Matters of Significance

The words of the Teacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem.

Vanity of vanities, says the Teacher,
vanity of vanities! All is vanity.
What do people gain from all the toil
at which they toil under the sun?
A generation goes, and a generation comes,
but the earth remains forever….

I saw all the deeds that are done under the sun; and see, all is vanity and a chasing after wind.  

—Ecclesiastes 1:1-4 & 14

While pondering the brevity of life, I turned to Ecclesiastes, the short book written by King Solomon, who was known as the wisest man to have lived. He surveyed everything going on in the world, all that he had seen and considered life. Generation after generation comes and goes, and each follows a similar pattern.

I watch my eleven-month old grandson’s delight as he makes his parents smile, and I watch his parents as they patiently help him maneuver through and discover new features of his little realm. They reveal a remarkable combination of patience, concern, caution and exhaustion, anticipating the potential calamity that could come with each step, each new adventure, assisting every step along the way. As I watch it all, I see images of Lori and our children so many years ago. According to Solomon, nothing changes. Generation after generation toils similarly. Nothing is new. Everything has been done before.

While acknowledging life’s brevity, he agonized over the repeated human tendency of wasting their limited time on earth pursuing matters of insignificance, or as he calls it, chasing the wind. Solomon himself had pursued personal pleasure, riches, wisdom and he referred to it all as “hebel,” the Hebrew word translated as “vanity” in the NRSV Bible and “meaningless” in the NIV Bible. The literal translation is vapor or breath.

According to Solomon, our pursuits, our expenditure of energy, our toil, our life is all vapor. It is all breath. I was recently in Big Sky, Montana walking on snow-covered ice, careful to maintain balance with each crunchy, cautious step. The beautiful pine trees should have filled the air with fragrance, but the air was too cold for me to experience it. Each exhale formed a small cloud of warm moist air that crystalized and vanished before the next breath repeated the pattern. The vapor cloud created by each breath is the image King Solomon paints of our life. It is brief and vanishing. And our pursuits are like chasing the wind.

If life is a breath of vapor and our pursuits as meaningless as chasing the wind, what is the point of it all? Solomon urges us to ponder the brevity of life so that we do not miss it. Life is short. We will all die. So today is a glorious gift that must be cherished and used and not wasted on meaningless activities.

He presents this point saying,

A good name is better than precious ointment,
and the day of death, than the day of birth.
It is better to go to the house of mourning
than to go to the house of feasting;for this is the end of everyone,
and the living will lay it to heart.Sorrow is better than laughter,
for by sadness of countenance the heart is made glad.
The heart of the wise is in the house of mourning;
 but the heart of fools is in the house of mirth.
It is better to hear the rebuke of the wise
than to hear the song of fools.  Ecclesiastes 7:1-5

It is better to visit a house of mourning than a party because the house of mourning will cause us to focus the amazing gift that life is, and we will “lay it to heart,” and we will be more likely to endeavor to make use of the limited time that we have. But if we spend our time seeking pleasure and fun and parties, listening to “the song of fools,” we might waste our life on unimportant pursuits.

Solomon concludes that God is the source of all meaning. He is the source of true joy. And if we seek to enjoy a meaningful life we will focus on matters of eternal significance – we will seek God, we will seek Godly relationships, we will serve God, and we will live an honorable life, maintaining a good name. Work is good and rewarding when we toil in God’s service.

Solomon agonizes over the thought that people waste their short lives chasing the wind when they might find meaning through God. We know that God came to earth as a human and He taught and showed us how to live and He died that we might have relationship with God, and through Christ Jesus we have redemption, new life, eternal life, the kingdom of God and life abundant. We know this, yet I agonize for the people who may not know that, or who may sit in church pews each Sunday yet are failing to experience relationship with Christ Jesus, who fail to know Him, who fail to seize the gift of God’s holy grace showering over them. Am I doing anything to help them gain eyes to see, ears to hear, and a life a abundance through relationship with Christ Jesus? Are you?

Life is so brief. It is a vapor, a breath. Today is an amazing, glorious gift from God. What will you do with it?