God’s Eternal Purpose for Your Life through the Gospel of John

During the summer orientations at The University of Texas at Austin, Christian Students on Campus has many events for the freshmen to get them involved with the club. Gatherings like the Welcome Dinner and Ice Cream Connect are on a larger scale, but my favorite events are the small Bible studies in Jester dormitory. On Monday nights in the Malcolm X Lounge, Christian Students on Campus gives a preview of their student-led Bible studies with a look at the gospel of John. This Bible study really affects me, because it gives a structured presentation of God’s special process which he had to go through in order to fulfill His eternal purpose.

God’s Eternal Purpose

Christian Students on Campus makes it very clear in their introduction that they love the Bible, and because of this the Bible studies are based very strongly in Scripture. With the “God’s Eternal Purpose” Bible study, the starting point is John 1:1 – “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” Here we see God dwelling in eternity past, and already he desires a communication and an expression. God wanted to accomplish His purpose through His creation, so He made man, a being created directly in the image of God Himself (Genesis 1:26). This shows that God’s purpose is to express Himself through man. The Lord reveals this purpose throughout the Bible, developing and enriching the seeds in Genesis into the final product — God’s building — in Revelation. This amazing coherence of the entire Word of God initially fascinated me, and later it completely changed my approach to reading the Bible.

An Overview

In this Bible study, four club members present the pertinent points regarding God’s purpose as seen specifically in John, but more generally throughout the Bible. With decisive logic and useful demonstrations, these students show how Satan attempted to foil God’s purpose by injecting his nature — the sin nature — into man through the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. God created mankind like a glove, so that he could enter into man through man’s spirit (Zech. 12:1). But Satan filled man with sin, which created an obstruction through which God, in His purity, would not pass. But God’s purpose remained valid, and He took some extra steps in order to remove the obstruction of sin and to get into man to be expressed through him.

These extra steps constituted a process for God, as one student expounds. First, God came out of eternity and became incarnated as a man. He decided to come to us in the form of a finite, fallen creature, so that he could sympathize with us on every level. However, as the incarnation of a perfect God, Jesus was a perfect man. He lived on the earth for almost thirty-four years, spreading His Gospel wherever he went. Then He was crucified as the perfect sacrifice to take away the sins of the world. Though sin deserves death (according to God’s standard of morality), Jesus took our place to die and redeem the world from Satan’s grasp. In His ascension and enthronement in heaven, Christ became the life-giving Spirit so that he can now enter directly into the spirit of man. All we need to do to receive Christ is to believe in His cleansing of our sins and call on His name.

Final Thoughts

I think every Christian has some understanding of this process that God had to go through in order to redeem his creation. But to see it presented in such a revealing and concise manner truly strengthened my appreciation and faith. Even more impressive to see is the culmination of this process as it relates to us, God’s people. Many Christians may see God’s process and even God’s purpose of desiring an expression of Himself. But once we are saved and expressing the Christ who lives in us, we should not simply wait around to die and go to heaven. God desires that His believers would be built up together into the House of God — the Church — to be God’s ultimate dwelling place (1 Pet. 2:5). This is a much higher and worthy calling, and a very inspiring one as well.

By: P. Bixby