Lesson 24: What Gives Meaning to Your Life?

“I no longer call you servants… but friends” John 15:15.

People search for life’s meaning in many ways. Wealth. Power. Status. Possessions. As alluring as these may be, people who achieve them are seldom satisfied. Often it is not until our later years that we fully grasp the extraordinary value of our relationships.

As we read in the last lesson, we are made members of Jesus’ kingdom the moment we are saved. Of course, if we accept Him as our Savior as a young child, we still have some growing up to do in earthly terms. But even adults who accept Him as Savior have some kingdom-learning to do. We continue to grow in faith and in the grace and knowledge of Jesus every day for the rest of our lives here on earth (2 Peter 3:18).

However, many of us get side-tracked in life, looking for meaning in the words at the beginning of this lesson. Many funerals are preached with the regretful words, “I wish I had spent more time with my family rather than at my job.” When our lives here are done, all the wealth and power and status and possessions will be left behind and forgotten. Only that treasure we have been able to transfer to Heaven will be waiting for us there (Matthew 6:19-21). What is that treasure? It is the people you have touched in this life, who are precious to you, and who you have been instrumental in making sure they will also be in Heaven with you.


Meaning to life is not something we can create on our own – it is Jesus’ work in us as He makes us the person He created us to be. Look at Jesus’ life for a moment – what gave His life purpose? In John 12:24 Jesus told a group of people that grain, in order to reproduce, had to be laid in the ground to die. In verse 27 we read that Jesus was troubled by what He had said. It was not that He thought He had said something wrong, but it reminded Him of the death He would die in only a few days. Those few days later, when He stood on trial before Governor Pilate, He said He had come to “bear witness to the truth” (John 18:37). The “Truth” was that He had come to make the only way any person could ever return to God. What does that mean to us? The only purpose for our life that can ever bring true and lasting meaning for us is that of helping Jesus complete His mission. He made the way for us to come to Himself, and we who are now His point out that way to everyone we meet so they can find and come to Him. Nothing we can ever accomplish on this earth has as great an impact on us as to know our life has been valuable for all eternity.

Memorize John 14:1-6: “Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. And you know the way to where I am going.” Thomas said to him, “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?” Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.