Understand and Engage Your Purpose in Life
How Discovering Your WHY Can Help You Thrive
By Brian Phipps
How do you feel about your life? Do you feel driven by a purpose or are you just floating along, going through your day-to-day activities and tasks?
If you’re feeling the latter, as if you’re just surviving life, it might be because you don’t quite understand the reason you’re here, your purpose for being — what we’re going to be referring to here as our “WHY.”
Consider these quotes:
"The two most important days in your life are the day you are born and the day you find out why."
– Mark Twain
“If we want to feel an undying passion for our work, if we want to feel we are contributing to something bigger than ourselves, we all need to know our WHY.”
– Simon Sinek
Twain and Sinek reflect the near-universal, throbbing need in human beings to have a reason for existing, a purpose in life … and an answer to an individual, personal WHY.
If you don’t know the answer to your WHY, don’t worry; consider one more quote:
“We are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.”The Apostle Paul, Ephesians 2:10 (NLT)
Good news! You do not need to manufacture your WHY. God has been long at work in your life to build your WHY within you. However, you do need to discover and engage this WHY. Tapping into the WHY God planted deep within you is a vital part of how, regardless of your life situation, you can thrive instead of just floating through life.
So how do you understand and engage your WHY?
The first step is understanding the big, overarching WHY God has for everyone. The second step is to discover and start investing in your Masterpiece Mission.
Know Your Big “WHY”
Your big WHY is to be blessed by God and to be a blessing with God to those around you. Abraham, the father of all of God’s people, was the first to receive this WHY.
In Genesis 12:2-3, God says, “I will bless you and make you famous, and you will be a blessing to others. All the families on earth will be blessed through you.”
This big WHY is your birthright.
As a follower of Jesus, you share in the WHY given to Abraham: you exist to love God and have your life blessed by God. You exist to pass that blessing on to others, making this earth a lot more like heaven.
Now, God placed in each of us a special way by which we carry out this big WHY throughout our days on earth — our Masterpiece Mission. When you live out the big WHY through your Masterpiece Mission, it will become a fire in your heart and lead you to thrive.
Your Masterpiece Mission
Masterpiece is probably not a word you use to describe yourself. You most likely didn’t look into the mirror this morning and say “God, you have outdone yourself with me!” And yet, “masterpiece” is the word Paul uses to describe how God created you, saying in Ephesians 2:10, “For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago” (NLT).
The verse ends by sharing the nature of that masterpiece: you are a custom work of art, formed to carry out a mission God has uniquely crafted you to accomplish. This work is your calling, your WHY, or your Masterpiece Mission.
Now, finding your Masterpiece Mission isn’t always easy. One of the ways you can discover your Masterpiece Mission is to use your “spiritual GPS.”
A Spiritual GPS for Your Masterpiece Mission
We’re all familiar with the GPS that helps you navigate from where you are, to where you need to go. Similarly, you can use a GPS assessment to find your way to your Masterpiece Mission.
This GPS assessment will help you:
Identify the special Gifts God has given you.
Clarify the unique Passion areas where you can most powerfully use those gifts.
Live out your Story as you use your gifts to bless the world through your passions.
It is time to start believing that you are a masterpiece, that your life on earth has purpose and meaning that was planted in you long ago. Moreover, it is time to experience the power and joy that come with living out your Masterpiece Mission.
Does knowing that God has a Masterpiece Mission with your name on it inspire you? Are you ready to do more than survive? Are you ready to thrive?
You can start growing through your GPS in Fully Alive’s free course, Find Your Place. It is only four sessions long and the first steps to a lifelong journey of discovery, joy, and fulfillment.
Invite a few friends or family members to join you and get started today.