Your bucket list

Some people make a bucket list, a list of things they want to do before they die.  The name comes from the expression “kick the bucket”, a slang expression for dying.

If you are a Christian you don’t need to make a bucket list.  God has already made one for you.

We are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.
Ephesians 2:10

The purpose of these works isn’t to achieve salvation.  Salvation is a gift that God gives us by his grace and we receive it by faith.

By grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.
Ephesians 2:8-9

We aren’t saved by our works but one of the reasons we are saved is to serve God by carrying out the work he has given us to do.

God doesn’t give us a list of all the things he wants us to do but reveals his will one step at a time.  We begin by studying the Bible and obeying what we read.  As we obey the general commands in the Bible and pray for guidance God will reveal to us the specific work he has for us.  Each step of obedience will lead to the revelation of what our next step is.

God not only gives us work to do but he also promises that he will enable us to successfully carry out this work.

The LORD will fulfill his purpose for me;
your steadfast love, O LORD, endures forever.
Do not forsake the work of your hands.
Psalm 138:8

Someone who makes a bucket list for himself and does everything on it will achieve a feeling of satisfaction.  A Christian who successfully completes the bucket list God has given him will receive an eternal reward.

For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ.

Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw—each one’s work will become manifest, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done.

If the work that anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. If anyone’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire.
1 Corinthians 3:11-15