Futility

The cure for my sometimes brooding and anxious heart is my futility.

Sometimes in my walk with God my heart gets cold and stale and I release it to drown for a season in the swift waters of life.

In the last month my inclination – no my instinct – has been to not press into God as I feel myself separating from Him.

It has been to just plunge headlong into my own thoughts and disengage from fighting “the good fight.”

I’m just tired. I’m overwhelmingly busy.

I haven’t been able to find my way back with warm verses like “those who wait upon the Lord soar on eagles wings,” or “for God so loved the world…”

This morning I read in Ecclesiastes 9:3 that “…the hearts of the sons of men are full of evil and insanity is in their hearts throughout their lives. Afterwards they go to the dead.”

It's interesting to me these scriptures are what brought me comfort.

Ecclesiastes 9 through 10 goes on to validate that we mourn, that our days are hard and that often we are futile, and well, that’s just the way it is.

Solomon tells us there is one fate for all men. Evil men, lazy men, righteous men - we can plan and we can toil but in the end we all go to down to Sheol.

I have seen everything during my lifetime of futility: there is a righteous man who perishes in his righteousness and there is a wicked man who prolongs his life in his wickedness.

There is futility, which is done on the earth, that is, there are righteous men to whom it happened according to the deeds of the wicked. On the other hand, there are evil men to whom it happens according to the deeds of the righteous. I say this too is futility.

I have a friend, who loves God.

Her whole life has been in service to Him.

In the last year-and-a-half her son died of a drug overdose, her mother passed away, and she watched her beloved husband of 40 years slowly suffocate from pneumonia.

Her grief is her world right now, and it is oppressive and overwhelming.

So what now is her fate?

Should I send her a greeting card with a watercolor scene painted on it and calligraphy talking about God’s promises for a hope and a future?

God brings the day of adversity just as he brings the day of prosperity.

There is a proper time and procedure for every delight, though a man’s trouble is heavy upon him.

To me, Ecclesiastes is honest about how inequitable life can be for those who strive for righteousness. These verses acknowledge that tension we all feel about how we wish we behaved and how we wish things would be - verses how thing actually are.

These verses don't instruct us to throw in the towel either. In fact, there is a strident warning that in the end the unrepentant life and unrestrained evil we may practice will not go unpunished.

Because the sentence against an evil deed is not executed quickly, therefore the hearts of the sons of men among them are given fully to do evil…

But it will not be well for the evil man and he will not lengthen his days like a shadow because he does not fear God.

Whether it is our exhaustion, our willful disobedience or the unfair tragedies of life

Ecclesiastes, I believe, is giving us permission to sometimes let go of our expectations and just be.

Because sometimes things really are as harsh and hard as they feel.

Time and chance overtake all.

It is refreshing to me that Solomon says sometimes the answer is to let go of our rigid fervor to churn out our fate through our best efforts and right living.

I think he's telling us to take ourselves less seriously.

Do not be excessively righteous and do not be overly wise. Why should you ruin yourself?

Do not take seriously all words, which are spoken, so that you will not year your servant cursing you.

For you also have realized that you likewise have many times cursed others.

The condition of my heart and my thoughts are what they are. I want to love Jesus and I want to live life well. But today it’s not a very shiny or pretty love.

But I am small. The cure for my brooding heart is that right now I need to be reminded of my smallness in the world.

Today God’s grace is lifting my burden in the truth that I am small and futile.

Everything under the sun has been done before and has been forgotten and will be forgotten again when I repeat it.

But Solomon’s words also gently pull us back into the heart of God to understand that even though the nature of this world is futile it is still good for the soul and our calling to practice God’s love.

Go then, eat your bread in happiness and drink your wine with a cheerful heart: for God has already approved your works.

Let your clothes be white all the time, and let not oil be lacking on your head.

Enjoy life with the woman whom you love all the days of your fleeting life, which He has given to you under the sun: for this is your reward in life and your toil in which you have labored under the sun.

Whatever you hand finds to do, do it with all your might: for there is no activity or planning or knowledge or wisdom in Sheol where you are going.

The race is not to the swift and the battle is not to the warriors, and neither is bread to the wise nor wealth to the discerning nor favor to men of ability:

For time and chance overtake them all.