A few weeks ago I saw this quote from Audrey Hepburn posted on social media:
‘The most important thing is to enjoy your life – to be happy – it’s all that matters’.
I see lots of quotes posted on social media and usually I just scroll past. But this quote jumped out at me. It got under my skin and unsettled me.
For the next few weeks I thought about why this quote affected me in this way. And I realised that it was due to what I have come to believe about the true purpose of our lives.
This Lent
At the beginning of Lent this year my husband and I committed to fasting and praying for our youngest son every Friday. He had left home this year to go to university and its not been an easy year. Although he has engaged really well with the student lifestyle – going out, drinking, sleeping all day, partying all night – he has not found his course enjoyable.
When he started life as a student he had ambitions for getting a part time job, joining some university societies and going to a local gym. Instead some days he’s found that he struggled to get out of bed. The dreaded ‘freshers flu’ wiped him out for most of the first term and he has struggled with anxiety and depression.
Finding purpose
You might be wondering what this has got to do with the Audrey Hepburn quote?
Well, if you’d asked me at the beginning of Lent what my prayer for my son was, it would have been for him to be happy. Surely that’s a pretty normal desire for those we love?
However as we’ve spent the last six weeks fasting and praying, that is no longer my prayer for him.
My prayer now is that he finds a sense of purpose and that he discovers his true identity. I want him to live the sort of life Jesus promises in John 10:10 (MSG):
A thief is only there to steal and kill and destroy. I came so they can have real and eternal life, more and better life than they ever dreamed of.
Freedom from captivity
Jesus isn’t talking about us being simply being happy. He is talking about us being liberated and released to live fully as the people we are created by God to be. Jesus wants us to become fully alive.
This is the life I want for my children, real and eternal life that is better than anything I can imagine for them. I want them to know the reason they are alive, to know their purpose and to live as the person God created them to be.
Poverty of identity
At Hope into Action we seek to address three forms of poverty which underpin homelessness: a poverty of resources, relationship and identity.
We provide homeless people with the resource of a house along with relationships with a friendship and support team from a local church.
Addressing the poverty of identity is often the deepest challenge of all but also the most important. There is nothing better than helping someone to discover who they are, the purpose for which they were made and their reason for living.
Serving others
And this is where we need to point towards the God in whose image we are all made. The God revealed in Jesus, who served others and gave up his life for us on the cross.
If his purpose was to serve others, and we are made in his image, then surely our purpose will be towards others as well?
If we focus inwards on ourselves and trying to make ourselves happy we will miss out on the true riches of life. As Jesus says in Matthew 10:38 (MSG):
“If your first concern is to look after yourself, you’ll never find yourself. But if you forget about yourself and look to me, you’ll find both yourself and me.
To find ourselves and to be fulfilled we need to look upwards and outwards.
Purpose for the lost
Finding our identity in Christ will not bring happiness as the world knows it. But maybe it could bring a release of anxiety to a generation that seem overwhelmed by it. A sense of purpose to those who are lost.
Perhaps we need to be less fixed on ‘being happy’ and more focused on being the person God created us to be?
So I leave you with a challenge, who do you know who needs liberation and who you would love to see living life to the full? This Easter, how could you commit through prayer or friendship to support this?
Laura Cuthill works for Hope into Action. Watch this brief video about our work:
Grace + Truth 