The Purpose God Has for Life

Adam, from the time that he was created, was made for the purpose of caring for and working the Garden of Eden (Gen. 2:15) that God had made through his speech (Gen. 1); moreover, in the Greek New Testament the term Episkopos (translated as bishop or guardian) is used to capture the very same purpose that Adam was made to perform. Jesus Christ not only was the speech of God sent out into the world (John 1:14), but he also became the second Adam (1 Cor. 15:45) and High Priest (Heb. 4:14). Thus, we have become a kingdom of priests (Rev. 1:6) under the High Priest on mission to join in love, power, and purpose (Blackaby, 77) through Christ in his work, joint airs of the universe with Christ (Stott, 8), and transformed by Christ to be missionaries like Jonah that would never be good for any service if not for the power of God at work through a process (Verkuyl, 45) controlled by God.

The birth, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ bestows on us the Word of God through the light entering the darkness of our hearts (2 Cor. 4:6) thus giving us a talent (Mat. 25:15) or seed as a gift not for our consumption (Kaiser, 14) but that instead we may be a blessing to be a blessing like Abraham (Gallager, 38). The gospel of God's speech thus is equally the message of man and the message of God, and that message is sacrificial, messianic, legal, personal, salvific, and cosmic (Stott, 22-23) as the message gets adapted to its culture as God's tenants invest their talents into harvesting a crop of righteousness. World missions help fulfill, through the expanding of God's kingdom, the purpose that we had been made for (Gen. 2:15), our role as a kingdom of priests (Rev. 1:6), the purpose of our blessing (Mat. 25:15), and even the purpose for God saying anything at all (Gen. 1:31) namely that what God made by his word was good and that he wants it to always be that way.

Bibliography:

Blackaby, Henry and Willis, Avery. "On Mission With God." In Perspectives On The World Christian Movement, ed. Ralph D Winter and Steven C Hawthorne, 74-77. Pasadena, California: William Carey Library, 2009.

Ellisen, Stanley. "Everyone's Question." In Perspectives On The World Christian Movement, ed. Ralph D Winter and Steven C Hawthorne, 17-20. Pasadena, California: William Carey Library, 2009.

Gallagher, Sarita and Hawthorne, Steve. "Blessing as Transforamtion." In Perspectives On The World Christian Movement, ed. Ralph D Winter and Steven C Hawthorne, 34-41. Pasadena, California: William Carey Library, 2009.

Hawthorne, Steven. "The Story of His Glory." In Perspectives On The World Christian Movement, ed. Ralph D Winter and Steven C Hawthorne, 49-63. Pasadena, California: William Carey Library, 2009.

Kaiser, Walter. "Israel's Missionary Call." In Perspectives On The World Christian Movement, ed. Ralph D Winter and Steven C Hawthorne, 10-16. Pasadena, California: William Carey Library, 2009.

Moreau, A., G.R. Corwin, and G.B. McGeeStott. "Introducing World Missions: A Biblical, Historical, and Practical Survey." Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Academic, 2009.

Stott, John. "The Living God is a Missionary God." In Perspectives On The World Christian Movement, ed. Ralph D Winter and Steven C Hawthorne, 3-9. Pasadena, California: William Carey Library, 2009.

Stott, John. "The Bible in World Evangelization." In Perspectives On The World Christian Movement, ed. Ralph D Winter and Steven C Hawthorne, 21-26. Pasadena, California: William Carey Library, 2009.

Verkuyl, Johannes. "The Biblical Foundatoin for the Worldwide Mission Mandate." In Perspectives On The World Christian Movement, ed. Ralph D Winter and Steven C Hawthorne, 42-48. Pasadena, California: William Carey Library, 2009.

Wright, Christopher. "Mission and God's Earth." In Perspectives On The World Christian Movement, ed. Ralph D Winter and Steven C Hawthorne, 27-33. Pasadena, California: William Carey Library, 2009.

Wright, N. "Bilding for the Kingdom: Our Work is Not in Vain." In Perspectives On The World Christian Movement, ed. Ralph D Winter and Steven C Hawthorne, 96-97. Pasadena, California: William Carey Library, 2009.