{"id":1063,"date":"2017-11-13T15:07:59","date_gmt":"2017-11-13T15:07:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/?p=1063"},"modified":"2017-11-13T15:07:59","modified_gmt":"2017-11-13T15:07:59","slug":"age-old-existential-questions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/2017\/11\/age-old-existential-questions.html","title":{"rendered":"The Age-Old Existential Questions"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Back in the 70s many on college campuses were asking the critical questions we all must answer: Why am I here? What is my \u00a0purpose? Is there a purpose bigger than just to eat, live and die? They looked for self-fulfillment. Many young people were asking the right questions but looking in the wrong direction for answers.\u00a0They turned to sex, drugs and Transcendental Meditation.<\/p>\n<p>That&#8217;s when the sexual revolution and women&#8217;s lib started. The answers folks came up with didn&#8217;t seem to satisfy. They pursued all sorts of things going farther and farther from the truth. We cannot satisfy our quest apart from God.<\/p>\n<p>Blaise Pascal said,<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhat else does this craving, and this helplessness, proclaim but that there was once in man a true happiness, of which all that now remains is the empty print and trace?<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>This he tries in vain to fill with everything around him, seeking in things that are not there the help he cannot find in those that are, though none can help, since this infinite abyss can be filled only with an infinite and immutable object; in other words by God himself\u201d<\/p>\n<p><em>[This is from page 75 of Blaise Pascal\u2019s Pensees (New York; Penguin Books, 1966).]<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Basically, he is saying there is a God-shaped vacuum in all of us that can only be satisfied by a personal relationship with God.<\/p>\n<p>In my Bible reading this week I was reading I Corinthians 8 verse 5 through 6. &#8220;For even if there are so-called gods whether in heaven or on earth, as indeed there are many gods and many lords, yet for us there is but one God, the Father, <strong>from whom<\/strong> are all things and <strong>for whom<\/strong> we live: and one Lord Jesus Christ, <strong>through whom<\/strong> all things were created, and <strong>through whom<\/strong> we live.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Those two little verses pack a lot of existential truth. It tells us where we came from and why we are here.\u00a0We are here because God placed us here. God is the Creator and Jesus is the Keeper. We exist for Him. So we do not live for ourselves but for Him.<\/p>\n<p>If that is true, does my life reflect it?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp; Back in the 70s many on college campuses were asking the critical questions we all must answer: Why am I here? What is my \u00a0purpose? Is there a purpose bigger than just to eat, live and die? They looked for self-fulfillment. Many young people were asking the right questions but looking in the wrong&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":466,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[199,201,200,202],"class_list":["post-1063","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-balise-pascal","tag-existence","tag-questions","tag-self-fulfillment"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The Age-Old Existential Questions - Safe Place with Ruth Graham<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/2017\/11\/age-old-existential-questions.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Age-Old Existential Questions - Safe Place with Ruth Graham\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"&nbsp; Back in the 70s many on college campuses were asking the critical questions we all must answer: Why am I here? 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Many young people were asking the right questions but looking in the wrong&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/2017\/11\/age-old-existential-questions.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Safe Place with Ruth Graham\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2017-11-13T15:07:59+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Ruth Graham\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"The Age-Old Existential Questions - Safe Place with Ruth Graham","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/2017\/11\/age-old-existential-questions.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"The Age-Old Existential Questions - Safe Place with Ruth Graham","og_description":"&nbsp; Back in the 70s many on college campuses were asking the critical questions we all must answer: Why am I here? 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No stranger to heartache, she seeks to provide a Biblical perspective to her journey of faith. She is warm and talks openly about her own need for a safe place as she journeyed through her husband\u2019s infidelities, her subsequent depression, her divorces, her teenage daughter\u2019s two unplanned pregnancies, another daughter\u2019s bulimia, her son\u2019s battle with drugs, grandson's special needs and returning to school at age 40. Although born into the \"famous\" Graham family Ruth did not feel she had a safe place to unburden the secrets of her life. She felt she had to project and image and wear a mask that she \"had it all together\". She had to meet others' expectations of her. It was not until a mid-life crisis did that she fully discover the unconditional love and grace of God. Her life's passion is to connect people to that same grace and love she found, no matter who they are or what sin. Ruth is an experienced conference speaker and Bible teacher. She has appeared on a variety of radio and television shows including: Good Morning, America, The Hour of Power, Focus on the Family, Moody Broadcasting, Fox &amp; Friends, CBN, Life Today and CNN. She has worked in publishing for over 14 years and is the founder of the Ruth Graham &amp; Friends Ministry. Ruth has three grown children and nine grandchildren. She lives in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia. Her life Bible verse is John 1:16.","sameAs":["http:\/\/ruthgrahamministries.com"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/author\/rgraham"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1063","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/466"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1063"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1063\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1066,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1063\/revisions\/1066"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1063"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1063"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/safeplacewithruthgraham\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1063"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}