Readings for today: Ecclesiastes 5-8, Psalms 9
The writer of Ecclesiastes is brutally honest about life. All is vanity, he says, over and over again. The original Hebrew of the phrase meaning, “all is smoke, all is vapor, all is hot air.” It doesn’t make life meaningless, it makes it confusing. It makes it contradictory. It lacks any kind of consistency. All of us know deep down this isn’t how it should be. The righteous should be rewarded and the wicked punished. Every single time. There should be no exceptions to this rule. Long life, deep joy, great wealth and honor should be reserved for those who live according to God’s law. Short life, deep bitterness, poverty and shame should be the fate of those who reject God’s law and go their own way. But what happens when the wicked flourish and the righteous perish? What happens when the lawless seem to be happy and the lawful struggle to find joy? What happens when the righteous are poor and powerless and oppressed while the unrighteous are wealthy and honored and accumulate great power and influence? These are the questions the writer of Ecclesiastes is struggling to answer and, if we’re honest, we’re still struggling to answer them to this day.
Taking a step back, I believe the fact that we wrestle with these questions is a clear indicator that God has indeed set eternity in our hearts. The very fact that every single human being no matter their faith or culture or life experience all ask these questions demonstrates there has to be something beyond this life. Something beyond this world. Something beyond that is calling to us. An echo of Eden in all our hearts. A longing for a return to true justice and righteousness and peace in the world. The very fact that we continue to strive for it despite all our failures throughout all of human history is strong evidence to me that there is a God who created us in a particular way and desires to have a relationship with us. Why else would we care? Why else would we fight so hard for things like universal human rights and to end slavery and oppression and provide relief for the poor? Why not survival of the fittest? Why not might makes right? Why not use my wealth and power and privilege to simply accumulate as much as I can throughout my lifetime?
Everything is smoke. Vapor. Hot air. It’s like we’re living in a steam room. Our vision of the world and other people and even ourselves is obscured by the water in the air. Even if we try to understand it, we will fail. If we work as hard as we can to probe the mystery, we simply cannot find clarity. Listen again to how the writer of Ecclesiastes puts it, “There is a futility that is done on the earth: there are righteous people who get what the actions of the wicked deserve, and there are wicked people who get what the actions of the righteous deserve. I say that this too is futile…I observed all the work of God and concluded that a person is unable to discover the work that is done under the sun. Even though a person labors hard to explore it, he cannot find it; even if a wise person claims to know it, he is unable to discover it.” (Ecclesiastes 8:14, 17 CSB)
So what’s the answer then? Resignation? Fatalism? Just put our heads down and endure? No. Over and over again, the writer encourages us to embrace contentment. Embrace the gifts we have been given. Enjoy them for as long as we can. Just don’t hold onto them. Don’t assume you will have them forever. Don’t place your trust in them. Instead, fear the Lord. This is the beginning and the end of all wisdom.
Readings for tomorrow: Ecclesiastes 9-12, Psalms 10