Christians! How does god give your life meaning?

Question

This question is often asked of atheists. With your faith in a god, how does that give life meaning.

How does fear of hell give life meaning?

Answer 1

The philosophical question "What is the meaning of life?" means different things to different people. The vagueness of the query is inherent in the word "meaning", which opens the question to many interpretations, such as: "What is the origin of life?", "What is the nature of life (and of the universe in which we live)?", "What is the significance of life?", "What is valuable in life?", and "What is the purpose of, or in, (one's) life?". These questions have resulted in a wide range of competing answers and arguments, from scientific theories, to philosophical, theological, and spiritual explanations.

These questions are separate from the scientific issue of the boundary between things with life and inanimate objects.
Popular beliefs
"What is the meaning of life?" is a question many people ask themselves at some point during their lives, most in the context "What is the purpose of life?" Here are some of the many potential answers to this perplexing question. The responses are shown to overlap in many ways but may be grouped into the following categories:

Survival and temporal success
...to live every day like it is your last and to do your best at everything that comes before you
...to be always satisfied
...to live, go to school, work, and die
...to participate in natural human evolution, or to contribute to the gene pool of the human race
...to advance technological evolution, or to actively develop the future of intelligent life
...to compete or co-operate with others
...to destroy others who harm you, or to practice nonviolence and nonresistance
...to gain and exercise power
...to leave a legacy, such as a work of art or a book
...to eat
...to prepare for death
...to spend life in the pursuit of happiness, maybe not to obtain it, but to pursue it relentlessly.
...to produce offspring through sexual reproduction (alike to participating in evolution)
...to protect and preserve one's kin, clan, or tribe (akin to participating in evolution)
...to seek freedom, either physically, mentally or financially
...to observe the ultimate fate of humanity to the furthest possible extent
...to seek happiness and flourish, experience pleasure or celebrate
...to survive, including the pursuit of immortality through scientific means
...to attempt to have many sexual conquests (as in Arthur Schopenhauer's will to procreate)
...to find and take over all free space in this "game" called life
...to seek and find beauty
...to kill or be killed
...No point. Since having a point is a condition of living human consciousness. Animals do not need a point to live or exist. It is more of an affliction of consciousness that there are such things as points, a negative side to evolutionary development for lack of better words.

Wisdom and knowledge
...to master and know everything
...to be without questions, or to keep asking questions
...to expand one's perception of the world
...to explore, to expand beyond our frontiers
...to learn from one's own and others' mistakes
...to seek truth, knowledge, understanding, or wisdom
...to understand and be mindful of creation or the cosmos
...to lead the world towards a desired situation
...to satisfy the natural curiosity felt by humans about life

Ethical
...to express compassion
...to follow the "Golden Rule"
...to give and receive love
...to work for justice and freedom
...to live in peace with yourself and each other, and in harmony with our natural environment
...to protect humanity, or more generally the environment
...to serve others, or do good deeds

Religious and spiritual
...to find perfect love and a complete expression of one's humanness in a relationship with God
...to achieve a supernatural connection within the natural context
...to achieve enlightenment and inner peace
...to become like God, or divine
...to glorify God
...to experience personal justice (i.e. to be rewarded for goodness)
...to experience existence from an infinite number of perspectives in order to expand the consciousness of all there is (i.e. to seek objectivity)
...to be a filter of creation between heaven and hell
...to produce useful structure in the universe over and above consumption (see net creativity)
...to reach Heaven in the afterlife
...to seek and acquire virtue, to live a virtuous life
...to turn fear into joy at a constant rate achieving on literal and metaphorical levels: immortality, enlightenment, and atonement
...to understand and follow the "Word of God"
...to discover who you are
...to resolve all problems that one faces, or to ignore them and attempt to fully continue life without them, or to detach oneself from all problems faced

Philosophical
...to give life meaning
...to participate in the chain of events which has led from the creation of the universe until its possible end (either freely chosen or determined, this is a subject widely debated amongst philosophers)
...to know the meaning of life
...to achieve self-actualisation
...all possible meanings have some validity
...life in itself has no meaning, for its purpose is an opportunity to create that meaning, therefore:
...to die
...to simply live until one dies (there is no universal or celestial purpose)
...nature taking its course (the wheel of time keeps on turning)
...whatever you see you see, as in "projection makes perception"
...there is no purpose or meaning whatsoever
...life may actually not exist, or may be illusory )
...to contemplate "the meaning of the end of life"

