The fundamental questions of life

Read this incisive article by R. K. Sepetjian. The article was originally posted here. 

Life's 4 fundamental questions

Did you know that what you believe about Life’s 4 Fundamental Questions can have an enormous impact on your worldview, way of life and the decisions that you make?

What are Life’s 4 Fundamental Questions?

1. Who am I?
2. Where do I come from?
3. What is my purpose?
4. What happens when I die?

Every people, tongue and tribe across the globe, and down through the ages, have struggled to discover meaning and purpose in their lives through an apprehension and understanding of the answers to the four questions above. In fact, every social and religious system in the world, attempts to answer these questions in a meaningful and inspirational way.

How would you answer these questions?

1. Who am I?

Would you define yourself by your sex?, race?, nationality?, political persuasion?, tax bracket? If so, how would each of those areas ultimately define who you really are?

2. Where do I come from?

How would you decide when in time to attribute your origin? Is the answer to where you come from, based on place of birth, place of youth, school, work or from where you were moments ago? Ultimately, we need to have come from “somewhere”, but where?

3. What is my purpose?

If asked, how would you answer what your purpose in this life is? Do you derive your answer from your goals and aspirations?, from your responsibilities?, from whim? Do we define our own purpose in this life or is there a greater purpose for our lives? How can a finite being be or determine the purpose of his own life?

4. What happens when I die?

Have you given any thought to your eternal destiny? When we breathe our last, is that it? Does our cosmic and kinetic energy simply cease to be along with our corporeal shell? We are going to be dead a lot longer than we will have been alive, so this is a critical one to ponder.

How would these questions be answered were someone a secular humanist or believer in the theory of evolution?

1. Who am I? — A random, cosmic accident; No one special.

2. Where do I come from? — The rocks beneath the pre-biotic soup after millions of years of rain.

3. What is my purpose? — None. I’ve come from nowhere and am heading nowhere.

4. What happens when I die? — Nothing. You just die and return to the earth.

Is this assessment correct? Are we really just cosmic accidents, emerged from rock, descended from animals and without a purpose or eternal home?

These same four questions have profoundly different answers if you seek truth where it can be found; in the Bible.

1. Who am I? — An intended creation, lovingly, fearfully and wonderfully made. (Psalm 139)

2. Where do I come from? — Created by God from the dust of the ground (Genesis 1)

3. What is my purpose? — To glorify God and enjoy Him forever! (1 Corinthians 10:31 / Roman 11:36)

4. What happens when I die? — Heaven–if I accept Christ as Savior. Hell–if I reject Christ as Savior. (Romans 10:9)

What do the ways you answer Life’s 4 Fundamental Questions say about you?