Will To Purpose

We're starting a new year here at Cross-Connection Church and beginning a new series. We are going to talk about our purpose in this world and how Christ's purpose alters our understanding of what our purpose is. So, open with us to the Gospel of Mark, chapter 10, and follow along.

Amen! Good morning! It feels like I haven't seen you guys since last year. Happy New Year! Welcome to Cross-Connection. Would you stand with me, please, and take out your Bibles? If you don't have a Bible, you can raise your hand, and one of our ushers will gladly bring you one. We're going to begin the New Year today in the Gospel of Mark, so turn to about the middle of your Bible and turn to the right. You'll find the four Gospels that begin what's called the New Testament of the Bible: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Mark, chapter 10, is where we are going to read from as we begin, and we'll pick it up at verse 35.

I'm so glad you guys braved the conditions this morning. It was so devastatingly stormy! Mark 10:35 says, "Then James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came to Jesus, two of His disciples, and said to Him, 'Teacher, we want You to do for us whatever we ask.' He said to them, 'What do you want Me to do for you?' They said to Him, 'Grant us that we may sit one on Your right hand and the other on Your left in Your glory.' But Jesus said to them, 'You do not know what you ask. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?' They said to Him, 'We are able.' So Jesus said to them, 'You will indeed drink the cup that I drink, and with the baptism I am baptized, you will be baptized. But to sit on My right hand and on My left is not Mine to give, but it is for those for whom it is prepared.'"

Father, as we open the Scriptures at the start of a new year today, I pray, God, that You would continue the work that You are desiring to do in us by the washing of the water of Your Word. That You would continue to transform us by the renewing of our minds so that our...

Lives would display daily Your good and perfect will in this world. We would be transformed more and more into the likeness of Your children, and Your nature would be evident; it would be manifest in us. So, God, we come and ask that by Your word and by the working of Your Spirit, You would continue that work. We ask it in Jesus' name, and all those who agreed said, "Amen." You may be seated.

Since 2014, I have begun each year here at Cross Connection by spending the first three Sundays of the year rehearsing or refreshing our minds on the vision that we have as a church: why we exist and who we are. It would be the easiest thing in the world for me to do just that, and I’m convinced that it would not be a useless or unhelpful endeavor. I think it’s really good for us to be reminded of who we are as a church and why we exist.

However, I took a short vacation with my wife last week, and we were visiting some friends up in Santa Barbara. We were staying with my good friend David Guzik and his wife. Last Sunday, we went to a new church that has been started in Santa Barbara County. It started out of Calvary Chapel Santa Barbara, where Pastor David was the pastor for seven years. We attended this new church plant, which is just about a year old.

While the message was being given by a friend of mine, Pastor Nate Wagner, I found that my mind began to wander. I know none of you ever have that happen while you’re at church. I was listening to the message; in fact, I even took some notes. However, as he was sharing the things he was sharing while looking forward to the new year, I was impressed that the Lord had a word for me, and that maybe that word was for us as well.

As we come into 2019, that word had everything to do with purpose. Let me begin with a simple question: How many of you, at the start of this year, began this year with a New Year’s resolution? Any of you? Lift up your hand high so I can take in mine. Some of you did. It is interesting that every year in the United States of America, research shows that about forty to forty-five percent of Americans have some sort of a New Year’s resolution—something that they start the new year off with, a goal and aim, or some new thing that they want to accomplish.

Not many of you raised your hands, probably because you've done that in the past and realized the reality. Research shows that about forty to forty-five percent of Americans begin with a New Year's resolution. By about day ninety of the year, less than half of those people are continuing to maintain that resolution. By the time you reach the six-month mark, about eighty to ninety percent of people have given up on their New Year's resolutions. It can be a challenge.

Of course, the new year, the date from December 31st to January 1st, is kind of an arbitrary creation of humanity. Some people give up on their New Year's resolutions altogether, saying they won't even do that. However, when you look at the information and research about New Year's resolutions, the typical resolution for people starting off is, what do you think? Lose weight. That is at the top of the list. Some of you may have tried that one before.

