Want to find a miserable person?  Check the roles of the riches or most famous or those at the height of their power.  Everyone knows the saying; how much money is enough, just a little more.  Fame and power are no different.  Celebrities seek more and more fame only to fall into the trap where they are willing to do anything to boost their fame including immorality.  Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.  I remember the recent images of an elderly senator who was too constricted by the ravages of age he could not perform his job but refused to surrender the power of the office.  Death finally took his power from him.

One of my great heroes was a man who did not seek fame and power, not even riches.  He lived a good life, loved his family, was a good neighbor and served God in word, deed, with his time and with his finances.  When he died the world took scarce notice but I believe that Eternity rejoiced.

Asian countries have the fastest growing Christian populations.  Asia has the fastest growing economies.  America’s economy is stagnant and Christianity is becoming more and more despised in the United States.  Coincidence?  Follow the movement of Christianity around the world and the movement of prosperity and you will find a surprising consistency in each.

I do not believe in the prosperity gospel, that is; God will make His follower rich and successful.  However, I do believe that the hand of God blesses His people wherever they are and the residue effect is to bless the society in which Christians flourish in number.  History bears this out.  Yet, there is still time for America.

God sent a reluctant Jonah to Nineveh with a message of repent or suffer the consequences.  Nineveh believed God that He would punish them and repented.  The result was another 100 years of peace until they eventually forgot the lessons and returned to their former ways.  America’s opportunity to turn back to God is slowly slipping away.  Soon, the Asian Christian culture will replace the former Western Christian culture.  And American culture will be assigned to the dustbin of history as have the once mighty European cultures.

If there is no God then, it does not matter how I live.  My life, any life is irrelevant in the scheme of a vast universe that takes no notice of my coming and passing.  However, if there is a God then, my relevance is entirely in His hands.  Those who fulfill their purpose are relevant.  The rest are no more than cosmic dust, they come and go and make no impact of value in Creation.

The shortened version of the Westminster Catechism comes to mind.  The chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy Him eternally.

Years ago, we were in language school in the French Alps and the students and teachers took the day off to go skiing.  It was early morning and we were some of the first on the slopes.  I rented skies and jumped on the first lift I came to.  I was carried over a small hill where I slid off of the lift and had the most spectacular view of my life.  In front of me were white-capped mountains framed in a blue sky with a wisp of fluffy clouds and the sun glistening off the snow.  Briefly, I paused and simply enjoyed the moment of being there.  I felt small among magnificent mountains, thanked God for the day and went on to have one great day of skiing.

There are those who have a high opinion of themselves than the splendor of creation would justify because they have denied the existence of the Creator.  If we are nothing more than a cosmic accident, evolved pond slime then it matters not in the ultimate scheme of the universe if we come and go.  So the life on this one tiny rock in a little solar system eventually self-destructs by evolving beyond its capacity to exist within its limitations, big deal.  What consequence is it if an insignificant life form on a single planet among billions winks out of existence?  None whatsoever.

But if, as the Bible contends, life was placed on this planet by a God who had a purpose in creating it and one of the life forms was endowed with the very image of that God, then that gives us meaning.

We are either irrelevant specks in a massive universe or we are the cherished creations of a God.  Inconsequential blimps on an evolutionary chart should not be climbing mountains to proclaim their self-importance to an impersonal universe that could care less.  However, precious creations of a Great Creator should climb mountains to give praise for one more day of life and a place of importance in the vastness of the universe.

History is replete with spiritual wannabes, those who create their own religions for whatever reason.  Their methods have remained consistent down through the ages, give people what they want, gods in their own images.  The problem with false teachers who create false gods is that, in the end, all the follower has is a false teacher with a false god and no future.

“Preach the word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage - with great patience and careful instruction.  For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine.  Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear.  They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths.”  2 Timothy 4:2-4

Nothing in life happens in a vacuum.  Call it the butterfly effect if you want but, our actions have eternal consequences.  The writer of Hebrews reminds us that we will all face a judgment for the lives we lived.  And before you speak for God about what that will be, know what he has already said on the subject of a righteous life and understand that he always keeps his word.

“And inasmuch as it is appointed for men to die once and after this comes judgment…,” Hebrews 9:27