Other
...to contribute to collective meaning ("we" or "us") without having individual meaning ("I" or "me")
...to find a purpose, a "reason" for living that hopefully raises the quality of one's experience of life, or even life in general
...to participate in the inevitable increase in entropy of the universe
...to make conformists' lives miserable
...to make life as difficult as possible for others (i.e. to compete)

Answer 2

Most people, including atheists, will say that love (in some form) gives their life meaning. Their love for their spouse or children for example. Or they will express love for humanity by saying that helping others gives their life meaning.

If love between humans give life meaning, how much more should love between humans and their Creator give meaning to life?

Christians believe that God is the source of love and it was He who put that need for love into our very humanness.

So your answer is that the loving relationship with God gives meaning.

As to heaven and hell. Heaven is not the reward. God alone is the reward. Heaven is just a place for those who want to be with God. And hell is just a place for those who don't want to be with God.

Answer 3

Well if i didn't have all those principles that the Bible lay out to follow. I would probably be a very evil human being right now.

Probably wouldn't answer you so politely and there would definitely be no end to my fury. I would have no line of demarcation between what is acceptable and what is not.

Without his Devine Spirit to remind me of how cruel, fragile and unpredictable this life is, i would not hope for the future.

And life without hope is just pointless and a pointless life is just wasted life.

God has given me something better to look forward to, than the other alternative: that is, when i die that's the end of it.

He has given me hope and even if this hope is in vain , it is better to believe than to die without any at all.

I would rather live my life as a Christian and do some good than to live any other way. Even if heaven is just an illusion, life is just better this way.

Answer 4

Amazing grace how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me, I once was lost, but now I'm found, was blind but now I see.. That pretty much sums it up. If I had the time to tell you all that Christ has done in my life , I would never get done typing it, or as Jonn the apostle said in John 21:25...

And there are also many other things which Jesus did, the which, if they should be written every one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that should be written. Amen.

Answer 5

How did God give my life meaning? He gave me hope! When He provided (or allowed) Jesus, the Christ, die for all our sins so that we could, once again, have fellowship with Father God. Once I realized this, accepting Jesus, the Messiah, as MY Savior and His Blood washing away ALL my sins, the acceptance of this has given me an "appreciation", a Love, that transcends all understanding! Oh what a great, wonderful place to be - living w/ God!

Answer 6

Jesus said he would build a place for us with him and would come again and receive us. This is the meaning of my life. I have something glorious to look forward to. We have the faith that this will happen. God loves everyone so much, he sent his son to die for our sins.

Answer 7

My life has meaning simply because I exist. I am a person. A sense of meaning comes from within.

Answer 8

Before I came to believe in Jesus... I was bad... really bad...

suicidal because of it. (and believing what I believed back then I still think that was the morally responsible action...)

Now I have a new life, hope for the future, and a sense of purpose and destiny.

I was broke. I needed to be fixed. It isn't the healthy that needs a doctor but the sick. I needed a savior.

Answer 9

A Creator implies One who is there. And the creation being so wonderful would imply the One who made it equalling the majesty of the workmanship to be worthy of worship.
Means we have a fixed point of beauty, wonder, person, social reference point of a multi-dimensional being that is in and outside of space-time and has a plan for planet earth and its inhabitants. If he is there and social he would communicate and He did.

Answer 10

for me, when I became a Christan and accepted Jesus as my Savior, I received his Holy Spirit indwelling in me.
It's hard to explain if you have never experienced it, but it was like my Spirit was reborn fresh start.
And because of my faith in Christ many opportunity's have arised to help others less fortunate, now that really gives any human being a meaning to life to help our fellow man.

Edit: I have no fear of hell at all, Gods word promises me Heavan so I have that to look forward too.

Answer 11

God has saved me from death's grasp many times! I'd say that's the truest love ever!