The search for the purpose of life has puzzled people for thousands of years. That’s because we typically begin at the wrong starting point—ourselves. We ask self-centered questions like What do I want to be? What should I do with my life? What are my goals, my ambitions, my dreams for my future? But focusing on ourselves will never reveal our life’s purpose.

He is perhaps best known for the subsequent devotional The Purpose Driven Life which has sold over 30 million copies making Warren a New York Times bestselling author. Warren's softer tone on political issues once central to U. When the current Lake Forest campus was purchased in the early 1990s a 2300-seat plastic tent was used for worship services for several years with four services each weekend.

Warren has called on churches worldwide to also focus their efforts on fighting poverty and disease expanding educational opportunities for the marginalized and caring for the environment. He is the founder and senior pastor of Saddleback Church an evangelical megachurch located in Lake Forest California currently the eighth-largest church in the United States (this ranking includes multi-site churches). Obama later sparked controversy when he asked Warren to give the invocation at the presidential inauguration in January 2009.