John Piper’s best-selling book Don’t Waste Your Life is a passionate plea to people, especially the youth, not to waste their life, as the title itself says so plainly. It is a book that stands in stark contrast to contemporary Christian literature, as one that calls people, in particular the youth, to live wholeheartedly for the glory of God. It is one of those rare, life-changing books that is written with such conviction, passion, and zeal. I likewise implore you, don’t waste your life! So, what is a life lived well as opposed to a wasted life?
Many young people do not even stop to think about the meaning of life itself as they are often caught up in following the motions, doing what others are doing, and what is socially expected of them, just coasting through life. They merely follow the script set out by society as taught to them by their parents, which is that they must attend school to enter university, study at university to obtain a job and establish a career, establish a career to get married and start a family, as well as buy a house, work hard in one’s career, and then finally retire. Even many professing Christians who attend church each Sunday follow this script, without any thought about what the whole purpose is.
Some even think of themselves as so mature, successful, and worthy of admiration for doing so, as the mark of a truly fulfilled person who lives a ‘good life’, but the reality is that many such people did not really want the degrees they attained, do not really enjoy the jobs they work in, do not really love the person they married, and once they retire, find retirement vacuous, empty, and meaningless. Such a life is, frankly, nothing to admire or envy. It is, as John Piper calls it, ‘a tragedy in the making’ and a ‘wasted life’.
Not all youth are caught up in following the script laid out for them by society, however. Some are looking to make a great impact on the world through their pursuits in various fields, be it the arts, music, science, politics, literature, or sport, living with a sense of purpose as they define in by their own terms. Such people are a living example of living out one’s purpose, and also one’s personality, in following their inner sense of purpose and meaning in accordance with the way God has designed them.
Even if they are not believers who are not doing it for the glory of God, their pursuit of purpose and living out their own personality, is nonetheless evidence that God created each human being – including those who are lost and have not yet come to know God – with a unique purpose and plan for His glory.
Intuitively, we know we were created for greatness, meaning, and purpose, not triviality, meaninglessness, and purposelessness. The question that remains is, what is the meaning and purpose of it all? What does it mean to be great?
The Tragic Meaningless of Life: Vanity of Vanities, All is Vanity
Philosophers of the world have asked and still ask the timeless questions about the meaning of life. What does it mean to live? What does it mean to live a good life? Is life how you perceive it or the circumstances in which one lives in? What makes a life a life well lived, as opposed to one not well lived? What is the purpose of life itself?
Indeed, the question about the meaning of life is the question that tugs the heart strings. It is a question that the human heart yearns an answer for – and one that leads to much confusion, fear, vexation, angst, and even despair over the very question itself.
Hiroki Moriuchi, the frontman of Japanese rock band ‘My First Story’, whispers four times repeatedly in angst in 虚言NEUROSE (Itsuwari NEUROSE), “What am I living for?, What am I living for?, What am I living for? What am I living for?”, before belting out a long, intense scream “Living for!”, frustrated with the tragedy of the meaningless of life. The meaningless of life is indeed a tragedy, the question to which Moriuchi responds through passionate lyrics, “Nothing I wanna know”.
The meaningless of life is a tragedy that is too daunting to face up to because the human heart craves meaning and does not want to live a meaningless life. For to live a meaningless life is to live a meaningless existence, and to live a meaningless existence is to not only live a useless life but to be useless. How frightening is the thought of living a useless existence!
The question as to what we are living for is a question that must be asked, if we are to examine our own lives. What we are living for, if we do not live out the fullness of our purpose and personality? Living out the fullness of our purpose and personality is the key to a fulfilling, meaningful life. For we were created by Our Creator God, to live a life of meaning and purpose.
God, the Creator of the Universe, is an artist. He is a God of meaning and purpose, who does not design something without meaning or purpose. No created thing is without meaning or purpose. So, the question “what are we living for?” is itself a meaningful one. But an even greater question is, “who are we living for?”, and “why are we living?”.
King Solomon, who the scriptures describe as the wisest man who ever lived (1 Kings 3:12; 4:29-31), examines the tragic meaninglessness of life in Ecclesiastes. The book of Ecclesiastes has a depressing tone in which King Solomon repeatedly describes it all to be ‘vanities of vanities, all is vanity’ (Ecclesiastes 1:2). This was a man who had everything the world could offer, everything almost every person would want and things that most people could only dream of. He spent much of his life chasing after such things – and attained them. He had everything: wealth, possessions, romantic love, family, power, influence, authority, knowledge, talent, and wisdom.
