Start with capital P

A few months ago, I had a meeting with my campus minister. Now, we go way back—I’m talking nearly four years back now. That’s nearly 20% of my life ago, folks, four years is way back for me. Since we go way back, we have the same love-hate (it seems to be mostly joking hate, funny how that works out, right?) relationship most friends and mentor-mentees. have. He’s a sarcastic, extroverted philosophizer, and I’m a sometimes-arrogant information geek. Our clashes look just like what you’d imagine them to.

We sat outside on the deck of our ministry on a day that’d make beauty itself envious and drank coffee. It was idyllic.

Er, except it wasn’t. I had just come out of the thickets of my most severe period of doubt and depression. I doubted not so much my faith as I did my purpose, and I wasn’t sure what I was living for.

“I’ve had a really tough time these past few months,” I told him. “My life has been filled with anxiety and, honestly, depression.”

He pondered for a moment, took a sip of coffee, and kinda jerked it down—he’s a pretty hyper person. “I find that moments of doubt are triggered by depression.”

“Couldn’t it be that doubt triggers the depression?”

“It could be. However, for intellectual types like us, depression can cause us to look past the things we know are true. We have all the arguments we need, and our doubts are fueled by our emotions, not our mind.”

Or something like that. I might be putting too much wisdom into his mouth, but the conversation followed along those lines.

To be honest, my campus minister was very right and painfully right when he pointed out the real reason for my doubt. It was a lack of meaning and purpose. In my case, I had lost the reason for why I loved people, for why I forgave, for why I strived for grace, for why my family was important, for why I made friends—I lost sight of Jesus. It wasn’t so dramatic either. He just slipped out of my mind. Tends to happen when you’re too focused on yourself.

So, I have decided to take up a resolution with this post and several more posts to come in February. I am making it a month of meaningfulness, yes, it’s time to be meaningful. I won’t claim to give perfect advice. The only thing I could even bet on is perfectly screwing it up. However, this is my shot, it’s my attempt to love God and love others in one way I know how; I will use my writing. Here’s the first thing I have to say: Meaning starts with Purpose. I’m talking about capital M and capital P here. “Making up your own meaning” or “making up your own purpose” is as good as having no meaning or no purpose because your own definitions stand and crumble with you. They’re subjective. They have no real worth.

If nothing Matters, there’s no reason to do anything. Therefore, in order to be a person who can consistently impact others to the glory of God, you have to know why you’re doing it. If you don’t, you’re prone to despair or impact to the glory of yourself.

Capital P comes from God. Gee, big revelation, I know. What is a bit less obvious is that Purpose is not just in singing praises to God, evangelism, or Bible reading. Purpose is in doing your boring schoolwork well so you can get a good degree and do good work as if working for Christ. P is in loving your neighbor, the poor, the forgotten, and the homeless. It’s is in rejecting peer pressure and forgiving friends that have hurt you. Purpose, my friend, is not what you make of it. Silly, how could it be? Only B-rate movie villains would be as arrogant as us humans to suppose we could define purpose. Purpose is in glorifying God through honoring Him and what He made: ourselves, others, and creation.

Might not be the right definition for capital P, but I can work with that.

Not long ago, I studied the book of James for a Bible devotional with friends. I flipped through its pages looking for a relevant (dare I say trendy) lesson I could give to some others. I used some clutch intern skills to put together something that barely managed to be both coherent and succinct—if you’ve ever tried public speaking, you know how difficult that can be. Then, my own lesson smacked me in the face. Really, it was because God’s word smacked me in the face.

My topic was on perseverance. I sipped a bit of earthy green tea from my handy self-heating mug as I reclined, thinking about it.

James’s letter was most likely written in the very early years of the Christian movement. Like, 40 to 50 AD. That’s super early for any non-history geeks. Around this time, as we read in another account of early Christian history (the Acts of the Apostles), the Jewish and Roman authorities persecuted the Jewish converts to Christianity. The persecution was so bad many Christians were dispersed and spread from their homes. They were sent into a hopeless situation—there was basically no way for this tiny movement to stand up to the Jewish leaders and Roman authorities. It was a lonely situation. These early believers had to split up from their larger community and go into smaller groups to avoid drawing persecution. Their circumstances were uncontrollable as if it was a natural disaster except human-made. They lived or died by the hands of the people around them, and there was no way to stop it except run. Into this hopeless, lonely, uncontrollable situation, here is what James says first:

Consider it a great joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you experience various trials, because you know that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its full effect, so that you may be mature and complete, lacking nothing.

James 1:2-4

Excuse me? Great joy? Endurance? Maturity? Faith in an awful trial meant obeying God anyways and continuing to go forward. Ladies and gentlemen, this posed big problems for me because I had no endurance, and I wasn’t very persevering.

My mind flashed back to my struggles with purpose. It was no struggle at all. For several months, I had been trying to become an image of someone I thought would be great. The Myron who could lead, capture a crowd charismatically, and be the best at “loving others” (read: impressing others). I relied on myself, and when I gave out, I gave up. I broke. Real perseverance was what I needed. Purpose is good. It’s so important. Yet, maybe even more important than it is sticking to it; we need purpose and faithfulness to persevere for our purpose in the face of peril.

A chill bolted down my spine, and I sat my mug down. That was it. Capital P. Purpose and perseverance. They were what I needed to be meaningful. A life that’s meaningful isn’t a life that you enjoy, not necessarily anyways. It’s a life that has significance beyond us, it’s something with unshakeable joy hidden beyond our circumstances, and in it is the power to be truly human by glorifying God. Sometimes it’s fun. Sometimes it’s grueling. Either way, it’s right.

It’s time to be meaningful, and I want to start with capital P. This article is not meant to be read; it’s meant to be done. Act. Nothing will change otherwise. Here are some goals I aim to commit myself to, and if you want to join in, that’s awesome.

1. Do something I love this week, and try to use it to serve someone else. (Writing for me. Do you have a hobby you like? Try inviting another person to join you in it.)
2. Read the Book of James, and pray about the themes of perseverance in it.
3. Encourage someone else to be meaningful this week. Send a text, call, or speak a word in person.

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