We have asked the first question in developing a worldview, Who am I? If you remember, Postmodern Materialistic Relativism (PMR), which is our cultures worldview, says we are nothing more than evolved goo, the product of blind chance and processes. On the other hand, when you ask the God of Christianity, Yahweh, the Covenant God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, you are answered quite differently. To everyone born on earth, since the beginning, he says something like the following: Who are you? You are the crown and glory of my creation. Above all created things I chose you to bear my image, male and female, so that by your life you might display me in this world. You are each crafted by me, given uniqueness possessed by no other living beings, and each of you is given uniqueness no other “you” possesses. Inherent dignity and value constitute your identity, because you are from me. It is not what you do, or don’t do, look like or don’t look like, which gives you value, rather it is simply that you are an “I;” a reality separate from me, made by me out of nothing, and in you is my image. You are mine. You were meant to relate to me in everything.

Wonderful, majestic, and holy are these truths! We cannot begin to fathom our existence before God save that divine revelation has given it to us! Imagine the chasm, the gulf, even the Grand Canyon that lies between PMR’s answer and God’s answer to Who am I? They are opposite realities. And I would simply ask you: Which one is true to reality and the desires of your heart? Does it not fit and does it not sing within you that we exist by another’s will? Of course it does. This is the “who” of worldview. It is true, always, and for all people. But now we ask, the “why” of worldview; why are we here? What is our purpose?

Again, let us begin by seeing what our PMR offers us, how it answers the question, Why am I here? Voddie Baucham gives PMR’s answer to this question with a nice motto: Get all you can; can all you can get; and sit on the can.1 What he is saying is kind of like the old saying I grew up hearing, he who dies with the most toys wins. Use all your talent, abilities, and resources to get whatever brings happiness to you. When you get it, “can it.” Canning may be foreign to you, but it is a process of preserving things, like vegetables, for the winter, when vegetables tend to be unavailable. Of course we have refrigerators now and super transportation that has basically rendered canning (in the old sense) a thing of the past. But think about how Americans consume, gather and then invest. You know, “Make a big retirement fund. Make money now so you can play later! Get a big car, a big house, and keep them in tip top shape. Collect old toys, cards, and sports memorabilia. Update, update, update! Get the latest computer, car, or entertainment systems!” And even an uglier idea: "get a new wife or husband; or a new face, new or enhanced or augmented body parts and on and on, ad nauseam.”

You see in our culture’s thinking, if this life is simply chance, life is now survival of the fittest. My survival and happiness depends upon my power to get what I want, and if you have what I want, I will get it by whatever means necessary, even if it hurts you. Truth be told, we will even hurt our physical bodies, or alter our physical bodies to get what we want. After all, according to PMR, there is no purpose or reason why I should not! Further, I will protect the things I get from others. Maybe you could think about hip/hop culture, and some of the videos you may have seen, and its emphasis on what you have and how you are pleased. If someone gets in the way, there is no hesitation to do immoral things, like kill, rape, lie, or steal. Seems pretty low does it not? Yet how often do we murder, not with a gun, but with our tongue, when someone gets in the way of what we want, be it a parent or a friend? I would say often! The world’s broken worldview is in us all, and the wrong answer to Why am I here? drives our choices, actions, thought and words! Let me give you a test to determine what grid you might think through. Kudos to Peter Kreeft for this test. Here are two mental pictures:

1) Angelina Jolie

2) Mother Teresa

Who are you more attracted to? [This is not, by the way, a guy/girl thing!!!] Rather, who would you like to spend the day with? Would you enjoy the slums of India and Bangladesh amongst the world’s poorest of the poor, where the smell of human waste and death is so pungent you would pass out? Or would you prefer an afternoon on the Sunset Strip in a 2008 Mercedes Convertible meeting and greeting the upper crust of society, with all the good things in life at your fingertips? Who would you like hanging on your arm giving you a personal tour of where they live? The one you would choose from your heart strikingly reveals your answer to "Why am I here?"

Surely we all see how the PMR worldview is very wrong and broken. Even if you aren’t a Christian, when you see oppression and injustice you cry, Unfair!, and rightly so. All of us, even the most hardened and hated criminals, do not want to be oppressed or treated unjustly. Yet we daily make choices that speak loud and clear to why we think we are here: to get, can, and sit! We are very happy to treat other unjustly, and even ignore those who are treated poorly!