Yet, despite all that, he was depressed after living a life of chasing after such things. None of that could fulfil his heart and give him joy or peace. His heart was restless, despite having all that which gives all manner of earthly comfort and security, treasure and pleasure. Everything truly was vanity. It did not matter one bit that he had everything in the world that almost all people, if not all, would naturally desire.
Despite King Solomon’s warning, especially to youth, most people simply cannot understand the vanity of chasing after the things of the world. One can point to many examples of people who have plenty of wealth, possessions, power, romantic love, and success, but still feel so empty, vacuous, and lonely – and even more empty, vacuous, and lonely than those who have far less, at that – and they still do not understand.
Why is this? It is because most people walk by sight, not by faith, including even many professing Christians. They are captive to the lusts of the eye which desires the things of this world, the things that one can see, leading the heart to become attached to such things.
Most people, including many professing Christians, are unspiritual, earthly, and worldly. Owing to their carnal mindset, they cannot receive the truth that because such temporal things are merely temporal, these things have no value. As the scriptures state, ‘The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned’ (1 Corinthians 2:14).
Even true Christian coverts who have received Salvation are still unable to receive such truths as long as they are spiritually immature. They simply cannot understand because they still constantly succumb to desires of the flesh, setting their hearts on the things of this world, desiring, and pursuing such things, rather than God. These people are unable to accept the truth that one is to receive whatever gifts from Heaven as the Heavenly Father God, sees fit to give to one, not grab things for oneself that one desires (James 1:17).
As Christians, we are to ‘walk by faith, not by sight’ (2 Corinthians 5:7). Christians are, by nature, a people of faith. We are not to be a people who follow our feelings or thoughts based on what we can perceive naturally through our senses. We are to live by faith, fully and wholeheartedly. This, however, does not come naturally because it goes against human nature, the Adamic nature that all of humankind inherited from Adam because of his sin (Romans 5:12).
Learning to walk by faith, and not by sight is a long process that can only be accomplished through much testing of one’s faith. Only when one has reached the point in one’s spiritual life when one can wholeheartedly entrust all things to God in faith, can one truly understand that chasing after the treasures, pleasures, security, and comforts of this world is vain and empty – and ultimately a tragedy.
Only then can only truly say from the bottom of one’s heart, “Vanities of vanity, all is vanity”, as King Solomon eventually was able to, after having everything showed him that no joy or peace, or security, can be found in such things that one should place one’s faith in, and that it is only God and God alone who one can place one’s faith in.
What a depressing thought that everything is vanity, all is vanity! Such a worldview in a bleak one indeed, and it is no wonder so many turn to so many distractions, be it money, possessions, entertainment, career success, romantic love, worldly knowledge and wisdom, or whatever else it is, to build their own legacy on earth.
This desire to build a legacy is the manifestation of the desire to live for greatness, a desire God has placed in humankind. It is no wonder that as people age, they start to think about the legacy they will leave behind, to make sure their life is not lived in vain.
Everyone seeks to create their own legacy on earth to varying degrees, whether it is to be remembered by one’s own family as a good spouse, parent, and sibling, or to be remembered by people all over the world as a person who made a significant impact on the world.
But what does it all matter, since all things, except God and His eternal Word, will pass away? For as Jesus said: “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away” (Matthew 24:35). Your earthly legacy will pass away. None of it will be eternal. Only your heavenly legacy will remain and have any eternal value at all. No matter how great in the eyes of people your earthly legacy will be, it will all pass away.
The Desire to Build a Heavenly Eternal Legacy Requires Faith
How then shall one live? Piper explains to us how we should live by contrasting two vastly different life stories. In the first, Piper tells the story of two women who were killed in Cameroon while on an evangelistic mission:
In April 2000, Ruby Eliason and Laura Edwards were killed in Cameroon, West Africa. Ruby was over eighty. Single all her life, she poured it out for one great thing: to make Jesus Christ known among the unreached, the poor, and the sick. Laura was a widow, a medical doctor, pushing eighty years old, and serving at Ruby’s side in Cameroon. The brakes failed, the car went over a cliff, and they were both killed instantly. I asked my congregation: Was that a tragedy? Two lives, driven by one great passion, namely, to be spent in unheralded service to the perishing poor for the glory of Jesus Christ—even two decades after most of their American counterparts had retired to throw away their lives on trifles. No, that is not a tragedy. That is a glory. These lives were not wasted. And these lives were not lost. “Whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel’s will save it” (Mark 8:35).
