A Purpose

DEVOTION

THE BOOK OF ACTS

A PURPOSE

Acts 20:22-24

22 "And now, compelled by the Spirit, I am going to Jerusalem, not knowing what will happen to me there. 23 I only know that in every city the Holy Spirit warns me that prison and hardships are facing me. 24 However, I consider my life worth nothing to me, if only I may finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me — the task of testifying to the gospel of God's grace.

NIV

We dealt with being compelled by the Spirit so now we should focus on this concept of Paul’s considering his life worth nothing to him, if only he might finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus had given to him, which is of course, as he says, testifying to the gospel of God’s grace. How many of us would have that opinion of our lives? How many of us would consider our life worth nothing, if only we could finish the race and complete the task the Lord has given to us? First of all we would have to acknowledge that the Lord has given us a task. That of course would require that we actually think he has. So if and we have to assume the Lord has given to each one of us the task of testifying to the gospel of his grace, do we accept that task? And if we do accept it, do we live as if that is the one and single purpose of our life, and that we must finish the race and that our life is worth nothing unless we do? Do we live our lives mostly in pursuit of our own agenda and simply incorporate God in our lives or is God and his task for us our agenda and we incorporate our wants into that life? It would seem difficult to give up being self-centered to become God-centered yet that is what it appears Paul was and that we should be. Certainly Paul did other things than just testify. We know he worked to support himself so as not to be a burden on those he was bringing the good news to. He had to eat, take care of his clothing, find a place to live while he was in all those towns, do the ordinary tasks of living a human life, yet his attitude was that of finishing the race, doing what God had given him to do. He certainly could not be about that twenty-four seven, but that was his attitude, that was what his purpose was. So it is not as though we cannot work, and grocery shop, and take care of the material things God has provided us with, but we should understand that we have a calling, we have a purpose, we have a task that God has given to each of us, and we should have the attitude that our life really has no meaning, it has no worth unless we are completing that purpose, that task. If we do not have one specific task, we do have the purpose of bringing glory to God. That alone is a great task and we should be about our fathers business. Living with a purpose.