Sooner or later, nearly everybody wonders what the purpose of life is. Is it to work hard to improve our living conditions, to provide for our families, to die after perhaps 70 or 80 years, and then to be nonexistent forever? One young person who felt this way said that there is no other purpose in life than "to live, to have children, to be happy and then to die." But is that true? And does death really end it all?
Many in both Eastern and Western lands feel that the main purpose in living is to acquire material wealth. They believe that this can lead to a happy, meaningful life. But what of people who already have material wealth? Canadian writer Harry Bruce said: "A baffling number of rich people insist they are not happy." He added: "Polls suggest a terrible pessimism has infected North America . . . Is anybody happy out there? If so, what's the secret?"
Former U.S. president Jimmy Carter stated: "We've discovered that owning things and consuming things does not satisfy our longing for meaning. . . . Piling up material goods cannot fill the emptiness of lives which have no confidence or purpose." And another political leader said: "I have for several years now been engaged in an intensive search for truths about myself and my life; many other people I know are doing the same. More people than ever before are asking, 'Who are we? What is our purpose?'"Many doubt that life has a purpose when they see that living conditions have become more difficult. Throughout the world more than a billion people are seriously ill or malnourished, resulting in the death of some ten million children each year in Africa alone. Earth's population, nearing 6 billion, continues to grow by more than 90 million a year, more than 90 percent of that growth in developing countries. This constantly expanding population increases the need for food, housing, and industry, which brings further damage to land, water, and air from industrial and other pollutants.
The publication World Military and Social Expenditures 1991 reports: "Every year an area of forest equal to the whole surface of [Great Britain] is destroyed. At present rates (of clearance) we shall, by the year 2000, have removed 65 percent of forests in the humid tropical zones." In those areas, according to a UN agency, 10 trees are cut for every 1 planted; in Africa the ratio is more than 20 to 1. So desert areas increase, and each year an area the size of Belgium is lost for agricultural use.
Also, this 20th century has had four times as many deaths from war as the previous four centuries put together. Everywhere, there is a rise in crime, especially violent crime. The breakdown of the family, drug abuse, AIDS, sexually transmitted diseases, and other negative factors are also making life more difficult. And world leaders have not been able to provide solutions for the many problems plaguing the human family. Thus, it is understandable why people ask, What is the purpose of life?
How has that question been addressed by scholars and religious leaders? After all these many centuries of time, have they provided a satisfactory answer?Confucian scholar Tu Wei-Ming said: "The ultimate meaning of life is found in our ordinary, human existence." According to this view, humans would continue to be born, struggle for existence, and die. There is little hope in such an outlook. And is it even true?
Elie Wiesel, a survivor of the Nazi death camps in World War II, observed: "'Why are we here?' is the most important question a human being has to face. . . . I believe that life has meaning in spite of the meaningless death I have seen." But he could not say what the meaning of life was.
Editor Vermont Royster stated: "In the contemplation of man himself, . . . of his place in this universe, we are little further along than when time began. We are still left with questions of who we are and why we are and where we are going."
Evolutionary scientist Stephen Jay Gould noted: "We may yearn for a 'higher' answer—but none exists." For such evolutionists, life is a struggle for survival of the fittest, death ending it all. There is no hope in that view either. And, again, is it true?
Many religious leaders say that the purpose of life is to lead a good existence so that at death a person's soul can go to heaven and spend eternity there. The alternative offered for bad people is eternal torment in hellfire. Yet, according to this belief, on earth there would continue to be more of the same unsatisfactory existence that has prevailed throughout history. But if God's purpose was to have people live in heaven like angels, why did he not just create them that way to begin with, as he did the angels?
Even clergymen have difficulty with such views. Dr. W. R. Inge, a former dean of St. Paul's Cathedral in London, once said: "All my life I have struggled to find the purpose of living. I have tried to answer three problems which always seemed to me to be fundamental: the problem of eternity; the problem of human personality; and the problem of evil. I have failed. I have solved none of them."What is the effect of so many different ideas by scholars and religious leaders on the question of life's purpose? Many respond as did an elderly man who said: "I've been asking why I'm here most of my life. If there's a purpose, I don't care anymore."
