What is God trying to do? It is the biggest question anyone can ask, and the Bible answers it with a clarity that is easy to miss. God’s goal is not merely to rescue individuals from hell, though He does that. It is not merely to improve human behavior, though He does that too. The Bible’s answer is larger and more beautiful: God’s goal is to dwell with His people, to be glorified in all the earth, and to sum up all things in Christ. Everything — creation, covenant, cross, church, and the new creation — is moving toward that end.
This article traces that goal through the whole story of Scripture. The Bible is not a collection of disconnected stories. It is one story with one destination, and the destination is God with us, forever.
The Goal Declared at Creation
The story begins with God creating a world and placing image-bearers in it. “God created mankind in his own image” (Genesis 1:27). The image of God is not a physical resemblance. It is a vocation: human beings were made to represent God in the world, to rule creation under Him, and to extend His glory across the earth. The first garden was a temple, the first humans were priests, and the first command — “be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it” — was a mission: fill the world with image-bearers who display the glory of God.
When sin entered, the mission did not change. It became harder. The image was marred but not erased. The goal remained: a world full of people who reflect God’s character and enjoy His presence. Everything that follows in Scripture is God’s pursuit of that goal through a broken world.
The Goal Pursued Through Covenant
God pursued His goal by choosing a people. He called Abraham and promised that through him “all peoples on earth will be blessed” (Genesis 12:3). He delivered Israel from Egypt and declared His purpose: “You will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation” (Exodus 19:6). He gave the law, the tabernacle, the priesthood, and the sacrifices — all of them signs of the same goal: God dwelling with His people. The tabernacle was called the tent of meeting because it was where God met His people. The temple was His house. The sacrifices were the means by which sinful people could approach a holy God.
But Israel failed, as every human people fails. The prophets looked beyond Israel’s failure to a future day when God would write His law on hearts (Jeremiah 31:33), pour out His Spirit on all flesh (Joel 2:28), and gather the nations to Himself (Isaiah 2:2–4). The goal was never a single nation. It was always the whole earth.
The Goal Achieved at the Cross
The goal reaches its turning point in Jesus. The apostle Paul writes that God’s purpose was “to bring unity to all things in heaven and on earth under Christ” (Ephesians 1:10). The cross is where that unity was won. Sin separated humanity from God and from one another. The cross removed the separation. “For he himself is our peace, who has made the two groups one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility” (Ephesians 2:14). Jew and Gentile, slave and free, male and female — all are reconciled to God and to one another through the blood of Christ.
The resurrection proved that the goal could not be stopped by death. The ascension enthroned the risen King. The outpouring of the Spirit at Pentecost created the church — the firstfruits of the new humanity, the community where God’s goal is already visible in miniature. The church is not an afterthought. It is the preview. When the church loves across boundaries, forgives the unforgivable, and worships the one true God, it shows the world what God’s goal looks like.
The Goal Displayed in the Church
Paul’s most concentrated statement of God’s goal comes in Ephesians 3:10–11: God’s intent was “that now, through the church, the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms, according to his eternal purpose that he accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord.” The church is God’s exhibit. The wisdom of God — that He would save a people from every nation through a crucified Messiah — is displayed in the church’s very existence. A congregation of people who have nothing in common except Christ is a miracle, and it is the miracle God uses to announce His goal to the universe.
This reframes the purpose of the local church. It is not merely a vendor of religious services or a gathering of like-minded people. It is the place where God’s goal becomes visible. Every act of reconciliation, every cross-cultural friendship, every act of mercy, every moment of worship is a signpost to the world: this is where history is heading.
The Goal Completed in the New Creation
The Bible ends where it began — with God dwelling with His people — but now the dwelling is permanent and the people are countless. Revelation 21 describes a new heaven and a new earth, a holy city coming down from heaven, and a voice from the throne: “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God” (Revelation 21:3). The tabernacle, the temple, the incarnation, and the church were all previews. The new creation is the reality.
In that final state, every part of God’s goal is fulfilled. His glory fills the earth as the waters cover the sea. His image-bearers, redeemed and glorified, reign with Him. Sin, sorrow, and death are gone. The prayer Jesus taught — “your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” — is answered in full. The goal is not escape from the world. It is the renewal of the world, with God at the center and His people at home.
Living Toward the Goal
What does God’s goal mean for an ordinary believer? First, it means your life has a direction. You are not drifting. You are being drawn toward a destination, and every act of obedience moves you toward it. Second, it means your work matters. Every act of justice, mercy, creativity, and truth-telling is a small anticipation of the new creation. Third, it means your suffering is not wasted. The groaning of creation and the groaning of believers (Romans 8) are birth pangs, not death throes. Fourth, it means your hope is certain. The goal does not depend on human progress. It depends on God’s promise, and God’s promises do not fail.
God’s goal is God with us, forever. That is the end of the story, and it is the meaning of every chapter in between.
The Goal in the Prophets: Isaiah’s Vision
No Old Testament book states God’s goal more grandly than Isaiah. Isaiah saw a day when “the mountain of the LORD’s temple will be established as the highest of the mountains” and “all nations will stream to it” (Isaiah 2:2). He saw swords beaten into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks. He saw a child born, a son given, whose government would never end. He saw a new heavens and a new earth where the former things would not be remembered. Isaiah’s vision is the goal of God in prophetic form: a world gathered to God, at peace, under the reign of the promised King.
Isaiah’s vision also includes the Servant — the figure who would accomplish the goal through suffering. “He was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed” (Isaiah 53:5). The goal of peace would be achieved through the wounds of the Servant. The mountain of the Lord would be reached by the road of the cross. Isaiah holds the goal and the means together, centuries before either was fulfilled.
The prophets remind us that God’s goal is not a human project. It is God’s project, announced by God, accomplished by God, and completed by God. Our role is to participate, not to engineer. We announce the goal, we embody it in the church, and we wait for its fulfillment with the patience of the prophets.
The Goal and Your Daily Life
God’s cosmic goal can feel abstract, but it has daily implications. Every time you forgive someone who hurt you, you anticipate the reconciliation of the new creation. Every time you choose honesty over deception, you display the character of the God who is truth. Every time you welcome someone different from you, you preview the multinational family of Revelation. The goal is not only a destination. It is a pattern for today. You do not wait for the new creation to begin living by its values. You live them now, in small ways, in ordinary moments, because the goal is already breaking into the present through the church.
For the philosophical and theological discussion of God’s purposes, see the Wikipedia article on the will of God.
