God created each of us as a unique person. This means more than having a unique set of fingerprints. He created each of us with a complex synthesis of interests, expertise, personalities, talents, gifts, values, callings, passions and priorities. He did this with divine intentionality. He did this for the fulfillment of His perfect grand plan, not by mere happenstance or rolling genetic dice. Our Creator is heavily invested in His plan for each of us, and He does not leave us alone to figure it out. He yearns that we discover what wildly successful looks like so we fit in His grand plan—an incredible mosaic of unique designs.
What About You?
What makes you tick? Like Copernicus, Blaise Pascal, Robert Boyle and Hugh Ross, some of us are drawn to science to leverage innate scientific curiosity for the glory of God. Some of us are compelled to connect with people, some with nature. Some are drawn to apologetics, some to politics, and others to athletics. In the movie Chariots of Fire, Olympic runner Eric Liddell says, “I believe God made me for a purpose, but He also made me fast. And when I run, I feel His pleasure.”1 As we Truventure, we have the privilege to explore the question, “When I (fill in the blank), I feel His pleasure.”
The picture of you or me being wildly successful comes into view if—and only if—we accurately perceive the distinctive ways we were each uniquely painted. The Master Artist paints one-of-a-kind portraits of us, each with a distinctive character all its own. He creatively expresses His image in us, each with our own special design to reflect His image with the specific passion He has for our unique life. He reveals His heart, the heart of the Great Artist, in each of us. As a result, we are a thing of beauty— individually and collectively. DC Talk says it this way:
A piece of canvas is only the beginning for
It takes on character with every loving stroke
This thing of beauty is the passion of an Artist’s heart
By God’s design, we are a […] kaleidoscope.2
The Creative Artist blends in each of us the common identity we have in Christ and the unique identity components that He purposefully imbued in each individual. We do not all get Roy Rogers’s good looks—after all, His own Son was considered unimpressive, was unrecognized by many, and was decorated with a crown of thorns. And yet all these attract us even more. As we embrace how He paints us, we become even more attracted to Him than when we insist on being painted our way.
The things we have in common in Christ flourish as we align with the specific person He designed each of us to be. In this way, we cooperate with the Master Artist’s hand-painted panorama across the ages, purposed to fit in His grand plan.
Like Eric, God made you for a purpose too. When do you feel God’s pleasure?
Tuck this question into your heart and take a walk outside. Don’t be in a hurry to answer the question…enjoy your walk with the Lord and look for the sparkle in His eye as you talk with Him. Make note of your revelations of His pleasure in you when you return.
Carpe diem stratégique!
Mark Modjeska and Angela Owen