The assigned texts for this 8th Sunday after Pentecost are Ecclesiastes 1:2, 12-14, 2:18-23; Psalm 49:1-12; Colossians 3:1-11; and Luke 12:13-21. I drew inspiration from several commentaries on Working Preacher, including this one by Vanessa Lovelace on the Psalm, Lois Malcolm’s on Colossians, and especially Matt Skinner’s Dear Working Preacher column. Our ecumenical men’s Bible study group here in Greene also recently read through the book of Ecclesiastes, so that experience was helpful as well.
In the entire three year church lectionary, there are only two passages we read from the book of Ecclesiastes. One is the famous passage about how there is a time for everything, a time to live, and a time to die; a time for planting and a time for harvesting. That’s appointed for New Years Day, which seems appropriate.
Today, we hear the one other passage appointed from Ecclesiastes, which is about the meaning of life. Or rather, it’s about what is not the meaning of life.
This is one of my favorite opening lines of any book in the Bible: “Vanity of vanities! All is vanity.” Or in other translations, “Perfectly pointless…everything is pointless” (CEB)
“Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless!” (NIV) “Smoke, nothing but smoke. There’s nothing to anything—it’s all smoke.” (MSG) “Nothing makes sense! Everything is nonsense. I have seen it all—nothing makes sense.” (CEV)
After that fantastic opening, the writer of Ecclesiastes spends much of the book recounting how he went through a series of experiments searching for the meaning of life. He searched for wisdom, and acquired great wisdom, but with greater wisdom came greater understanding of the problems in the world, so wisdom leads to sorrow.
He searched for meaning through pleasure, through laughter, through wine and food, through work, and through wealth, but all these turned out to be meaningless, chasing after wind. In the grand scheme of things, on the cosmic scale of time, nothing he accomplished mattered.
He even talks about having 100 children to establish a legacy, but then he remembers they’ll all die too, that death comes for everyone. It’s all vanity. It’s all meaningless.
From chapter 6: “who knows what is good for a person in life, during the few and meaningless days they pass through like a shadow? Who can tell them what will happen under the sun after they are gone?”
If you’re looking for an uplifting, hopeful book, Ecclesiastes is not it. But it does point to the reality of being human. We are designed to seek meaning and purpose in life, but no matter how hard we try, no matter how much hard work we do, no matter what we accomplish, nothing we do lasts. We are mortal creatures doomed to die. Death is coming. Amen
We continue with our hymn of the day.
No, just kidding. We’re not ending on that note, because as Christians, we know a better way to look at life. We know life is not meaningless. We know we will die, but we also know we have been set free from death. Death is not the end of the story.
Turn to Colossians. Paul says in verse 2, “Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth, for you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.”
The fact that we’re all going to die does not make life meaningless and pointless. Instead, knowing that we are going to die sets us free to live. So how will you use your freedom? Children of God, how will you live?
The world tells us our goal is to accumulate more, to work harder, to get enough, to do enough to not be forgotten. If you don’t believe me, watch a commercial break on television—it’s all about what you’re lacking and how some product or service can fix you.
But we don’t have to spend our lives trying to make our own immortality—Jesus has already secured that for us. We don’t have to try to find eternal life in temporary, earthly things like fornication, passion, greed.
We don’t have to keep wondering if we’re working hard enough, if we’re climbing the corporate ladder fast enough, if our retirement accounts are fat enough. We have been set free from bondage to fear, set free from the chains of self-sufficiency, set free from the stress of trying and failing to save ourselves.
The Psalm we read tells us there is no ransom, no price one can give to God for one’s life. There is nothing you can pay to live forever and never see the grave.
And yet we keep trying. At least 250 people have paid about $28,000 each to have their bodies cryonically frozen after death in the hope of science eventually progressing enough to bring them back to life. (Source) Billionaire Larry Ellison’s foundation spends $40 million a year studying the biology of aging, trying to find a way to stop the aging process, because as he once said, “Death makes no sense to me.” (Source)
Jesus told the crowd a parable: A rich man’s land produced a bountiful harvest, and he didn’t have room to store it. So he decided to build bigger barns to store all his wealth. Then, secure in his wealth, he could look forward to relaxing for many years, eating, drinking, and being merry.
But God said to him, “You fool! This very night your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be? So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich toward God.”
Depending what sources you read, the number one cause of divorce in America is stress and fighting over money. Part of that is because for most people there’s never enough of it, but part of it is because people value money for different reasons.
In the curriculum I use for pre-marital counseling, there’s a survey to help people recognize how they view money. The results you can get are money as status, money as security, money as enjoyment, and money as control.
Valuing money as status and enjoyment is pretty clear, and we know what the teacher in Ecclesiastes would say about that. Money might make you look successful to your neighbors; money might make you feel good, but ultimately that’s meaningless. Chasing after wind. No matter how much you have, you always know there’s more you could have.
The other two options—money as enjoyment and money as control—are more interesting. That’s closer to what this rich farmer is dealing with.
Greed, Jesus tells us in this story, is idolatry. Greed is about wanting to be secure, wanting to be in control. Like every form of idolatry, it’s about looking for life somewhere apart from God. It’s about wanting to be self-sufficient apart from God.
Money itself is not evil, but if you allow it to be the master of your life, it will pull you away from God, and that’s evil. As 1 Timothy tells us, the love of money is the root of all evil.
If we’re trying to live life on our own, to extend our earthly lives and make our own meaning, money is very helpful. Money lets us buy better medical care; it enables us build monuments to ourselves; it allows us to get other people to do what we want, to remember us.
But if you look to money or possessions for the meaning of life, this too is meaningless vanity.
Jesus said, “Take care! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of possessions.”
Instead, as Paul continues in Colossians 3, live as God’s chosen people. Clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience. Forgive each other. “Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.”
In the waters of baptism, your old self has been drowned and put to death. You have died with Christ, and you have been raised with Christ.
Who you were before doesn’t matter. Whether you were Greek or Jew, slave or free, male or female, rich or poor; whether you were tenant or landlord, black or white, young or old, judge or prisoner, you have put on Christ. You are set free. You are being renewed in the image of your creator who has redeemed you, who has given meaning to your life.
This week, may you remember that true life is found in God. May you be set free from the burden of trying to save yourself, trying to keep up with the false, idolatrous standards of this world.
May you use your freedom to love and serve your neighbors. And may the peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Amen