What is your philosophy of life?

What gives your life meaning? Does it come from the good things in life which give you present enjoyment? If so, what answer can you give to someone who lacks these things? Or to yourself, when you find yourself facing pain, suffering and ultimately death?

If there is no God – then, logically, there is no meaning or purpose to life – apart from what we create for ourselves. And because we all die, that underlines the irrationality of human life. So much of the songs, poetry and art of today reflects this loss of meaning, this emptiness.

And material success or fame cannot change our sense of emptiness. It was just such a sense that led Bernhard Langer, after winning the US Masters in 1985, to question his way of life – and that led, in time, to his present faith in Christ. The marketing industry relies on this sense of emptiness. It creates hungers for things to fill the void, and so dull the pain. For without God, there is no true source of fulfillment and hope – and certainly no hope beyond death.

Of course, if there is no God, there is also no basis for moral law. As one of the brothers says in Dostoyevsky's The Brothers Karamazov, "Is God dead? – then everything is permitted!" If there is no God, we are free to do as we please. There is no behaviour, no course of action, we cannot justify. All laws, all human sanctions, are just that – human rules, that can be rewritten or ignored.

Without God, man becomes his own god, with no moral reference-point. And because of our perversity – which all history, and all today's media, bear witness to – this leads inexorably either to the pursuit of our own happiness, so we become indifferent to that of others; or the tyranny of the state, whose service is the only 'good', regardless of personal suffering.

If, on the other hand, there is a God who has created all things – there is not only an explanation for the beauty and order we see in the world – there is also the possibility of meaning and purpose to human life. For he who creates, does so for a purpose. And if God has a purpose for us, it will agree with his own character. So we are driven to ask, What is God like?

His purpose and character will inevitably be the ground of all morality. And to him we shall all be answerable. It is this which makes men fearful of death. Sailors on a ship at the Battle of Jutland, facing almost certain destruction, asked one another, What is it like to be dead? And Hamlet, contemplating suicide, is given pause because of the dread of something after death – the undiscover'd country from whose bourn no traveller returns. It .. makes us rather bear those ills we have, than fly to others we know not of. Thus conscience does make cowards of us all...

As for that country from which no traveller returns – the once-popular English philosopher, C.E.M. Joad, was once asked, If you could meet any historic person and ask him one question, who would it be? He replied, Jesus Christ – And I would ask him, Did you really rise from the dead?

Our fear of death arises from the knowledge that we have lived, not according to God's will, but our own. Aldous Huxley admitted that it was his desire, to be free of all moral restraint, that led him to deny God's existence and a judgement beyond death. But the consequences of this choice, made by so many others in the last 100 years, have been written indelibly, much of it in blood, on the pages of history! Has not history revealed that man is incapable of bringing in some utopia of freedom and equality, let alone of brotherly love?

In a very real sense, man is lost. He has lost his way morally, intellectually and spiritually. He cannot find a solution to the evils in the world, or in his own individual life and his relationships to others. He is also lost to God. Created to have fellowship with his Creator, he now doesn't know him, and rejects the opportunity to do so.

Finally, he is lost from the possibility, or hope, of rescue from God's assize – if God is implacable! So we come back to the question, What is God like? And to others, Can I have hope of knowing him, and through knowing him, have hope? And, How could this come about?

What is God like?

This is where Joad's question is important. If God raised Jesus from the dead, he vindicated him and his claim to witness to the truth about God. For there is no doubt that the parables Jesus told, point us directly to the character of God, as well as revealing the situation of man with respect to God.

The two parables we heard read, and the well-known one that follows them, usually called the story of the Prodigal Son, were together Jesus' response to the accusation that, This man welcomes sinners and eats with them! His accusers concept of God's holiness, which they sought to emulate, was that God held himself aloof from those who broke his laws. They said, There is joy in heaven when those who provoke him perish from the world. [From Siphrι, a Rabbinic commentary on Num. & Deut.]

But Jesus gives us a very different picture. By implication he teaches that all men are, by nature, lost – even the elder brother, who rejects his 'prodigal' brother, and should know better, has no closeness to his father. But, most of all, he presents God as one who seeks to find and restore the lost to himself – so there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.

Jesus pictures us as sheep – preoccupied so often by our own desires, that we wander away from God without a thought. But, as the Good Shepherd, he goes after even one lost sheep, and when he has found it, joyfully and tenderly carries home on his shoulder. It is a picture that should have spoken warmly to those who knew that God is spoken of in this way in their Scriptures.

Jesus pictures us as the coin – lost through no fault of its own, but lost nevertheless, and powerless to do anything about it. The woman employed every means until she found her lost coin, and was then so pleased she gathered her friends and neighbours, to tell them of her relief and joy.

Finally Jesus pictures us as the rebellious son, who is given the freedom to walk out on his father, and spend his inheritance foolishly in the far country. The bitterness of his loss comes home to him, and he comes to his senses. What it means to repent is powerfully portrayed – the son goes back, willing to confess his guilt, knowing he deserves no welcome.