Following losing weight, the next most common resolution is to begin an exercise program, which ties into the whole idea of losing weight. Then, some people come into the new year and say, "I resolve to read more," or "I resolve to be more intentional in my relationships." Others might say, "I resolve to love my spouse and my children more," or "I resolve to get out of debt, to start a budget, to save more."

All of these things are really good; there is nothing bad about those resolutions or goals. But why do we do them? Why set the goal? Why make a resolution? While all of these may be good things, it is important to understand the purpose behind them—the answer to the question of why.

For example, when someone says, "I resolve to begin an exercise program or to lose weight," they might say it is because they think that will help them be healthier. The "because" is important; the "why" is important. Similarly, someone might say, "I resolve to read more because it will make me more intelligent or perhaps a more fascinating person to talk with."

Another might say, "I resolve to be more intentional in my relationships because I believe those relationships will improve, and my life will be more enjoyable." Finally, someone might resolve to get out of debt or save money because they think it will relieve anxiety in their life or enable them to achieve other goals.

I want to be more of a giver with the things that I have. Quite frankly, I think we all acknowledge—especially by the hands that were raised—that there were quite a few more people who did not raise their hands when we talked about resolutions. Resolutions are difficult, and they are all the more challenging if you don't understand the purpose for which you're making the resolution. If you don't have an undergirding purpose for that goal or aim, it is less likely that you will follow through on it.

This leads us to point number one on our sermon guide: having a purpose is exceedingly important. It is essential to have or understand your purpose. A number of you, after graduating from high school, went away to college or university. At a certain point in that experience, most schools require that you declare a major. You say, "I'm here for X purpose," and as soon as you determine what that purpose is, it adjusts your orientation for school to the classes that you'll take and moves you toward that purpose.

Unfortunately, there are a lot of people in colleges and universities today who are kind of there without a clear purpose. As a result, they meander through their education, and along the way, they may pick up one, two, or even five degrees while racking up a nice bill for their parents. Some of you, or perhaps the parents, have experienced this whole situation. Without a purpose, they just meander through that experience.

I would suggest that the same is true in life. If we don't have a clearly articulated purpose, we begin to meander, and as we meander, we start to lose meaning. It has been discovered that meaning in life is connected to purpose. Some people even believe that purpose creates meaning. Research has shown that more than pursuing happiness, people are pursuing and desiring a meaningful life. I talked in our last series, just before Christmas, about this pursuit of happiness. We live in a culture that is geared toward pursuing happiness, but more than that, people are seeking deep meaning in their lives.

Meaning and happiness are not always connected. You can go through unhappy circumstances and difficult situations that are not happiness-inducing, yet still maintain a sense of meaning. There have been people who have experienced this.

I know people in our church who have gone through the unhappy experience of cancer, and yet in the midst of that experience, they find deep meaning in what they're going through. Meaning and happiness are not always connected. You can experience deep, meaningful experiences in life and not necessarily experience happiness.

Our culture, and most people, are often looking for happiness. Blaise Pascal, the French philosopher, said that all men seek happiness. However, I think you could go a step further and say that mostly what people are looking for is meaning, and meaning is the result of purpose. Purpose is obviously an important topic, and we can see that it is significant just by looking at some of the books and publications that are the biggest bestsellers in our culture.

Maybe some of you read the book that came out in 2002, which became an immediate bestseller. It was written by Pastor Rick Warren and is called The Purpose Driven Life. It spent more than 90 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list, and to date, it has sold more than 60 million copies. It has been translated into dozens of languages. People are desiring purpose and asking, "How do I have a purposeful, meaningful life? I want to have a Purpose Driven life."

I don't think I can talk about the topic of meaning and purpose without returning to a book that I have revisited quite a few times over the last couple of years, called Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl. I find this book to be really amazing, and I have encouraged you to check it out before.

