Articles
Coping with Life 13 – Emptiness
Coping with Life 13 – Emptiness
By Mike Willis
“Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, vanity of vanities! All is vanity” (Eccl. 1:2). Perhaps you have had a similar feeling in your own life. You feel that you have no purpose for living and those things that you used to really enjoy no longer intrigue or motivate you. This feeling can happen to the rich and prosperous just as certainly as it does for those who are down and out. How often have you have heard in the news that some very popular musician or actor decided to take his own life?
In the Bible, the Book of Ecclesiastes grapples with the emptiness of life on earth. The writer was a very wealthy and politically powerful man. He was King Solomon, one of the richest and wisest men alive in the tenth century BC. He wrote,
What does man gain by all the toil
at which he toils under the sun?
A generation goes, and a generation comes,
but the earth remains forever.
The sun rises, and the sun goes down,
and hastens to the place where it rises.
The wind blows to the south
and goes around to the north;
around and around goes the wind,
and on its circuits the wind returns.
All streams run to the sea,
but the sea is not full;
to the place where the streams flow,
there they flow again.
All things are full of weariness;
a man cannot utter it;
the eye is not satisfied with seeing,
nor the ear filled with hearing (Eccl. 1:3-8).
In Ecclesiastes, the wise king searched for happiness and contentment in such quests as self-indulgence (pleasure), wisdom, music, riches (accumulation of property), work, etc. In his quest, he concluded, “For of the wise as of the fool there is no enduring remembrance, seeing that in the days to come all will have been long forgotten. How the wise dies just like the fool! So I hated life, because what is done under the sun was grievous to me, for all is vanity and a striving after wind” (Eccl. 2:16-17).
Perhaps you have felt the same emptiness with your life as he experienced. Despite being rich, wise, politically powerful, and able to have anything he wanted, he still found life meaningless!
What did he conclude that man should do? Read the twelve short chapters and learn how he reasoned about the many life situations that men confront on earth. When he came to the conclusion of his short book, here is what he concluded that gave life meaning, “The end of the matter; all has been heard. Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man. For God will bring every deed into judgment, with every secret thing, whether good or evil” (Eccl. 12:13-14). If you are trying to find contentment, joy, meaning, and purpose without God, you are likely to experience the same feelings Solomon did at the beginning of his book.