But the love of God for the returning sinner is even more powerfully portrayed. But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him. (Lk !5:20) The picture of an Eastern father forsaking his dignity and running, must have blown the minds of Jesus' hearers. But such, implies Jesus, is the warmth of God's mighty love for us. And in his own person Jesus enacted that love, not only in eating with outcast sinners, but in going to the cross for us, bearing the punishment of our sins, that would otherwise separate us from God.

But, in addition, Jesus implies – we who turn back to God – are not just pardoned – we are re-instated as beloved sons in God's household. Bring the best robe and put it on him. Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. Bring the fattened calf and kill it. Let's have a feast and celebrate. For this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found. (Luke 15:22-24)

A word that gives hope.

Now perhaps we can catch the wonder in Paul's words as he writes to Timothy, and through him to the church in Ephesus. For there were leaders in that church who had turned away – and were succeeding in turning others away – from the true gospel. Instead of emphasizing the utter grace and love of God to the lost, they were dividing the church in unprofitable disputes about Jewish speculative ideas, and about how Christians should follow Old Testament laws. And these leaders had become proud, forgetful of having trust in God, seeing their position as a way of making money. (1 Tim 1:3-7; 3:3,8; 6:3-10)

Paul therefore marvels at God's grace to him, who in the past had been a blasphemer about Christ and a violent persecutor of God's true people. Grace so great because God had entrusted to him, the worst of sinners, the preaching of the good news of the glory of God, the source of all blessing. (1 Tim 1:11NJB)

And what was that good news? That trustworthy saying – that word to take to heart, and depend upon? That Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. It's an echo of Jesus' own words, The Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost. (Lk 19:10) In that blinding moment on the Damascus road, when in God's mercy, Jesus had revealed himself to Paul – Paul had undoubted been appalled to find his zeal had led him, not to contend for God, but against him and his Messiah. There could be no greater blasphemy – and like Isaiah in the Temple – had no doubt seen himself as a ruined man, in the presence of a holy God.

But the grace of our Lord was poured out on me abundantly, along with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. He didn't deserve God's forgiveness – but God gave it to him, with and through a saving trust in Jesus Christ, along with all the love that flows from Jesus. Paul recognises that the mercy that was shown to him is available to all who will exercise a saving trust in Christ, and so receive the life that belongs to the eternal age to come. There is no-one so far gone – even someone who has opposed God – who cannot be forgiven and restored to be a beloved son or daughter.

Christ Jesus came into the world. Here was the Good Shepherd himself seeking his lost sheep. Here is the running Father, in the person of his Son, holding out his arms to embrace the returning sinner. He who is in very nature God.. took the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness.. and he humbled himself and became obedient to death – even death on a cross! (Phil 2:6-8)

For the world he came into did not recognise him, nor did his own people receive him. (John 1:10,11) Instead men hated him and nailed him to that cross to get rid of him out of their lives! We may not be able to do that – but if we want no part with him, and exclude him from our lives – are we not as guilty?

Yet to all who receive him, to those who believe in his name – that is who entrust themselves wholly to him, whose character of loving mercy they've come to recognise – he gives the right to become children of God. (John 1:12) For he came to save sinners, and such is the wonder of his love.

Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. Is that a word we have taken to heart? Are we depending on it? Do you say you are? Then may I ask you – Have you recognised that you are lost without the Saviour? Have you personally turned away from your trust in yourself, to trust in Jesus as your Saviour? Have you come to him, confessing your own guilt, as the lost son did, and asking for his pardon? And have you asked him to be your Lord? If we have, then be assured, we have eternal life, and will not be condemned, but have passed over from death to life. (John 5:24) We are no longer lost, but found, and there is rejoicing in heaven!

Maybe there is someone reading this who has not done that. Someone who does not yet know the meaning and purpose for their life, that God wants you to have. Someone who wants to have the hope and assurance that only God can bring you. But has not yet the courage, or the humility, to abandon their own way – and the empty wisdom of this world – for the open, forgiving, arms of the Father, and the wisdom that comes from on high, that the world does not understand.

I will therefore pray for you now – and afterwards I invite you to make your own the words of confession, trust and commitment that I shall pray. First then my prayer for you:

Loving Father I pray now for any reading this who do not yet know you in a personal and saving way. Please give them such assurance of your love for them, that their fears are taken away. Please help them to hear the call of Jesus, the Good Shepherd, who laid down his life for them. Please open their understanding by your Spirit, that your light banishes the darkness, so that they may be found. For the sake of your Son, our Saviour and Lord. Amen.

And now the prayer for any such to echo in your own hearts:

Almighty Father, I have not trusted you or obeyed you, but have gone my own way, and am not worthy of your love. I want to thank you for sending your only Son to die for me and for my sins. Please forgive me, and help me by your Spirit always to trust Jesus as my Saviour, and to obey him, and speak of him, as my Lord. For his sake, Amen.

When Paul had expressed to Timothy that trustworthy saying, and testified to Christ Jesus' unlimited patience and love towards him, there remained only one thing to do – to give God the glory in worship and praise. So let us conclude with those very words:

Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God – be honour and glory for ever and ever. Amen.