In the eyes of people, Eliason lived a tragic life: over eighty and single all her life, with no (earthly) family to come home to or look after her, no glamourous career, no wealth or possessions accumulated for retirement, only to be killed instantly in an overseas mission in an accident as the final blow to her supposedly ‘tragic’ life.
Edwards likewise lived a life of tragedy in the eyes of people. She was almost eighty, a widow, and despite having had a respectable career, she left it behind her, and became a missionary, only to be killed instantly in an accident while serving overseas as a missionary.
But these two lives were in no way a tragedy at all. Nor were they wasted lives. Nor did they suffer a loss. No, their loss is their eternal gain! For Jesus said, “whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel’s will save it” (Mark 8:35).
Piper then implores what he calls an ‘American Tragedy’ in the subheading, followed by the phrase ‘How Not to Finish Your One Life’:
I will tell you what a tragedy is. I will show you how to waste your life. Consider a story from the February 1998 edition of Reader’s Digest, which tells about a couple who “took early retirement from their jobs in the Northeast five years ago when he was fifty-nine and she was fifty-one. Now they live in Punta Gorda, Florida, where they cruise on their 30-foot trawler, play softball, and collect shells.” At first, when I read it I thought it might be a joke. A spoof on the American Dream. But it wasn’t. Tragically, this was the dream: come to the end of your life—your one and only precious, God-given life—and let the last great work of your life, before you give an account to your Creator, be this: playing softball and collecting shells. Picture them before Christ at the great day of judgment: “Look, Lord. See my shells.” That is a tragedy. And people today are spending billions of dollars to persuade you to embrace that tragic dream. Over against that, I put my protest: Don’t buy it. Don’t waste your life.
This retired couple were ‘living the dream’ that so many aspire for: happily married life to one’s ‘best friend’, with both working in steady, comfortable, well-paying jobs, early retirement, travel, and plenty of accumulated wealth and possessions that they need not save money. In the eyes of people, this couple had succeeded in living a life that everyone would aspire for, living an enviable life to be admired, in enjoying the pleasures, treasures, leisure, and comforts this life could offer.
But truly, truly, it is not only nothing to admire or envy. It is a tragedy, and what is even more tragic is that they thought it was a dream. And it was a dream come true in the eyes of most people, but ultimately a tragic, meaningless, worthless dream. For Jesus said, “for whoever would save his life will lose it” (Mark 8:35).
Piper makes an urgent call to all to reject that ‘tragic dream’ of simply enjoying the treasures, pleasures, leisure, and comforts of this world, imploring what a waste of life that is. Imagine telling Jesus on the Day of Judgment, “Here Lord, this is my shell collection”, or “Lord, these are my softball score sheets.”
One may ask, what exactly is the problem with collecting shells, or playing softball. The problem is not with collecting shells or playing softball or any other licit leisure activities. The problem is with pursuing mammon, instead of pursuing God, living for this world, and not for the glory of God.
Pursuing earthly treasures, pleasures, comforts, and security is to pursue mammon, walking by sight, instead of by faith, pursuing that which can be seen, and not that which is unseen. This is antithetical to walking in faith which is the ‘assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen’ (Hebrews 11:1).
The tragedy is that many, if not most, will not learn the lesson that pursuing any earthly treasure, pleasure, comfort, and security, is not only all in vain, but that all such things are vanity, until later in life when they have experienced the emptiness of it all – if ever at all.
Tragically, many will never learn this lesson and will never see their need for God. It takes a great amount of faith in God to fully accept this, and to accept this wholeheartedly and willingly. There are some who have a very strong faith from a young age and can accept this wholeheartedly and earnestly. Few people can because of the amount of faith it takes. But whoever who asks God for more faith, in humility and confidence in God that He will grant it, will receive it:
Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened. Or which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!
