Lecture 1: The Meaninglessness of Life without God

One of the most fundamental questions in humanity: what is the meaning of life?

"Judging whether life is worth living amounts to answering the most fundamental question of philosophy. I see many people die because they judge that life is not worth living. I see others paradoxically getting killed for the ideas that give them a reason for living. I therefore conclude that the meaning of life is the most urgent of questions." - Albert Camus

"Clinics are crowded with people suffering from a new kind of neurosis, a sense of total and ultimate meaninglessness of life." - Viktor Frankl

Why should we ask questions about the meaning of life?

• Meaning gives us purpose; purpose gives us meaning
• It will shape the way we live our life

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Humanism, Materialism, Hedonism and cannot give meaning in life

Power, Money and Sex: How Success Almost Ruined My Life - Deion Sanders

• Had it all, won a Superbowl and couldn't figure out how to celebrate because life had no meaning. Couldn't buy anything to put the emptiness away. His lawyer told him that Jesus gives him meaning, and he became a believer

Atheists who found life has no meaning:

• "It is meaningless that we are born; it is meaningless that we die. We are empty bubbles floating on the sea of nothingness." - Jean Paul Sartre
• "Life is a disease and the only difference between one man, and another is the stage of the disease at which he lives." - George B. Shaw
• "We must build our lives upon the firm foundation of unyielding despair." - Bertrand Russell
• "We're just a bit of pollution... if you got rid of us... the universe would be largely the same. We're completely irrelevant." - Lawrence Krauss
• "The universe at the bottom has no design, no purpose, no evil and no good. Nothing but blind pitiliess indifference." - Richard Dawkins

If there's no God, then the universe came by chance --> if it's by chance, then there's no design --> if there's no design, there's no purpose --> if there's no purpose, there's no meaning

Meaning comes from purpose; purpose from design; design from a Designer

Why can't humanism, materialism and hedonism give life meaning?

Nothing less than yourself can satisfy you. And nothing in the world is greater than you, for you are made in God's image, filled with His Spirit, abiding in His Son. Only God is. We are "not of this world" - so this world cannot satisfy us.

What is the world to us?

This world is a pointer to what lies beyond the world.

Example:

• You are driving down a highway and very hungry, then you see a sign: "Food next exit."
• What would you say if you found someone just as hungry but they went to the sign and held it, hoping to quench their hunger and thirst from the sign?

"We don't belong here. We have somehow lost our way. This makes our present existence both strange and splendid. Strange because it is not where our true destiny lies; splendid, because it points ahead to where that real hope is found. But if we mistake the signpost for what is signposted, we will attach our hopes to lesser goals, which cannot finally quench our thirst for meaning and joy." - Alister McGrath

Samaritan Woman:

• The woman was thirsty, living in sin
• The Lord told her when you drink of this water (this water that you pull up from the world), you will still be thirsty

It is "life under the Son" that gives "life under the Sun" ultimate meaning