On page 76 of the book, Viktor Frankl, who lived for several years in German concentration camps during the First and Second World Wars, writes this: "Any attempt to restore a man's inner strength in the camp had first to succeed in showing him some future goal." Friedrich Nietzsche's words, "He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how," could be the guiding motto for all psychotherapeutic and psycho-hygienic efforts regarding prisoners.

Whenever there was an opportunity for it, one had to give them a why and an aim for their lives in order to strengthen them to bear the terrible how of their existence. Woe to him who saw no more sense in life, no aim, no purpose, and therefore no point in carrying on; he was soon lost. The typical reply with which such a man rejected all encouraging arguments was, "I have nothing to expect from life anymore."

The challenging thing to consider, according to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), is that suicide was the second leading cause of death among individuals between the ages of 10 and 34 in 2016. Think about that for a second: the second leading cause of death among individuals aged 10 to 34 in 2016 was suicide, and it hasn't gotten much better.

I shared the statistic that came out in late November a few times as we were approaching Christmas. The CDC reported that for the third consecutive year—2016, 2017, and 2018—life expectancy in the United States has gone down. Not considerably, not by months or years, but by weeks or days. This trend is not good. The two factors driving this trend are suicide and opioid addiction. Oftentimes, opioid addiction is linked to drug use stemming from extreme physical or mental pain. People are trying to cope with the mental and physical pain they are experiencing, often through self-medication or sometimes prescribed medication.

The leading cause of death during these years, according to the CDC, was poisoning, which also includes overdose by drug use. This is a significant problem that is happening, and I want to suggest that the fleeting sense of meaning and purpose identifiable in culture here in the United States and the Western part of the world, along with the increase in opioid use and suicide, are not disconnected. I propose that these issues go together; they may not be causal, but they definitely correlate.

The challenge is that our society, for the better part of the last century and perhaps even longer, has been telling us that we are just the highest form of animal and that we are the result of random chance and mutation over billions of years. This scientific, atheistic, evolutionary mindset suggests that we are merely the highest form of animal produced by random chance and mutation, and as a result, there is no ultimate purpose.

That’s where that naturalistic, materialistic philosophy ultimately takes you. There is no ultimate meaning, and there is no ultimate purpose. Since that’s the case, you have to come up with purpose on your own; you need to manufacture meaning for yourself. Every individual needs to manufacture meaning for themselves. This is the ultimate end of a materialistic, naturalistic mindset. It leads to what’s called nihilism. Nihilism is the belief that there is no real ultimate meaning.

If you ever read anything from Friedrich Nietzsche, you know that this is exactly what he was predicting in his day. He assumed there is no God and wrote about the death of God in Western culture. He ultimately arrived at a nihilistic worldview, but he understood that his perspective was too soon. I encourage you to read "The Madman," which is only about four paragraphs long. It’s a parable of the madman who goes through the streets proclaiming, "God is dead! God is dead! And we have killed him!" He questions what shall become of us, the murderers of God. What’s going to happen to society when this occurs? He predicted that there would be a nihilistic meaninglessness that would follow. He was about 150 to 200 years too early, but that’s exactly what we have seen happen.

It’s important to recognize, as Dr. Alan Bloom said, that ideas have consequences. One of the consequences of the idea that there is no God is the loss of meaning. The 20th-century German philosopher Martin Heidegger stated, "If God is dead, then nothing more remains which man can cling to and by which he can order himself." To me, that sounds like hopelessness.

In this context of manufacturing your own meaning, we find ourselves left with the conclusion that, as well-renowned atheist Sam Harris says, the only meaning we have is found in the moment. We have to live for the now. This philosophy is reminiscent of Oprah Winfrey’s idea that you have to live for the moment right now. What this starts to develop in people, especially when you add social media—Instagram, Facebook—is reflected in the hashtags we see.

