What is the meaning of life?
Well, that depends on where you are coming from. A scientist will give you a different theory than a theist, and then, of course, there is the depressing Big Bang theory saying it all started with an explosion and will end with one and be no more.
Personally, I can find an answer for myself in this quote from Chaim Potok’s book “The Chosen.”
The passionate Zionist father says to his son, “Human beings do not live forever. … We live less than the time it takes to blink an eye, if we measure our lives against eternity. So it may be asked what value is there to a human life. There is so much pain in the world. What does it mean to have to suffer so much, if our lives are nothing more than the blink of an eye? … I learned a long time ago … that a blink of an eye in itself is nothing; but the eye that blinks, that is something. A span of life is nothing; but the man who lives the span, he is something. He can fill that tiny span with meaning, so its quality is immeasurable, though its quantity may be insignificant.
"A man must fill his life with meaning, meaning is not automatically given to life. It is hard work to fill one's life with meaning — that, I do not think you understand yet. A life filled with meaning is worthy of rest. I want to be worthy of rest when I am no longer here.”
Now I am no longer a parent but a grandparent, and even further away from the daily fray of life, a great-grandparent. As my grandchildren get older, I am no longer a large part of their lives. Gratefully, all of our family are quite busy, and not wanting to be a bother, I let them be, but I still want to be involved and needed.
Then something wonderful will happen to show that the time I spent serving my family was meaningful. Like the time in September when my cellphone rang, and I saw it was my grandson, Cade. Of course I wondered what he would be calling about so I tapped the icon and said, “Hello.”
He replied,“Hey Grandma, are you busy today.”
I answered,“No, not really. Why?”
“My friends and I are inviting our grandmas to lunch today. Can you come at 2:30 — Kinda lunch/dinner. I can pick you up.”
He came promptly at 2:30 with his good friend who had picked up his grandmother, and we headed to the Riverwood Mall, where we met up with Cade’s two other friends and their grandmothers.
We ate pizza, talked and laughed and had our picture taken under the umbrellas so beautifully hung above the walkway in the Riverwood Mall in Provo, Utah. It was all quite wonderful, and I felt very special to have had this lovely time spent with my now grown-up grandson.
The gesture by Cade was very meaningful, but it really doesn’t take much — a text or a phone call can always do. My life can have meaning when I am the one to reach out to friends and neighbors as well, and become involved and helpful in their lives.
Service is meaningful, and so is allowing others to serve me. In this month of Thanksgiving, being grateful has meaning as well.
I hope to be an eye that has blinked and then, when I am no longer here, I indeed want to be worthy of rest.