(Matthew 7:7-12)
Despite knowing that this life is temporal, why then do so many professing Christians settle for a life of ease, as opposed to doing great things for God? Why do so many professing Christians follow the motions of simply attending university to find a job, and establishing a career to marry and raise a family, and buy a house, and then finally retiring? Why? It begins with a lack of faith to simply trust in doing the will of God and surrendering one’s whole life to Christ.
A weak or wavering faith leads to a lack of hope that all things will be in accordance with the will of God in one’s life, no matter what. Those who love God have hope, as the scriptures declare that ‘for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose’ (Romans 8:28).
A lack of hope leads to a lack of love for God and charity towards others because one’s love for God is rooted in one’s hope that God does all things for the good of those who love Him. One’s love for God grows in having such trust in God. Charity towards others follows from one’s love towards God. A lack of faith in God leads ultimately to a lack of love towards God and others. This in turn leads to a lack of zeal for doing the will of God, a lukewarm love for God that is neither cold nor hot, and a lack of charity towards others.
What is tragic is that the vast majority of professing Christians are lukewarm Christians who profess Christ, may or may not attend church regularly, and even actively serving in church, but are just living a life of chasing mammon, like the world. They are wasting their lives away, deceiving themselves by thinking that because they attend church regularly, receive the sacraments, such as Communion, Confession and Penance regularly, and even serve in church, that they are pleasing God. All that means nothing if one’s heart does not truly love Jesus.
The sacrifices one makes for God, such as attending church, receiving the sacraments, and serving in church, count for absolutely nothing where devoid of a true love for God. For such sacrifices are not done out of a true worship of God. It is impossible to truly worship God if one’s heart is full of the love of mammon and pursuing mammon.
Yet, that is precisely the case for the majority of professing Christians, even those who devotedly attend church, bible studies and receive the sacraments. They are like the Pharisees who ‘honour [Jesus] with their lips, but their heart is far from [Him]; in vain do they worship [Him], teaching as doctrines the commandments of men’ (Matthew 15:8-9).
True worship of God is to love God, doing His will and obeying His Commandments. Only those who truly worship God and love Jesus will enter the Kingdom of Heaven. There is no true worship in the hearts of those who profess Christ but love mammon and pursue mammon.
Living Out the Fullness of One’s Purpose and Personality for the Glory of God
The only way to truly live is to find life. That life is in Jesus, who not only gives life, but is life. For Jesus said, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me” (John 14:6). God, Our Creator, is the foundation of the Universe and ‘all things were created through Him and for Him’ (Colossians 1:16).
This includes us, humankind, His Creation, each of whom was created uniquely. Isn’t it amazing how God, the Creator of the Universe, creates each person so uniquely, so intricately, so intimately, for a unique purpose that no other person or created thing has? That is truly wonderous.
Since all things were created through Him, all things display the glory of God, whether the heavens, the light, the animals, and each human being, as God intended. For humankind, the personality of each and every person as created by God was absolutely intentional, for His purpose, in according to His Sovereign Will. Importantly, personality in this sense does not merely refer to a person’s temperament, but the entirety of a person’s being. This is significant for its implications.
The first implication of this definition of personality as the entirety of a person’s being, is that a person does not consist of only their temperament, which pertains to a person’s tendency to behave, such as whether the person is sanguine, choleric, melancholic, or phlegmatic. While temperament is a significant part of a person’s personality, it does not make up the totality of their personality.
The tendency to behave only pertains as far as a person’s most likely behaviour in certain situations generally and does not account for other factors that would determine how a person would behave in each circumstance, such as moral character, values, and culture. This is evident in the vast differences in behaviours in specific circumstances, and tendency to behave among people of the same temperament. For example, one melancholic person may be very patient and tolerant, whereas another melancholic person may be very impulsive and impatient.
The second implication is that personality is both in-born as well as shaped by circumstances. Secular psychology often touches on the ‘nature versus nurture’ question and becomes fixated with the idea that certain traits are either the result of nature or nurture. Such discourse is always going back and forth over the issue, unable to resolve the question. This is because an understanding of human nature can only come by divine revelation, revelation from God, Our Creator.
The human personality is both given by God to each person, that is, in-born, as well as shaped by circumstances which God allows. Both factors are at play.
Some personality traits in a person are innate, and evident in the person from early childhood, such as their temperament and certain penchants that do not fade away with time and still exhibited in adulthood. These include traits such as introversion or extroversion, and talents such as scientific, artistic, or linguistic aptitudes. Other traits develop over time, owing to circumstances, such as empathy, understanding, sociability, and patience.