Quite a number who observe the profusion of views among the world's religions conclude that it really does not matter what one believes. They feel that religion is just a diversion for the mind, something to provide a little peace of mind and comfort so that one can cope with life's problems. Others feel that religion is nothing more than superstition. They feel that centuries of religious speculation has not answered the question about life's purpose, nor has it improved the life of the common people. Indeed, history shows that this world's religions have often held mankind back from progress and have been the cause of hatreds and wars.
Yet, is it even important to find the truth about the purpose of life? Mental-health professional Viktor Frankl answered: "The striving to find a meaning in one's life is the primary motivational force in man. . . . There is nothing in the world, I venture to say, that would so effectively help one to survive even the worst conditions, as the knowledge that there is a meaning in one's life."
Since human philosophies and religions have not satisfactorily explained what the purpose of life is, where can we go to find out what it is? Is there a source of superior wisdom that can tell us the truth about this matter?
Who can tell us what the purpose of life really is? Well, if you were to visit a machine designer and saw him working on a complicated piece of machinery that you did not recognize, how could you find out what it was for? The best way would be for you to ask the designer.
What, then, of the magnificent design we see all around us on earth, such as in all living things, down to the smallest living cell? Even the much smaller molecules and atoms inside the cell are wonderfully designed and orderly. What, too, of the marvelously designed human mind? And what of our solar system, and our Milky Way galaxy, and the universe? Did not all these awesome designs require a Designer? Surely he could tell us why he designed such things.The Encyclopedia Americana noted "the extraordinary degree of complexity and of organization in living creatures" and stated: "A close examination of flowers, insects, or mammals shows an almost incredibly precise arrangement of parts." British astronomer Sir Bernard Lovell, referring to the chemical composition of living organisms, wrote: "The probability of . . . a chance occurrence leading to the formation of one of the smallest protein molecules is unimaginably small. . . . It is effectively zero."
Similarly, astronomer Fred Hoyle said: "The entire structure of orthodox biology still holds that life arose at random. Yet as biochemists discover more and more about the awesome complexity of life, it is apparent that the chances of it originating by accident are so minute that they can be completely ruled out. Life cannot have arisen by chance."
Molecular biology, one of the more recent fields of science, is the study of living things at the level of genes, molecules, and atoms. Molecular biologist Michael Denton comments on what has been found: "The complexity of the simplest known type of cell is so great that it is impossible to accept that such an object could have been thrown together suddenly by some kind of freakish, vastly improbable, event." "But it is not just the complexity of living systems which is so profoundly challenging, there is also the incredible ingenuity that is so often manifest in their design." "It is at a molecular level where . . . the genius of biological design and the perfection of the goals achieved are most pronounced."
Denton further states: "Everywhere we look, to whatever depth we look, we find an elegance and ingenuity of an absolutely transcending quality, which so mitigates against the idea of chance. Is it really credible that random processes could have constructed a reality, the smallest element of which—a functional protein or gene—is complex beyond our own creative capacities, a reality which is the very antithesis of chance, which excels in every sense anything produced by the intelligence of man?" He also states: "Between a living cell and the most highly ordered non-biological system, such as a crystal or a snowflake, there is a chasm as vast and absolute as it is possible to conceive." And a professor of physics, Chet Raymo, states: "I am dazzled . . . Every molecule seems miraculously contrived for its task."
Molecular biologist Denton concludes that "those who still dogmatically advocate that all this new reality is the result of pure chance" are believing in a myth. In fact, he calls the Darwinian belief regarding living things arising by chance "the great cosmogenic myth of the twentieth century."The idea that nonliving material could come to life by chance, by some haphazard accident, is so remote as to be impossible. No, all the superbly designed living things on earth could not have come about by accident, since everything that is designed must have a designer. Do you know of any exceptions? There are none. And the more complicated the design, the more capable the designer has to be.
