Just a simple thought:
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the point of everything. Why am I here? What is life about? Why am I restless with the status quo right now? I’ve been frustrated with myself and with life in general. It all seems so futile. So last night I turned to a book on the futility of life: Ecclesiastes. Besides the Song of Solomon, this has to be one of the least read or understood books of the bible; I admit to not understanding it fully. This is what I got from it: Everything is futile, so be happy, enjoy food and drink and a hard day’s work. Overall, fear God and obey His commands. I finished it and I thought, “is that it?” I jumped ahead to Ephesians and read all of it, and then Phillipians. Looking at Ecclesiastes in light of the New Testament, this is what I saw. The law is what love would do. The law can only be fulfilled by love. Only Christ has ever fulfilled the law, and He did it by love. If we believe in Christ, then we have the power, the Spirit of God, to fulfill the law through love. Paul keeps calling us to do that over and over again in his letters. He says it gives God glory, that it proves our citizenship and adoption into the kingdom of God. So here’s the point of it all:
Obeying the Law,
Motivated by Love,
Empowered by the Holy Spirit,
For God’s Glory,
Until He calls us Home.
If we are doing that, then we can, as Solomon puts it, “be happy, and enjoy ourselves as long as we can [...] eat, drink, and enjoy the fruits of [your] labor, for these are gifts from God” (Eccl. 3:12-13). It’s so easy, yet it takes a lifetime to practice. And that’s the point. We do these things now in preparation of our citizenship in heaven, for this is how we will act while in the presence of God for all eternity.
Filed under: Reflections