Hashtag FOMO, or the fear of missing out, is prevalent today. Many people experience this fear when they see their friends or those they follow on social media. Everyone curates their social media feeds, showcasing only the best moments: the amazing dinners, the exciting experiences with friends, and the fun times at concerts. As you scroll through these posts, you may find yourself at home feeling left out, grappling with FOMO. This phenomenon is often accompanied by the hashtag YOLO, which stands for "you only live once."

It's interesting, albeit somewhat sad, to observe how this mindset has permeated 21st-century Western culture, particularly in the United States. We are constantly told to live in the moment and seize every opportunity because we only have one life. This idea is echoed by Sam Harris, a leading podcaster whose show is listened to by millions each week.

On the other hand, there is Jordan Peterson, a clinical psychologist and professor at the University of Toronto. He has written a bestselling book titled "Twelve Rules for Life," which has gained significant attention over the past two years. In his book, Peterson discusses the concept of living for immediate pleasure, stating that while the pleasure of expediency may be fleeting, it is still pleasure. He suggests that this fleeting pleasure is worth pursuing, especially when weighed against the terror and pain of existence.

Peterson poses a thought-provoking question: why not take everything you can and enjoy it whenever the opportunity arises? He challenges us to consider whether there is an alternative that is more powerful and compelling than the nihilistic, life-based existentialism prevalent in 21st-century American culture. This is a crucial question, and I believe there is indeed an alternative.

My belief leads to this grounding proposition: the purpose of Jesus gives our life a more meaningful purpose. This is the proposition I want to consider over the next three Sundays, including today, in a series called "Life on Purpose." The purpose of Jesus provides a more meaningful purpose than what is offered by the likes of Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins, or the late Christopher Hitchens.

Since 2012, I have had the opportunity to work with many individuals who are starting new churches, a process we call church planting. I have worked with an organization called Calvary Church Planting Network, and as a result, I have also been able to teach at Calvary Chapel Bible College, just north of here. I teach a church planting class about four times a year, and I will start teaching that again in just three weeks.

When I get together with church planters, one of the things you discover is that starting a new church is similar to any entrepreneurial endeavor, such as starting a new business or organization. There are some differences, but there is a lot of similarity. One of the key aspects is that when you are working with someone who is engaged in an entrepreneurial venture—whether it’s starting a business, an organization, or a church—you want to help them clearly define and articulate their purpose, mission, vision, and values.

We always work in that progression: purpose, mission, vision, and then the values that support all of that. You have to start with purpose because it is from that purpose that you derive your mission. Your mission is to fulfill your purpose, and your vision is how you will fulfill your purpose. Therefore, you must clearly identify what your purpose is.

What fascinates me is that when you come into the Gospels—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John—I just started reading through the Gospel of Matthew again as we enter a new year. I encourage you to do the same. We are currently in chapter four, reading through a chapter a day in the New Testament every weekday. It’s really easy to follow along if you want to join me. I have a website called the Listening Plan that works through the New Testament in a year.

As I went through the opening of the Gospel of Matthew, I realized that over the next two and a half months, we will be in the Gospels. As you read through Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, you discover...

Jesus, on about a dozen occasions, clearly articulates his own words regarding his purpose for coming here. He does this in what you begin to see as "I have come" statements. He explicitly says, "I have come for X."

If you do a little research and search for what people think Jesus was all about—just look online for "Why did Jesus come?" or "What was his purpose?"—you will find that there are many opinions about Jesus's purpose. However, very few of those opinions are well-founded, and hardly any come directly from his mouth. Therefore, I think it's really valuable to examine the Scriptures. It would be a great Bible study for you to highlight every time in the Gospels when Jesus says, "I have come for this."

I have been doing this for several years and have compiled a list of probably 12 or 13 of these statements on a notes program in my iPhone. I go through and keep track of them, always looking to see if there is one that I missed.

Over the next few weeks, we are going to look at three of Jesus's purpose statements. I am convinced that when we begin to understand and grasp what his purpose was, then we, who trust in Jesus and follow him—called disciples in the Bible—will find that his purpose begins to inform, affect, and even infect our own purpose. This leads to a more meaningful experience.

