What if Ecclesiastes were written today? Your blog posts, your status updates, your tweets, your instagram pics, are meaningless. Anything outside a life of pursuit of God, is meaningless. We get too caught up in the trivial and menial things in life. Too many people are investing time and treasure into things that will die. You can work your entire life, make tons of money, have a million friends, have 18 college degrees, but at the end of the day, you will meet the same fate as the man who has nothing. All the money that you had will more than likely be your children's inheritance. Which, Ecclesiastes says, may or may not go someone who is going to squander your gift.
One thing Ecclesiastes does not say, though, is that bringing up a child who fears the Lord is meaningless. Bringing up a child who knows how to conduct himself is meaningless. Building relationships, teaching others and learning about God and who he is and what he wants from us, is meaningless.
As much of a downer Ecclesiastes may seem to be, it says God does bring happiness. A life lived under God, is a life not lived in vain. The things you teach your children are not meaningless. The relationships that you build, the people that are brought to Christ because of your friendship and your example, are not meaningless.
At first, I was a little confused as to why Ecclesiastes followed Psalms, Proverbs and preceded Song of Songs. Some people may think I'm missing the point. After all, at the time I'm writing this, it's after 1 am. But I get it. To me, Ecclesiastes is motivating. Motivating to not spend so much time in things that don't matter. Motivating to not waste my money that I work for on stupid things that I'm only going to have for a short time anyway.
