What Do People Live to Do, the Way a Horse Lives to Run?

  “…I felt as though a hurricane had swept through me, leaving me hollow and exhausted. I swallowed a mouthful of orange juice and closed my eyes.

‘And what is it,’ I said softly, more to myself than to John, ‘What is it that people do? What do we live to do, the way a horse lives to run?’ I didn't expect an answer, and John didn't give me one…”

This text is an excerpt from one of my psychology textbooks.  In this particular case study, husband John and pregnant wife Martha have just undergone tests to see if their unborn baby has Down Syndrome. Although they do not yet know the outcome of the test, they nevertheless find themselves in the midst of a heated debate as to how to handle the possible outcome.  As I was doing my reading for class, what struck me was not Martha’s question, for I know that many have asked themselves, “What is it that makes our brief little lives worth living?” Rather, what perked my attention and broke my heart was the cold silence that followed this particular woman’s earnest yet timid plea for some sort of meaningful answer, for as she herself admitted, “I didn’t expect an answer, and John didn’t give me one…”   

In a world filled with suffering and chaos, we naturally possess deep and fundamental cravings for purpose and significance.  So where do we go and to whom may we turn to find and learn of our cause worth living for?  The answer is God and His Word.  The Bible offers compelling and profound answers to these questions that threaten to destroy the heart and soul if left unanswered.  Praise God, therefore, that we need not remain in a state of hopelessness and helplessness, for through His Word we have been granted both hope and help.

I know full well that brilliant men have devoted their lives to detailing and proclaiming God’s revealed purposes for mankind.  Now I do not currently have a lifetime—I have a limited amount of time before I must go and finish my Statistics homework.  Sounds thrilling, I know.  But in my limited time I want to simply proclaim what God has revealed to me through His Word regarding this great question:  What do people live to do, the way a horse lives to run?

To begin, we were created for God’s glory, and that is how we are designed to live—to daily bring Him glory!  In my textbook John told his wife, "A lame horse dies slowly, you know? It dies in terrible pain. And it can't run anymore, so it can't enjoy life even if it doesn't die. Horses live to run; that's what they do.”  The assumption here is that if a horse cannot live in a manner that fulfills its design, namely running, then that horse cannot experience true delight and pleasure as it was intended to.  In fact, the argument John makes is that a horse which cannot satisfy its innate need to run is not truly alive. More specifically, the assumption goes that horses, or any other creature for that matter, can only find deep and lasting joy from being and doing what they were created to be and do.  For horses, that is running.  For birds, soaring through the skies above.  For whales, it is plunging to the depths of the great and beautiful oceans.  For flowers, it is blooming forth in all their glorious splendor.  

But what about man? Surely among all the creatures and creation man would not be left without a purpose.  And herein lies the wonderful truth:  Man was created in God’s image with the glorious purpose of being a mirror to reflect His glory—our purpose is to fill the earth with the light of Christ’s beauty by reflecting Him to others. 

God has intimately created each one of us, beginning with knitting us together in our mothers’ womb.  Our lives are not accidents!  There is nothing meaningless about our existence, and to attribute our lives to random evolutionary mutations strips us of our Divine design and destroys that which God has made us to be.  We do not have to be like Martha and John who find themselves floundering in hollowness and exhaustion as they wrestle with the despairing prospect of a purposeless and therefore meaningless life.  We have been given the answer to our existence, and have therefore been granted a great and glorious hope!  Through the Gospel of Christ, we can come to more fully understand that our inborn longing to be satisfied is met in God’s purpose to be glorified.  And furthermore, God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him!  Beginning with myself, my hopeful and earnest prayer is that our Lord Jesus may be glorified in us as we reflect His glorious Gospel to a broken and hurting world.  We have tasted the riches of His glory, and just as the heavens display the glory of God and the skies proclaim the works of His hands, may we live in such a manner that invites others to come and eat and drink and live in Him!