Christians often recoil against the idea of ‘being yourself’ or ‘becoming yourself’, dismissing it as worldly, secular motivational philosophy, claiming that because we have a sinful fallen nature, that we should not be ourselves, and that we should be who God wants us to be. The problem with such reasoning is that it assumes that our personality is created flawed or inherently flawed.
To the contrary, our personality as created by God is perfect but owing to our own fallen nature we tarnish it, hindering the fullness of our personalities and the manifestations of our personalities. In our fallen state, we diminish our personality, not live out its fullness for the glory of God. That even unbelievers know we should be ourselves, only shows that it is intuitive that each person knows that he has a unique personality that serves a unique purpose on earth, testifying to the fact we are all Creations of God who were made for our Creator.
As nineteenth century Danish Christian philosopher Søren Kierkegaard famously summed it up, “Now, with God’s help, I shall become myself.” He emphasised God’s help in becoming who God truly created him to be. His personality is not the problem. Sin is.
One is to be who God created one to be, which is to live out the fullness of the personality He gave to us. Our personality is truly His good gift to us. We should embrace it, not hate it. To embrace our personality is to embrace God’s good gift to us, and is an act of gratitude towards Him, not pride, arrogance, or self-love.
Even embracing one’s personality in ignorance towards the things of God is more virtuous than hating the personality He gave to us. To hate the personality God gave to us is to hate the One who gave us our personality and contend with God over the way He made us. For the scriptures say:
Woe to those who quarrel with their Maker,
those who are nothing but potsherds
among the potsherds on the ground.
Does the clay say to the potter,
‘What are you making?’
Does your work say,
‘The potter has no hands’?
(Isaiah 45:9)
We are the clay, and He is Our Potter. It is not for us to question why God made us the way He made us, or to hate the way He made us. He Created us in exactly the way He wants us to be. In our fallen state, we are as broken pottery who need to be repaired.
Our personalities are damaged and not as they should be, in need to restoration and healing, and unable to fulfil the intended purpose of the Potter. In our redeemed state, we are as fully repaired pottery who are now able to fulfill the purpose as the Potter intended.
Once our personality as God designed it to be is fully restored, our true purpose can be fulfilled. Our true purpose is defined by God, who is the Author of our lives, and our lives are like a book that unfolds before us.
The path to knowing our true personality and embracing it fully is a long, difficult, arduous, and often painful one. It is a necessary part of the healing process to restore our brokenness. Such pain does not destroy, but makes us stronger spiritually, mentally, and emotionally, strengthening the heart, soul, spirit, and mind, and draws us closer to God.
It is in the midst of our pain when God speaks to us the most clearly, revealing to us His will for the future. Pain often serves to prepare us for the future – a future filled with hope and the fulfilment of God’s Promises for us (Jeremiah 29:11).
Pain humbles, sanctifies, cleanses, and purifies us, preparing us to receive bigger and better blessings that God has in store for us. Just as with great power comes great responsibility, greater blessings come with greater responsibility in using such to bless others. To properly exercise such responsibility, one must be spiritually mature enough. When God is taking a person through a process of spiritual growth, especially a long process of spiritual development which can take years, and even decades, that is the key indication of what God’s purpose for one’s life is.
There are many examples in scripture of the process of spiritual development of a person God wants to use greatly. For forty long years, Moses was in exile in Midian, a remote place, isolated from his people, far away from the prestige of Egypt, tending his father-in-law’s sheep (Exodus 2:11-25).
As a young man, Moses was arrogant and hot-headed man, lacking all manner of meekness and patience, which led him to kill a man (Exodus 2:12). God had to teach him to be very meek and very patient before he was fit to lead them out of Egypt which required one to be very meek and very patient in caring for a constantly grumbling and ungrateful people (Exodus 16:2-26). Only when he finally reached the level of virtue required to fulfil his purpose did the long period of sanctification end.
Job suffered for years, if not decades, before he could receive even better blessings than he had previously received from God. The suffering Job endured was unspeakable. His wife left him as soon as boils broke out all over his body, and his friends constantly accused him day and night, going so far as claiming that he deserves even greater punishment for crying out in pain, further adding insult to injury.
