Meaningless

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Reading Ecclesiastes is not for the faint of heart. I had forgotten how discouraging the author is towards life in general and humanity as a whole. He's not one to sugarcoat or make light of a life that isn't. As I've been reading the book for my devotions I wondered what I needed to glean from this. 

That life is meaningless? That my desire to write is meaningless? The book certainly doesn't spread much love in the direction of being happy and joyful toward life.

And I started thinking. Why would God give one of His children a desire, if He didn't intend for us to use them toward His glory and perfect end?

Being a fairly (as some people have described me) "bubbly" personality, I don't like to think of life as meaningless. I like to believe that God has given me a specific life to live and wants me to live it to His glory. So where does the book of Ecclesiastes leave me?

It leaves me challenged. If life is meaningless, what am I going to do to change my heart and make it meaningFUL? Life isn't the birds in the trees or the fish that populate the waters. Life is the state of our hearts. The joy in our souls. The point of living. 

Yes, life IS meaningless if you aren't walking with the Savior of our sins.

Yes, life IS meaningless if you aren't taking the gifts He has given you and using them towards the glory of His kingdom.

Yes, life IS bleak, gray and pointless if you aren't living your life for Christ, because any other road leads straight to Hell. What else is more meaningless when God has made it clear in His word He wants NONE of His children to go to such a dark and ugly place filled with weepy and gnashing of teeth?

Maybe that author of Ecclesiastes was onto to something when he said life was meaningless. Because it is. Someday this earth will be no more. The things we find important really aren't in the grand scheme of life. The fight with our sibling, the argument with our boss, the quibble over whether our dream should have come true before someone "less deserving". All those things are meaningless when you compare them to where we are ultimately headed: Heaven. 

What isn't meaningless? Walking strong in faith that we are doing exactly what God asks of us. Whether that means writing a novel. Feeding the homeless. Or parenting your children, what He asks of us, no matter how minute or inconsequential it might seem, it is NEVER meaningless.