We may also illustrate the matter this way: When we see a painting, we accept it as evidence that a painter exists. When we read a book, we accept that an author exists. When we see a house, we accept that a builder exists. When we see a traffic light, we know that a law-making body exists. All those things were made with a purpose by those who made them. And while we may not understand everything about the people who designed them, we do not doubt that the people exist.
Similarly, the evidence of the existence of a Supreme Designer can be seen in the design, order, and complexity of living things on earth. They all bear the marks of a Supreme Intelligence. This is also true of the design, order, and complexity of the universe with its billions of galaxies, each containing billions of stars. And all the heavenly bodies are controlled by precise laws, such as those for motion, heat, light, sound, electromagnetism, and gravity. Can there be laws without a lawmaker? Rocket scientist Dr. Wernher von Braun stated: "The natural laws of the universe are so precise that we have no difficulty building a spaceship to fly to the moon and can time the flight with the precision of a fraction of a second. These laws must have been set by somebody."
True, we cannot see the Supreme Designer and Lawgiver with our literal eyes. But do we deny the existence of such things as gravity, magnetism, electricity, or radio waves just because we cannot see them? No, we do not, for we can observe their effects. Then why should we deny the existence of a Supreme Designer and Lawgiver just because we cannot see him, when we can observe the results of his amazing handiwork?
Paul Davies, a professor of physics, concludes that man's existence is not a mere quirk of fate. He states: "We are truly meant to be here." And he says regarding the universe: "Through my scientific work, I have come to believe more and more strongly that the physical universe is put together with an ingenuity so astonishing that I cannot accept it merely as a brute fact. There must, it seems to me, be a deeper level of explanation."
Thus, the evidence tells us that the universe, the earth, and living things on the earth could not have come about just by chance. They all give silent testimony to a highly intelligent, powerful Creator.For instance, your brain is far more complex than any computer. The New Encyclopædia Britannica notes: "Transmission of information within the nervous system is more complex than the largest telephone exchanges; problem solving by a human brain exceeds by far the capacity of the most powerful computers."
Hundreds of millions of facts and mental images are stored in your brain, but it is not merely a storehouse of facts. With it you can learn how to whistle, bake bread, speak foreign languages, use a computer, or fly an airplane. You can imagine what a vacation would be like or how delicious a fruit will taste. You can analyze and make things. You can also plan, appreciate, love, and relate your thoughts to the past, the present, and the future. Since we humans cannot design such a thing as the awesome human brain, then the One who designed it obviously has wisdom and ability far greater than that of any human.
Regarding the brain, scientists admit: "How these functions are carried out by this magnificently patterned, orderly and fantastically complex piece of machinery is quite obscure. . . . Human beings may never solve all the separate individual puzzles the brain presents." (Scientific American) And physics professor Raymo says: "If truth be told, we still don't know much about how the human brain stores information, or how it is able to call up memories at will. . . . There are as many as a hundred billion nerve cells in the human brain. Each cell is in communication, through a treelike array of synapses, with thousands of other cells. The possibilities of interconnection are staggeringly intricate."
Your eyes are more precise and adaptable than any camera; in fact, they are fully automatic, self-focusing, color motion-picture cameras. Your ears can detect a variety of sounds and give you a sense of direction and balance. Your heart is a pump with capabilities that the best engineers have not been able to duplicate. Also magnificent are other body parts: your nose, tongue, and hands, as well as your circulatory and digestive systems, to name a few.
Thus, an engineer who was hired to design and build a large computer reasoned: "If my computer required a designer, how much more so did that complex physio-chemical-biological machine which is my human body—which in turn is but an extremely minute part of the well-nigh infinite cosmos?"
Just as people have a purpose in mind when they make airplanes, computers, bicycles, and other devices, so the Designer of the brain and body of humans must have had a purpose in designing us. And this Designer has to have wisdom superior to that of humans, since none of us can duplicate his designs. It is logical, then, that he is the One who can tell us why he designed us, why he put us on earth, and where we are going.
When we learn those things, then the wonderful brain and body God gave us can be used toward fulfilling our purpose in life. But where can we learn about his purposes? Where does he give us that information?
Unique Source of Superior Wisdom
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