"Meaningless!
Meaningless!”
says the
Teacher.
“Utterly meaningless!
Everything is meaningless.” Ecclesiastes 1:2
“Utterly meaningless!
Everything is meaningless.” Ecclesiastes 1:2
Just
because Solomon found everything meaningless as he looked backed on his life,
doesn’t mean he’s suicidal. While he makes
a broad statement and says EVERYTHING is meaningless, his conclusion in chapter
12 is that only God gives life any meaning.
Solomon
lived his life in excess, making what he wanted to make, taking what he wanted
to take. He said yes to everything—palaces,
marriages, food, wine. He stops here at
this point in life, looks back and realizes all that stuff got him nowhere.
Making
that realization doesn’t make you suicidal.
It’s a true statement. This world
will pass away and everything on it. Only
the treasures we stored up in heaven will matter, not the ones we locked up in
storage facilities.
It’s
a sad thought when we understand this truth, but it should motivate us to live
differently, for something that truly matters forever—God’s kingdom.