But how does God answer this question, Why am I here? To answer this, let’s begin in Colossians 1:15–17. This is a depiction of who Jesus was and is. Paul, the author, says, “He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by him . . . all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.”

Simply put, Jesus is God. He made everything. But why did he create? And does he sustain everything? For one purpose, given at the end of verse 18: “And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent [or supreme].” There it is; the answer we all want! Why are we here? Answer: So that my Son, the very radiance and icon of my being, would be supreme in the universe. You may say, “OK . . . great . . . ummmm . . . what does that mean?” Try this: It means when you open your mouth to say anything, or you think any thought in your mind, or you do anything with or to your body, or you take anything from or give anything to another, you do it all with the heart motive of adoring Jesus Christ! We are here for him, not for getting things!

Voddie Baucham, says, “God is for you having things; God is against things having you.”2 Think of Gollum’s ring in that great scene at the beginning of The Fellowship of the Ring, when Gandalf asks Bilbo to give up the ring he took from Gollum in The Hobbit. Bilbo begins his reply with ignorance, but soon is in full blown anger over Gandalf’s request. Gandalf replies, “But there is no need to get angry.” And here are the famous words, ripe with connotations of how things have us: “If I am [angry] it is your fault,’ said Bilbo. ‘It is mine, I tell you. My own. My precious. Yes, my precious.” As the scene escalates, Bilbo intends to slay his best friend Gandalf over the one ring! The ring definitely had Bilbo! Bilbo’s existence (Who am I?) and purpose (Why am I here?) are threatened by the ring. Rather than ruling over it, and getting rid of it for the good of Middle-Earth, he is ruled by it, adores it, and is ready to lay down all that is truly precious (Frodo, the Shire, Gandalf) for all that is pseudo-precious, indeed for all that is untrue!3

But God tells us he made us for himself. He has us. He made us each in his image, male and female, and each of us peculiar and unique, be it our shape (body, face, height, weight etc.), or our abilities (learning, doing, and remembering). Each of us is equal before God, with the same purpose of glorifying God. He made Angelina Jolie look like Angelina Jolie. He made Mother Teresa look like Mother Teresa, not Angelina! Both equal in value and dignity, made in his image, female. Now of course, Angelina Jolie and Mother Teresa have gone polar opposites in carrying out God’s purpose for them, and we will get into what happened in our next lesson.

But here is the amazing wonder of God (who in himself is infinitely different): we each show different aspects of God. Christianity teaches that God’s purpose is to display his infinitely differentiated Self to a billion other selves, and see it all reflect back unto him in a dazzling light filled with all the spectrums of color, sound, smell, touch, and thought, which are all from God to begin with!4 Here the display is not only for us to see, but also for us to delight and enjoy and adore! As the prophet Habakkuk said, “For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD as the waters cover the sea” (2:14). Why? We truly cherish differences, even in our fallen world. The reason I love my wife is because she is different from me, and within me God put stuff that was wired to really love and appreciate her in her differences. Of course the big one is that she is female! Praise God! How much more then, will we worship God! It must be that who God is and what he does covers the earth. It is our only hope of fulfilling who we are and why we are here!

So we are here on this earth to allow God to squeeze out of us all that God has put into us (and into the world for that matter) to the end that he is supreme in all things.5 That is our purpose for existing. This is why you and I are here!

To help you better understand this, read these three passages of scripture: Matthew 17:1–6; Matthew 26:6–13; and Luke 10:38–42. Then answer these questions:

1. What does adoration (i.e. worship, making him supreme) of Jesus look like for the characters in these stories (Peter, Mary, and Mary)?

2. Why do Peter, Mary of Magdela (the woman traditionally thought to anoint Jesus), and Mary respond to Jesus as they do? What did they see?

3. How do others respond to the Marys’ responses of being in Jesus presence?

4. Do you side with the disciples and Martha, or with the Marys?

Your answers to these questions will help you better understand your purpose of showing Christ as supreme in everything. Basically, because of the infinite moral and aesthetic beauty seen in the life, death and resurrection of the Son of God, we should lavish all that was once precious to us, and use all God has put into us, to worship him and lead others to worship him!

As we close for this time, let me ask you, Why are you here? If I followed you and listened to you, and knew you, would you fit in God’s world and his purpose? The answer is most likely a loud “No.” Our next lesson will explore “What’s wrong!”

Nate Smith is the Assistant Pastor and Director of Youth Discipleship at Riveroaks Reformed Presbyterian Church in Germantown, TN