2/15/24 – 336 words – 1.5 minutes reading time

The Bible goes into some detail on the origins of the universe and where man came from. And, while our origins are very important, in a way, the question is mostly academic. Unless you are a solipsist (believer that all existence is an illusion), the fact is that we are here, regardless of where we came from. So, a more salient question is “Why are we here?”.  What is our purpose?

There are dozens of Bible verses stating our purpose. Interestingly, it seems that man’s purpose changes as time goes on. The first reference to why man was created is in Genesis 1:26, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth”.

So, according to the Bible, our first purpose was to be caretakers for this amazing planet and all the things in it.  I don’t want to miss the significance of that. The word dominion in Hebrew means to subdue or bring into bondage. Our original job was to tame this wild planet. And I think that since it appears that the universe was crafted precisely to provide the exact conditions to enable physical life in a variety of forms, it is safe to assume that our first r purpose was (and is) to “subdue” the earth in such a way that it remains a safe and comfortable place for all the life forms created by God to live in peace and harmony.

So, how do you think we’re doing on our first project? Early on we encountered some complications that have caused us to really struggle with the fulfillment of our initial purpose. Because we failed to satisfactorily achieve mankind’s initial objective, God had to redefine our purpose. To see what that looks like, check out my  next blog post – The Purpose of Mankind – Part 2.