Life “under the sun” – meaningless. — Ecclesiastes 1: 2-4, 8-9, 13-14, 17-18
Ecclesiastes 1:2–4 (NIV84):
2 “Meaningless! Meaningless!”
says the Teacher.
“Utterly meaningless!
Everything is meaningless.”
3 What does man gain from all his labor
at which he toils under the sun?
4 Generations come and generations go,
but the earth remains forever.
Solomon observes that life on earth keeps going round and round. It doesn’t really change.
Yet, we can’t seem to get enough of it to fully satisfy the longings of the soul.
Ecclesiastes 1:8–9 (NIV84):
The eye never has enough of seeing,
nor the ear its fill of hearing.
9 What has been will be again,
what has been done will be done again;
there is nothing new under the sun.
It seems God has put us in a burdensome and inescapable plight.
Ecclesiastes 1:13–14 (NIV84): What a heavy burden God has laid on men! 14 I have seen all the things that are done under the sun; all of them are meaningless, a chasing after the wind.
Maybe education and being wiser than others will give me meaning and purpose?
Ecclesiastes 1:17–18 (NIV84):
but I learned that this, too, is a chasing after the wind.
18 For with much wisdom comes much sorrow;
the more knowledge, the more grief.
Actually, the more I know, the more I become aware of, and it adds to my sorrow and grief.
Solomon is concluding that life without God, “under the sun,” is hopeless and purposeless. He would say meaningless.
Are we trying to solve the creation without the creator?
Do we really think we can find meaning without the designer?
We might find echoes, moments, but not lasting meaning that really satisfies the longing of our souls.
We were made for life beyond this earth, beyond the sun. We are made for eternal life with God.
Let us focus our attention on Him and keep being disappointed and grieved by life without Him.
