The preacher had attempted many things in his search
for a meaningful life. He tried wisdom and he tried morality all to no avail.
He gave a go at a hedonistic lifestyle, indulged in self-aggrandizement only to
be frustrated and vexed. Then he returned to explore secular wisdom and put
much thoughts to life. Though he found secular wisdom a little advantageous over
folly, yet they both yield absolutely nothing meaningful. He found himself
hating life and loathing it and he said so in Ecclesiastes 2:17.
In fact, he hated work particularly and not just
anything in general. This he verbalized in Ecclesiastes 2:18. Why so? For after
all, people expect work to give them a sense of purpose in life. A deeper
reflection tells us that work was God’s first mandate to man. After He had
created Adam, he specifically told him to go dress, keep and till the garden
and have dominion over all that God had created. We should find satisfaction
for after all it is a God given assignment in life. People feel defined by
their job and derive satisfaction over what one does for a living. But not so says
the preacher here.
According to him, work is the wrong place to look for
meaning in life. Work can be demanding. When one lopsidedly spends undue time
till he has no time for any other thing, he will soon feel the ill-effect of
overwork. What about being overworked and underpaid. Then what about difficult
colleagues or domineering superiors we work with or under. Some had to work
with lazy subordinates and ended up having to pick up the mess they had
created. What about people from other departments of one’s employment, whose
assignment we must coordinate with. And they seem to be slow in working
everything. One can certainly be left very frustrated at work.
What frustrates Solomon was the thought that he
couldn’t take any profit he had gained with him after he passed on. It is another
person who would inherit the profit from his hard work. He realizes that one
day he has to leave everything behind and someone else would inherit the result
of his labor. Giving up to despair he exclaimed in verses 20-21, “So I turned about and gave my heart up to despair over
all the toil of my labours under the sun, because
sometimes a person who has toiled with wisdom and knowledge and skill must
leave everything to be enjoyed by someone who did not toil for it. This also is
vanity and a great evil.” One can spend a whole life building his empire only
to hand over to another who would squander it within a short space of time. He
couldn’t guarantee that his successor would continue with the good work he had
begun. No one can be sure of what will happen in the future. The very thought
of all these brought undue depression to him. To think that he was working for
someone else’s benefit. In deed his son Rehoboam squandered the kingdom he had
worked so hard to galvanize. Immediately after he ascended the throne, 1 Kings
12 revealed that he lost ten tribes to the Northern Kingdom. Here Solomon’s
concern for permanence of his work was proven true. His son had failed him and
God miserably.
In verse
22-23, Solomon revealed his second frustration. It was bad enough to think that
all his works would benefit someone else who could squander it. Now he had to
content with the fact that all his works required him to toil and labour hard.
He had to literally sweat it out to achieve success. And when he went to bed at night, his mind would
still be considering different things he must do to achieve more. This truly
vexed him. Work
to him was “sorrow” and “vexation.” Then as a turnoff event, he saw a bit of
positive light to alleviate him from his depression. In verses 24-25, he tried to
bring some positivity to his work and toil. So, he said, “There is nothing better for a person than that he
should eat and drink and find enjoyment in his toil. This also,
I saw, is from the hand of God, for apart from
him who can eat or who can have enjoyment?” It is true that when one
factors God into one’s life’s work, his perspective of life takes a different
angle. He just learns to enjoy the fruit of his labour.
As we come to the
close of this passage, we realize what Jesus said in Matthew 6:33 is so true. That if we “seek
first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things
will be added to you.” There is a marked difference when we let God have the first claim in
our life and in all we do. We will realize as Paul had told his protege in 1
Timothy 4:4-5, “For everything
created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it
is received with thanksgiving, for
it is made holy by the word of God and prayer.” One last counsel from Paul as we
close. 1 Corinthians 25:58 Paul urges us: “Be steadfast, immovable, always
abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not
in vain” Let this be our focus!
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