The Writings of Ecclesiastes

For most of your life you pursuit anything and everything you believe will make you happy.  You are fortunate to have the wealth to get whatever you want, hoping it will give your life meaning.  You have wealth, career changes, many different types of relationships, luxurious homes, many people you thought were friends and so much more.  But none of this actually brought you meaning and true joy. Throughout the years, and many failed attempts, you finally discover the one thing that brings meaning to life. Now you have to get this message out to everyone else.  You cannot keep to yourself what you spent years learning.  But how can you let the world know?  Is it your responsibility?

Have you ever had the feeling that life has no meaning or felt unsure about whether heaven exists? Have you ever wondered why evil people get great power and live long lives in wealth and luxury, while many other good people spend their lives in hardship and poverty?  Have you ever worked hard on a job and felt great satisfaction and pride in your efforts but later felt sad because you realized it would soon be forgotten? Well, the good news is that you are not alone! For thousands of years people have been wondering the same things – and the book of Ecclesiastes is a timeless masterpiece that explores some of the biggest questions that people have about life and its meaning. 

Ecclesiastes may have been written by Solomon but no one knows for sure and no one even knows when it was written.  The message is timeless so it doesn’t really matter. With life’s journey almost complete, the author of Ecclesiastes, called The Teacher,  decides it is important to pass down his wisdom to others, and mostly importantly to young people.  He is like parents all over the world who want to make sure that important lessons from life are passed down in the hope young people will listen and learn from those older, not having to make the same mistakes.  This Teacher wants to do this too and he also confronts some of the hardest and most challenging aspects of life.  He addresses the confusion in life and the reality that justice and righteousness do not always prevail here on earth. 

This Teacher lived life at the very highest levels of government and this has given him a unique perspective of the human struggle for meaning and significance. But even with this high vantage point, our Teacher was not able to see that without eternity, life on earth makes little sense.  At first his thoughts focus only on earthly life, with everything beyond death declared to be unknowable.  When you read the words of the Teacher and his cries of “meaningless, meaningless, everything is meaningless” you can hear the despair in his heart and the anguish he experienced trying to gain true fulfilment from his life on earth. Finally the Teacher recognizes that God has set eternity in the human heart and obeying God is the one true path to a meaningful life.

The writings of the Teacher are a record of his many thoughts and reflections, sometimes even contradicting other parts of the Bible.   Ecclesiastes is an honest record of someone trying to make sense of a complicated and confusing life. 

As the Teacher makes clear, life is short, like a disappearing vapour. Despite advances in science, medicine and technology, human life is still a vapor, same as it was when the Teacher wrote the Ecclesiastes thousands of years ago.  This book is as relevant today as back then.  As the Teacher makes clear, there are limitations to trying to figure out the meaning of life.  God is mysterious. But what we can know is that God is eternal, and He has made a way for us to share it with Him. As we walk through life, the pleasures we experience will never offer lasting fulfilment,  but they can be enjoyed as wonderful gifts from God.   Finally the Teacher gives one final conclusion to his search for meaning in life: “Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the duty of all mankind”.