Step 0.15 – Getting Ready
There are a lot of adventures on offer these days.
Spiritual retreats. Self-help quests. Exotic paths to personal enlightenment. Most of them promise clarity, peace, or a better version of yourself.
But let’s be honest—most of them don’t go anywhere.
They might give you something to feel, but not something to build your life on. They stir emotions but leave the big questions hanging in the air. At best, they distract you from the ache in your soul. At worst, they convince you that the ache is the point.
This expedition is different.
It doesn’t offer hype or illusion—it offers truth.
It doesn’t begin with you—it begins with God.
It doesn’t end in vague spiritual feelings—it ends in a deep, transforming relationship with the One who made you.
But before we take the first step, let’s get our bearings.
Why This Journey Is Different
Everyone is on some kind of journey—whether they know it or not. But most people are walking without a map, assuming the road will somehow lead somewhere meaningful.
The biblical worldview gives us more than a path.
It gives us a compass, a map, and a clear destination.
It tells us:
• Life has purpose.
• You were created intentionally.
• There is a reason you’re here.
And understanding that reason changes everything.
Before the Beginning: God Had a Plan
Before time began, God had a plan. He didn’t create the universe on a whim or build humanity as a side project. No—He designed everything with a clear purpose. And that purpose centered on mankind.
He shaped the universe to support life, then created human beings in His own image. That alone is staggering.
Genesis 1:27 (ESV)
“So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.”
To be made in God’s image means we were created to reflect Him—to reason, to feel, to choose. We were made for relationship with Him.
What Makes Us Unique
Humans are set apart by three God-given capacities:
• Intellect – the ability to think, reason, imagine, and question.
• Emotion – the ability to love, grieve, celebrate, and feel deeply.
• Will – the freedom to choose between good and evil.
These aren’t flaws—they’re features. They make it possible for us to reflect God’s character and freely choose to follow His will. But they also make it possible for us to rebel.
The Risk… and the Reason
So why would God give us this freedom, knowing full well we’d misuse it?
Because He wasn’t creating robots.
He was creating beings capable of love.
Not romantic love. Not sentimental feelings.
But agape—the highest form of love.
Agape is selfless, sacrificial, and unwavering. It gives without expecting. It serves without being asked. It sacrifices even when the cost is everything.
John 15:13 (ESV)
“Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.”
But there’s a problem. We didn’t choose agape.
We chose self.
The Fall: What Went Wrong
When the first humans rejected God’s authority, something in them broke. That break—the Bible calls it sin—fractured the image of God in us and corrupted our nature. We still think, feel, and choose—but now we’re bent inward. We use our minds to justify selfishness, our emotions to manipulate, and our will to serve ourselves.
We were made to reflect God.
Instead, we reflect our own desires.
The Holy Spirit: God’s Plan to Restore Us
God could have ended the story there—but He didn’t.
From the very beginning, He had a plan to redeem what was lost.
He sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to demonstrate agape perfectly—by laying down His life to save us. And after Jesus’ resurrection, He sent the Holy Spirit to dwell in us, guide us, and restore what sin had broken.
The Holy Spirit is not a force or a feeling. He is the presence of God living in those who believe—convicting us of truth, renewing our minds, empowering us to obey, and teaching us to love.
Without the Spirit, we’re just religious.
With the Spirit, we are new creations.
The Purpose of the Expedition
This journey is not about behavior management.
It’s not about avoiding hell or earning heaven.
It’s about transformation.
The purpose of life is to become the kind of person who lives and loves the way God designed—from the inside out. It’s about overcoming your fallen nature and learning to live with agape at the center.
And that begins with renewing your mind.
Romans 12:2 (ESV)
“Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.”
So Where Are We Headed?
We’re headed toward what you were made for:
A relationship with God rooted in truth and expressed in love.
This isn’t just a better version of your life. It’s a completely different kind of life—one that can’t be found anywhere else.
It’s not a tourist trip. It’s an expedition.
And it’s time to begin.