Fulfilment

The stress of life is a term that you hear about more and more. The news is full of doom and gloom, the global recession has everyone scurrying to batten down the hatches, to watch with fear as the world lurches from crisis to crisis. It is interesting to look back to old television programmes that painted a picture of utopia when the year 2000 and beyond came around.
We would have prosperity, robots would be doing most of our work, leisure time would be the norm and most disease would be eradicated.
The reality is that we need to work more to make ends meet, we have more worries than before and stress in work, stress at home impacts our lives every day.
People generally lack fulfilment in their lives. We tend to look to possessions as a key route to finding fulfilment. But if you are like me that fulfilled feeling lasts for only a fleeting moment. Power or positions of authority are another way to satisfy the thirst for fulfilment. Just look at the sad souls who enter shows like 'Pop Idol' or 'Americian Idol' and say that their lives are ruined when thay are rejected by the judges.
We were made by God for God. In that fact lies the path to complete fulfilment. I can only remember one catechism from my days of Sunday School, and that is the first one. The first question is "What is the chief end if man"? The answer is "Man's chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever".
I love the word ENJOY. We are to enjoy him forever, learning more and more of the facets of his nature as we journey through eternity with the Lord.
Fulfilment is found in loving relationships. Enjoying God's love would be a complete fulfilment, which can never be found in things I possess or the things that I have accomplished but in the person of Jesus Christ, knowing him, loving him and serving him. Without that focus life becomes meaningless.
Lord! protect our children from a society that teaches that life is about loving self and satisfying self. May they see that a fulfilled life is only possible in knowing, loving and enjoying God. Forever.