We begin first in this passage in Mark chapter 10. If you have your Bible open to it, we read the first verses, which lay the context for his purpose statement that is going to come in Mark chapter 10. It is a really interesting context.

Two of Jesus's disciples, as he is journeying to Jerusalem, are part of this narrative. This is a significant point in Jesus's life and ministry, as he is going to Jerusalem for the last time. He knows that he will be betrayed by one of his disciples, condemned by the Romans and the Jewish leaders of the day, and ultimately crucified. He has been trying to prepare his disciples for this, explicitly telling them, "We are going to Jerusalem, and this is what is going to happen." However, they do not fully understand.

As they are on their way, two of his disciples—one named John and the other named James, who are brothers—come to Jesus. John is considered to be probably the youngest of Jesus's disciples, so it is very likely that he is still a teenager. James and John approach Jesus and say, "Jesus, we want you to do for us whatever..."

We ask, now that's kind of the way that most people approach prayer with God, right? It's like drive-through: "Jesus, I want a double-double, animal style." That's generally the way people approach prayer with God. They want God to do for them whatever they desire.

This isn't new. I mean, James and John, the first disciples, were saying the same thing to Jesus. When you first read that, you kind of anticipate a rebuke from Jesus, right? You expect Him to totally reject that request, but He doesn't. Instead, He says, "Okay, what do you want me to do for you?" They respond, "We want you to have us sit, one on your right and one on your left, when you come into your kingdom." Basically, they're saying they want the most prominent positions. They recognize that Jesus is number one; they just want to be on either side of Him in His kingdom.

The awesome part is that in one of the other Gospels, James and John get their mom involved. They figure, you know, He can't say no to mom, and who could say no to a Jewish grandma? So, there she comes, asking for them to have the most prominent and important positions in His kingdom.

Now, James and John, and not just them but the other disciples of Jesus, had a mindset that purpose and meaning are found in power and greatness. That was their view. What was the thing that the disciples argued about in the Gospels? Who would be the greatest? They asked Jesus this on a number of occasions. Who's going to be the greatest? Sometimes they would just talk about it among themselves, saying, "I'm going to be the greatest because..." Then Jesus would have to say, "Hey, what are you guys talking about?" They would respond, "Oh, nothing, nothing."

In their minds, purpose and meaning were found in power and greatness. I would say that there are probably a lot of people in 21st-century Western culture who still believe that purpose and meaning are found in power and greatness. The way that people define or describe power and greatness is different, though. If you talk to a dozen different people and ask them, "What is power? What is greatness in life?" you would probably get eight, ten, maybe twelve different answers. For some people, power and greatness in our day are found in likes and subscribers on social media. Now, that may sound absurd to you, but there's more to it.

Some people feel that the most important aim of their lives is to get more subscribers and more likes. I was reading an article about one of these individuals last night. He is a Swedish guy who lives in Los Angeles, and his name is PewDiePie. You may have heard of him; that's his name on YouTube. He has 79 million subscribers on the platform. Just wrap your brain around that—it's more than the NFL gets, multiple times more than the NFL gets in a week. The nightly news, national news, gets about a million and a half views every time.

PewDiePie posts videos five to seven days a week, and every time he posts a video, he gets six to nine million views. When he says something to his subscribers, they take it as gospel. People are concerned about this because he has power. This 29-year-old Swedish immigrant in the United States is sitting in front of a computer playing video games on Twitch. What is that? That's power. That's greatness for some people.

For others, power and greatness are found in the amount of commas and zeros in their net worth. One of these individuals you might know is Mark Cuban. Mark Cuban has an organization called Three Commas. What does "Three Commas" mean? It refers to a net worth of a billion dollars. You can't be a part of his organization without three commas. That's power and greatness.

Other people believe that power and greatness come from being at the top of business or politics. They think they will find power and greatness through political endeavors. Some believe that they will achieve power and greatness by accumulating letters after their names—academic credentials. They think that if they get more letters after their names, that will make them powerful and great.

