at the diner sharing lunch and fellowship. Then, we say God created us for fellowship, and it sounds almost like God wanted a buddy to hang out with…
For the record, I would entirely agree that God created us for fellowship; but what does that actually mean? The answer to this question is actually a critical component in understanding why we are here, and what the meaning of human life is. To investigate the question, we need to review the creation account in Genesis to see what God was really up to in the early dawn of time.
The first thing that we need to remember is that God created Man in His own image. (Gen. 1:27) By saying that God created Man in His image, we are not saying that they were the same in appearance, as identical twins. The image of God is a much more profound quality than that! After God created the man, he breathed the breath of life into the man: “the LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.” (Gen. 2:7) Notice that the man had a body and then received the breath of life. All of the animals had bodies too, but God breathed something of Himself into the man, and then (and only then) is he said to have become a living being. It is this essence of God that made man alive, for man is a living soul. Understand then, that man is not a body with a soul, but rather a soul within a body, and that is precisely the thing that makes man the image of God. A body will die eventually, but the soul remains, it is eternal, thus man is not like the animals.
While Adam and Eve lived in the Garden of Eden, they had access to God. They spoke together, they received instructions, they were in relationship together. (Gen. 1:28-30; 2:16; 18-20; 23; 3:8-30) During this time, God gave Adam things to do; God placed him over all of the animals giving Adam ‘dominion’ over the earth. (Gen. 1:28) God let Adam name the animals (Gen. 2:19-20) He had in essence delegated some of His work to the man in allowing him to rule over all of the creatures of the earth; man was acting as God’s steward or representative in this way; the man and woman now had a purpose for their being, they were to act as God’s representative to manage God’s creation in God’s best interests.
Man, created in the image of God, having a direct relationship with God, was now acting as a representative of God by ruling over the earth: man and God were in “fellowship”. Fellowship therefore is a relationship with a purpose.
2. Man violated the restriction God placed upon him
God placed Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden which He had created for them. There, God had placed many trees containing fruit that was good for them to eat, and one tree from which they were to never to eat; the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. (Gen. 2:17) You know how the story goes from here, the serpent tempts Eve into eating from the tree. (Gen. 3:5-6) Eve doesn’t go for the trick right away, however because she remembered that God had forbidden them to eat from it. But then the serpent (Satan) used his trump card when he told her that if she ate the forbidden fruit that she would become just like God: Eve took the fruit, and Adam quickly follows.
It is an important, yet often overlooked fact that the temptation that resulted in the fall of man was exactly the same sin that caused Satan’s fall from grace. In Isaiah 14 the story is told of how he fell into rebellion against God: he wanted to be just like the Most High. (Is. 14:12-15) From that day to this, the root of all sin is a desire to usurp God’s position and become a “god” ourselves, deciding what is right and wrong, deciding what is important for us, and deciding to disregard God’s teaching about how we should live our lives.
There were very serious consequences for mankind’s entering into rebellion against God. The consequences are listed in Genesis 3:14-24, and they include the following:
· Direct access between Man and God was terminated; Man died spiritually
· Adam and Eve were expelled from the Garden of Eden
· They were cut off from the tree of life
· Physical death, pain, suffering, disease and anguish would now become part of life
· Man would live in a hostile environment
3. Old Testament History
From Genesis chapter four onward is the story of God working to re-establish relations with men. There are a few men who from time to time will respond well, but most will continue in outright and open rebellion towards God. God begins to re-establish relationship when He enters into a covenant relationship with Abraham in Genesis 12; in fact all redemptive history begins at this point. . The remainder or Old Testament History is the record of that relationship; the heroes of the Old Testament are the heroes of the covenant relationship, while the villains of the Old Testament are the villains of that relationship.
The covenant relationship between man and God progresses with time, and God formalizes a covenant with Israand a Nation of God’s people is formed through the Law of Moses. Israel has its ups and downs, but of course the “downs” always result from the same thing: rebellion against God i.e. ‘sin’. Eventually, things come to the point where God sends His prophets to warn Israel to repentance, for their continual rebelliousness threatens the very continuation of the relationship. Yet with the prophets comes the word that a day is coming when God will move the relationship forward again with the coming of an Anointed One, who will take away sin from the picture and enable this relationship to grow; in essence there would be a peace treaty.
4. The Ministry of Jesus, the Christ
Jesus came into the picture very innocently; a baby in a manger in a little town called Bethlehem in an insignificant Roman province called Judea. While this all sounds so harmless and insignificant, it isn’t every day that a baby who just happens to be God-incarnate comes along! He grew up in another little town in the mountains near Galilee called Nazareth. At the age of 30, He began His ministry of peace and reconciliation, first in the area around Galilee, and then moving out from there and ending up in Jerusalem. He led a sinless life, meaning that it was entirely in harmony with God’s will, and not a life lived in rebellion against God. For the record, this is also unusual… and the effect of this is that He is our model for living: our Role Model.
After His sinless life, men, living in rebellion against God as always, arranged for Him to be put to death; to get Him out of the way as it were. In so doing, another unusual thing happened; He arose from the grave, for in His death, burial and resurrection, He paid the price for all of our sins, established a New Covenant between God and Man, and He restored the relationship between God and Man , taking sin away and making an offer of a final and permanent peace treaty for all peoples who would respond. In so doing, He had accomplished out of apparent defeat, the greatest, most important, and most far-reaching event of all recorded history.
After His resurrection, Jesus gave His disciples the Great Commission (Matt. 28:18-20) which established His Church, and commanded that they open the doors to all of the peoples of the earth. Under the Old Covenant, one had to be born into relationship with God, now anyone who would respond favorably could enter relationship. Even more amazingly, when we respond, we receive the gift of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:38) restoring direct access between Man and God for the first time since the Garden of Eden. The Great Commission gave instruction to the followers of Christ, those who are in relationship with Him, to take the Good News to all mankind, to make disciples, to teach them to obey His teachings… This Commission took the offer of relationship, and combined it with God’s purpose: Relationship + Purpose = Fellowship. The damage that Man’s rebellion had caused had now been taken away; Mankind had been redeemed!
5. Conclusion of the Matter
What you have just read is the ‘Executive Summary’ of the entire Bible. Obviously I have made no attempt to include all of the details, but I have good reason for approaching it in this way. First, the ‘dots’ are much easier to connect when only the most important facts are on the table. Second, by viewing redemptive history simply, we can quickly come to identify several very significant facts:
- All humans have a reason for being on this earth: fellowship with God
- There is a purpose for your life: serve God
- Every single man, woman and child has a glorious hope: eternity with Christ
- We know exactly what we need to do with our lives: grow into discipleship, teach others to become disciples, and to builds the Body of Christ
- Who are you? You have the highest title in the entire Universe: Disciple of Jesus Christ