In the midst of the suffering, little did Job know that even greater blessings had always been part of God’s plan in his life to display His glory, and not for Job to indulge in for himself. He had to endure the suffering faithfully and patiently to come to be able to accept that he must be faithful to God, even if it meant that after losing everything, nothing is restored to him.
Only when he finally learnt to fully surrender all things to God, and stop questioning God, did his period of sanctification end. Only when he forgave his three friends – which by no means easy, given the constantly uncharitable, unjust, harsh accusations they levelled against Job – did God bless him with even greater blessings (Job 42:10).
Joseph, likewise, had to endure many trials before he could fulfill his true purpose in life. Firstly, he was sold into slavery by his brothers because of their envy towards him (Genesis 37:18-36). He was purchased as a slave by Potiphar, an Egyptian officer, and served him as a slave (Genesis 39:1-3). Joseph was shortly promoted but not before long, was falsely accused of rape and subsequently imprisoned (Genesis 39:17-20).
Despite these trials, God’s favour was with him (Genesis 39:3, 21). These trials were fiery, but God always delivered as a sign of His favour, while allowing him to endure such to strengthen his faith and grow in virtue, to prepare him for his purpose – to become ruler of Egypt (Genesis 41:37-46).
Our personality needs to be restored and developed to its fullness through the development and strengthening of virtue, to serve our true purpose in accordance with the will of God. The restoration of the human personality requires healing, and its development requires trials, temptations, and tribulations.
While such a process is a long, arduous, and painful one, it is one that is ultimately liberating and freeing, giving one indescribable joy and peace within oneself, to not only know who one really is, but that one is also being who one really should be. To be free from all disorder within oneself, by walking in communion with God and being within His will for one, is the true liberation of the human personality.
Living out the fullness of one’s true purpose is to live a life that pursues the heavenly virtues, of faith, hope, and charity – virtues that this world cannot receive for these come purely by grace from God. It is a life that exhibits such virtues and does not hide it. This is what it means to be the salt and light of the world:
You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people’s feet.
You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.
(Matthew 5:13-16)
It is a life that even unbelievers will acknowledge to be virtuous and glorify God for it (1 Peter 2:12).
It is a life that is full of joy and peace that transcends all human understanding which people will be both baffled and amazed by, seeing the peace one has in spite of one’s trials, hardships, afflictions, suffering, and pain (Philippians 4:7).
It is a life full of meaning, purpose, and conviction.
It is a life that will both shock, amaze, and even inspire the unbeliever for being able bear the unbearable, suffer the unsufferable, fathom the unfathomable, and love the unloveable.
An Unwasted Life
An unwasted life is not a life of pursuing pleasure, treasure, leisure, comfort, and security which are only temporal, and not eternal. Rather, it is a life that pursues wisdom from God, and to do the will of God for one’s life. A life of seeking pleasure, treasure, leisure, comfort, and security is the most unworthy way to live. Such a life is not only a life not worthy of Christ but one that draws one further and further away from God!
Such a life may be respectable, or even enviable, in the eyes of the world: one lives to a ripe old age of ninety, has a large family and many grandchildren, a respectable career in the eyes of the world, and an outwardly moral lifestyle – all lived for oneself to satisfy the lusts of the flesh, lusts of the eyes, and pride of life. As long as life is lived only for oneself, there is no difference between such an outwardly moral person and the vilest of sinners, such as the prostitute, sodomite, or drug trafficker! For neither of them live a life worthy of Christ! Both are rebels in the eyes of God!
To not seek after God is itself spiritual adultery, for as Saint James said, “You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God” (James 4:4). This verse does not refer only to worldly professing believers but all people, whether believer or unbeliever.
As long as not seeking after God and doing His will, one is living a wasted life that has no eternal value. Not only that, one will also reap eternal punishment for the unworthy ways in which one lives, for such ways are rebellion against God. Only those who do the will of Christ out of a true, genuine love for Him will be able to enter the Kingdom of Heaven.
Only a life lived for the glory of God is unwasted, worthy of Christ, and eternal. For that is the true purpose of life, which is to live in perfect union with God, in the joy and peace of Christ. A life that does not live for the glory of God is ultimately meaningless and purposeless, for it has no eternal value, and is only passing away, all in vain. I implore you, seek God and do all things for His glory, starting now!
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