People define power and greatness in different ways. We understand that this is the orientation of the world. In Mark 10:42, Jesus says, "You know that the so-called rulers in the world, the Gentile world, the heathen world, our world, the so-called rulers in our world, lord it over people. They hold their power over people, and the great men have absolute power." People are seeking power and greatness. Friedrich Nietzsche believed that this was the driving force of all humanity, which he called the "will to power."

Power, the desire for power, he said, is what drives all humanity. The will to power, the desire for achievement, for ambition, and the striving to reach the highest possible position—this may be the way things are in the world. That was the observation of Nietzsche, and it is evident in many different aspects of our culture today.

However, look at what Jesus says. For Jesus and His kingdom, things are different. In Matthew chapter 10, verse 43, it states, "Yet it shall not be so among you." This is the way it is in the world, but it shall not be so among you. Whoever desires to become great among you shall be your servant, and whoever desires to be first among you shall be slave of all.

Point number three on your outline is that the purpose of Jesus is contrary to the natural inclination of man. We have a nature that inclines us toward some aim. Nietzsche says it was the will to power, and as you look around our culture, that is how many people live their lives—trying to gain some sort of ascendancy in the hierarchy. There is a lot of talk about this in our culture today, and that is what we see in the world. But Jesus says, "It shall not be so among you."

Now, He is speaking to His disciples. If you have trusted in Jesus and consider yourself a follower of Him, then He is speaking to you. You are a disciple, and when He says, "It shall not be so among you," He is calling His followers to a higher purpose. He is asserting that He has a purpose for you that is greater than the purpose you are naturally inclined toward. He proposes that it will be better for you, more meaningful for you, if you engage with this purpose.

So, He says, "Whoever desires to become great, to become first..." This is one of those places in the Gospels where you encounter this a few times. His disciples are asking how to become great, and you might anticipate that Jesus would rebuke them, questioning why they want to become great. This is somewhat akin to a Buddhistic perspective, which suggests that you must do away with all self-desire to find meaning.

However, these people come to Jesus and say they want to become great, and He does not say, "Oh, you shall not want that; you have to deny that desire." Instead, He responds, "Okay, you want to become great? Here’s how: If you want to be first, if you want to be great, then you shall become a servant; you shall become a slave of all."

The first purpose statement of Jesus is found in Mark 10:45: "For even the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve and to give His life a ransom for many." This is the first of about a dozen purpose statements, and we will look at three. Jesus emphasizes that the Son of Man did not come to be served; instead, He came to serve and to give His life as a ransom for many.

Jesus employs a very Jewish rabbinical form called antithetical parallelism. He speaks a truth with two parallel ideas that are opposing. He presents it once in the negative and once in the positive. He states, "I came not to be served." In our culture, we often think that if you are great or powerful, you have many people who do your bidding. However, Jesus, the Son of Man, did not come to be served. Instead, He came to serve, and the expression of that service is in giving His life as a ransom for many—a payment for others.

Point number four on your outline is that the purpose of Christ was sacrificial service. This is not the only purpose of Jesus, but it is an important one. In fact, this is the theme verse of the Gospel of Mark: "The Son of Man came not to be served but to serve and to give His life a ransom for many." This statement tells us about His purpose. Why did Jesus come to the earth? It wasn't to heal sickness, though He did that. It wasn't to feed the hungry, though He did that. It wasn't to raise the dead, though He did that. It wasn't to be a revolutionary, though in many ways, you could say He was quite revolutionary, transforming the Western world and continuing to transform the rest of the world.

However, that wasn't His aim. Those were byproducts, not the primary purpose for which He came. His purpose, as He states, is that the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve and to give His life as a ransom for many. This is my purpose. Now, He did all kinds of other things; He healed the sick.

