By: Jaymi Firestone
When God created us, He made each of us different. He made us to live and breath every day with our own thoughts and emotions. He created us to live life. He created us for far more than what we give most days though. We weren’t created to just waste time living lukewarm, and mundane lives. We were created for a purpose.
We were not created for earth, but for eternity.
“For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.”
John 3:16 NLT
God created us to live with Him eternally. He put us on this earth to seek Him, so that one day we could be with Him in Heaven. God made us for more than what we are going to do on Saturday.
We weren’t created to be liked, but to show love.
Every aspect of society pressures us to be liked or to fit in. We are expected to find our “niche” or the group of people we relate to the best. The desire to fit in has made me want to be liked by those around me. It even hurts when we aren’t liked by others. I know that is something that we talk about in grade school, especially with peer pressure and the desire to make friends. The reality is though, that isn’t something we just seek as children. We seek to be liked as adults as well.
God created us to show love to others. Being liked and standing out are two different things. Wanting to be liked means we try to be something, to act a certain way, just to fit in. Showing love means that all we do is love other people, regardless of whether they like us or not.
Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.
Philippians 2:3-4
Love covers everything in this life. Jesus died because He loves us. The least we can do is love others. So I’m reminding myself today that I need to stop worrying about being liked, and start showing love.
We were not created to draw attention to ourselves, but to show glory to God
“As for me, may I never boast about anything except the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. Because of that cross, my interest in this world has been crucified, and the world’s interest in me has also died.”
Galatians 6:14
We have the gifts and talents we do because God has blessed us with them. He is the reason we are the people we are, and we serve the way we do. Nothing can be attributed to us, but only to Him.
We were not created to collect followers, but to follow Christ.
This…
In a world where social media reigns supreme, we literally seek followers. Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, Snapchat…they are all made for us to do whatever possible to gain more followers. They’ve created hashtags to tie things together in order to have the opportunity to reach outside our social circles and get a few more people “liking” our photos, or following our page.
The whole reason we were created though is the follow Christ. He didn’t ask us to gain our own followers, but to bring followers to Him. Jesus isn’t concerned with how many “likes” the photo of our dog got. He cares about the people we helped, and the way We love them. We weren’t created for this world, we were created to seek and save the lost. Simple as that. This is a problem that has gone on since the early church…
I appeal to you, dear brothers and sisters, by the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, to live in harmony with each other. Let there be no divisions in the church. Rather, be of one mind, united in thought and purpose. For some members of Chloe’s household have told me about your quarrels, my dear brothers and sisters. Some of you are saying, “I am a follower of Paul.” Others are saying, “I follow Apollos,” or “I follow Peter,” or “I follow only Christ.”
Has Christ been divided into factions? Was I, Paul, crucified for you? Were any of you baptized in the name of Paul? Of course not! I thank God that I did not baptize any of you except Crispus and Gaius, for now no one can say they were baptized in my name. (Oh yes, I also baptized the household of Stephanas, but I don’t remember baptizing anyone else.) For Christ didn’t send me to baptize, but to preach the Good News—and not with clever speech, for fear that the cross of Christ would lose its power.
1 Corinthians 1:10-17
So here’s the deal…
We were created for more than just day to day life on this earth. We were created to love others and follow Christ. It’s a matter of reminding ourselves daily that we were created for far more. So we need to be living that way.
Live like that.
