“In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth.” — Genesis 1:1
He should have stopped there. Or maybe at some point in verse two, where the earth was without form, void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. When the Spirit moved upon the face of waters also seems like a perfect place to stop if you ask me, but he didn’t, so he just went on creating. And here we all are, in the likeness of the One who made us. And it does not look anything like it did in verse 31; this is not good.
The entire world is in chaos: the poverty, the hunger, and the vile atrocities we commit on ourselves in the name of greed and self-preservation; and now it seems like nature is trying to spew us out. Who should bear the fault of the havoc we unleash on ourselves and the world? The final “call to arms” was to be fruitful and multiply, to subdue and have dominion, we have heeded the call in superbly, all while abandoning the call to replenish the earth. Is there any fault to be found? Is he speaking, and we are not listening? Or is he silent, and we are not listening? How can a thing know its purpose when its creator only left it one line of code, one sentence of instructions? What exactly is the meaning of this whole life, adulting thing?
I am seven, or eight; I am not certain. It is around that time in our lives when we desire to be older, dissatisfied with how small we are and can’t stopping adding “plus” to our ages when we are asked. I am in that phase where I have just discovered the wonderful realities of Malory Towers, The Famous Five and St. Clare’s, and now I can’t stop searching for more in every sentence I see. I am the kid that spends time away from the rest of the kids during family events, only to answer when I am called that I am thinking. In the quiet of my head, I would ponder about life, and little injustices to me: like not being able to lick Knorr seasoning cubes or take as much milk as I wanted. If these things were going to finish anyway, why couldn’t I have them? I am struggling with words that seem too long for my eyes to catch, and for me to understand, but I am reading anyway. It is then that I stumble across it; with its pristine burgundy cover, A Purpose Driven Life seemed the answer to my questions. It was not. And I abandoned my search for a greater meaning and focused on the discoveries in my children encyclopaedia.
I never finished the book. And while I feel like it was, possibly, because I was at the age where I was not ready for it, I can’t help but feel that the way the author began contributed to it. The book begins with how we are created for the Creator’s pleasure, designed ultimately to worship him. It’s the only part of the book that returns to me, years on from the day that I read it. So the Creator was bored and formed me out of dust? Because when I consider all the ordeals that I have been through, will most likely still be put through, on a personal level, it feels really… (There’s no word I can use here without appearing blasphemous, but I hope you get the point.) On a global level, and the possible words I can use to describe the way the whole thing makes me feel is borderline heretic. So, all the chaos going on… created for his pleasure? I don’t know, but the whole thing just sounds somehow (best word choice - all things considered).
My family is religious. I believe there is a God, sometimes. Purpose for me has always been tied to God. And, on some days, that is more than enough. But today, it isn’t. I have troubling believing that this existence, my existence, is the machination of a benevolent God. It seems like nothing is working, and when things finally do by chance, I am tired from achieving it and can’t find the reason why I bothered in the first place. And then I have to start again the next day, and again. All to what end? To be one of the chosen, clothed in white and singing the praises of the Most High, for eternity? Eternity? I currently find that praise and worship sessions often give me headaches, and make me antsy from all the loud music, and the plan, the purpose of my existence, is to do something akin to that for eternity. Did it have to be me? Because, if His Son said that he could raise stones to worship me, then why go through the stress of creating me and forcing me to go through all this?
There’s a prayer that one of my uncles says for me, that I would come up with something that makes me be remembered even after I am gone. And while there’s a whole lot of good will behind the prayer, there’s the pressure that comes with it. And with that pressure, the thought that who really does having a lasting legacy serve? If that is to be my purpose, when I am dead and the purpose is realised, would I know it? Striving all my life for a goal, only to be awarded it posthumously? Say I reach the goal while I am still alive, what next? For the probability of going higher than such a lofty dream is ridiculously low. So of what purpose is waking up, and going again, and again, when it seems like there is always more to be done. And we are programmed with that first blessing, first prayer from the One who created us: to be fruitful and multiply, to subdue the earth and have dominion over it. There is no end to it till your last day. And all that is left is the finality of the end, when your world, the world as you know it, ceases to exist and even if you lived a purposeful life, it would not matter then.
Maybe the whole act of spending our lives like rats on a treadmill chasing a purpose, and some meaning is the purpose of life. Maybe the journey is the purpose, and then the eventual eternity that comes after or you start it all again as a different person/animal (depending on your beliefs. But I still can’t see it. The reason that I have to wake up each day, and start again. And no matter how hard I strain my ears, quiet my mind, I am yet to hear the voice of the One who forced this existence on me for his pleasure. I am not even sure if this will change, because who knows how much time we have left? But now; there is no purpose, and that’s the hill I am probably dying on. And when I die, to quote a friend and a visionary – Ruka: “heaven doesn’t sound that great… sounds exhausting. I’d rather be sleeping.”
@TheOsondu