Jesus fed those who were hungry, raised the dead, cast demons out of people, and taught. He did all these great things, but underneath all that was an important driving purpose. Every single one of you, on a daily basis, has various responsibilities as an employee, a boss, a husband, a wife, a family member, a son, a daughter, a father, or a brother. There are certain things you do, but underneath that, there needs to be a driving purpose that gives all of those actions greater meaning.

I want to suggest to you that when you fully begin to grasp and understand the purpose of Jesus, it will alter your own purpose and make your life all the more meaningful. You will be living for a higher purpose. This is really important. Immediately after the first service this morning, a man came up to me. It was his first Sunday here, and I didn't even know why he came. He sat in the back and said, "Listen, I've been suicidal the last few weeks because I don't know what I'm here for." He added, "I think this message was exactly for me." I asked him if he had been following me around, but I know who has been following him around.

Understand that this is really important. It was so significant that Jesus, before he died, the night before he was crucified, said, "This is so important; I want you to never forget it." He instructed us to do this in remembrance of Him, giving His life as a ransom for many. We partake of the bread and the cup, which we begin our New Year with every single year. We do it every seventh Sunday here at Cross-Connection Church to remember His body that was broken for us and His blood that was shed for us. This is to remind us of His defining purpose: He came not to be served, but to serve and to give His life as a ransom for many.

What was the result of this? I want you to do your homework. Write it down on your little sermon guide. Here’s your homework: read Philippians chapter 2, verses 1 through 11, and see the outcome of Jesus's sacrifice. What was the result of the one who thought it not robbery to be equal with God but made Himself of no reputation?

No reputation, taking on the form of a servant, became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross. The result was, look it up: Philippians chapter 2, verses 1 through 11. It will take you 45 seconds to read it later on today.

So, Jesus said, "I want you to remember this because it's really important." I’m going to invite Christian and the worship band to come up and lead us. Our ushers are going to come in; they’re going to bring the trays to take the bread and the cup. Just hold on to them until the end.

As we hold these, remember that Jesus's purpose was to lay down His life as a ransom for many. He says, "I don't want you to forget this because it's so important." I want you to think, as you hold these things, how does the purpose of Jesus alter the way I see my day-to-day activities?

Consider the things you are doing at work, at school, in the home, in the neighborhood, and in the community. How does it change the way we perceive what we are doing? I suggest that it will change your framing and understanding of your purpose in that place.

You might feel like you are just doing this job because you have to, because this was the career you got an education for, and you have been doing it for 15 years. You may feel like you have nothing else you can do and no idea why you are there. I suggest to you that you are there because God placed you there for His purpose and aim.

Father, I pray that You would open our hearts to receive from You as we think about these things. Direct our attention to You as we sing this song. May the lyrics direct our focus to You. As we hold tangibly in our hands this little piece of cracker and this little cup of juice, let them remind us of what You did in laying Your life down for us. God, cause it to affect our understanding of why we are here right now. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.

Jesus, on the night that He was betrayed, took with His disciples a Passover meal. At a certain point, He took bread, blessed it, broke it, gave it to His disciples, and said, "This is My body, which is broken for you. Do this in remembrance of Me." In the same manner, after they had eaten...

He took the cup and said, "This is the New Covenant in my blood. Just do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of me." After He did that, I wonder if the disciples were not a little bewildered. They didn't fully understand what was going on, and they wouldn't until the following day.

As they looked forward to it, we look back and remember Your body broken and bruised for us, Your blood shed for us. This You did because You came to give Your life as a ransom, to serve and not be served. Your purpose was characterized by sacrificial service—a life laid down for the lives of others. This was not just a physical, temporary life, but an eternal life for others.

Lord, You have given us in that a message of eternal life, a message to share with those we work with, play sports with, go to school with, live next door to, and are related to. I could think of no higher purpose than to share the greatness of this good news: that it is a life beyond this life, and it makes this life even better.

So, God, I pray that You would help us to take hold of this, and that Your purpose would change how we frame and understand ours. Praise You, Jesus.

Let's stand together. You can pass your cups to the center aisles as we continue to sing this song to the Lord.