Q. 1. Why did God make you?

• WSC 1
• Augustine, Confessions 1.1.1
• Wesley, Sermon 114, “On the Unity of the Divine Being”

Made to. Our ultimate purpose or telos is eternal happiness with God in heaven. In God’s presence there is “fullness of joy”—“pleasures forever” (Psalm 16:11). The blissfully happy, perfectly blessed final state, in which we have direct experience of God, is commonly called the beatific vision. This happiness begins on earth as we come to know, love, and enjoy the Triune God through the gospel of Jesus Christ—the “good news of happiness” (Isaiah 52:7; cf. Luke 2:10). “Many indeed think of being happy with God in heaven; but the being happy in God on earth never entered into their thoughts” (Wesley, Sermon 114). “Happy are you, O Israel! Who is like you, a people saved by the Lord” (Deuteronomy 33:29).

Happy. In the Bible, happiness is more than an emotion that depends on circumstances. Biblical synonyms for “happy” include “blessed,” “joyful,” “satisfied,” “glad,” and “delighted.” It is a myth that “happiness” and “joy” are substantially different. In Scripture and church history, they are used synonymously.

In God. True happiness is to know, love, and enjoy the only true God, and his Son Jesus Christ, in the fellowship of the Holy Spirit (see Q. 8). “To enjoy is to adhere in love to some thing for its own sake,” and “the things which are to be enjoyed are the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit” (Augustine, On Christian Teaching 1.2.4, 5). “The love of God … chooses God as the chief good of the soul, the enjoyment of which assures its perfect and eternal interest and happiness” (Watson, Theological Institutes, 2:481–482). When we delight ourselves in the Lord, God satisfies us with himself (Psalm 37:4).

Restless. Since God created us for happiness, “All men seek happiness. There are no exceptions. However different means they may employ, they all strive towards this goal” (Blaise Pascal, Pensees 148). As long as we pursue our happiness in created things instead of the Creator, we will be restless and miserable. Man’s happiness does not consist in wealth, honor, fame, glory, power, pleasure, or any other created good. God alone is our portion forever (Psalm 73:25–26). “God alone constitutes man’s happiness” (Aquinas, Summa Theologica I-II, Q. 2). Augustine prayed, “You move us to delight in praising you; for you have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless until they rest in you” (Confessions 1.1.1).

Rest in him. “Every desire is set at rest by happiness, because once it is possessed nothing remains to be desired, for it is the last end” (Aquinas, Contra Gentiles 1.100).