All Is Vanity!

[Musicmaster]

When we look at the world around us, it's easy to lose out on that Light that shines above, around and from beneath it all. Solomon felt the weight of the wisdom he was given, and it burdened him in his pursuits of pleasures and things to make him happy, and in it all, he found vanity and indifference in the world.

In a sense, he saw a little of of this world from the perspective of the Most High. In relation to what He has prepared for us, the things of this world, and it's fallen ways, it's all vanity by comparison.

Ecclesiastes 1:3, 8-11, 14, 17-18
3 What profit has a man from all his labor In which he toils under the sun? ...
8 All things [are] full of labor; Man cannot express [it]. The eye is not satisfied with seeing, Nor the ear filled with hearing.
9 That which has been [is] what will be, That which [is] done is what will be done, And [there is] nothing new under the sun.
10 Is there anything of which it may be said, "See, this [is] new"? It has already been in ancient times before us.
11 [There is] no remembrance of former [things], Nor will there be any remembrance of [things] that are to come By [those] who will come after. ...
14 I have seen all the works that are done under the sun; and indeed, all [is] vanity and grasping for the wind. ...
17 And I set my heart to know wisdom and to know madness and folly. I perceived that this also is grasping for the wind.
18 For in much wisdom [is] much grief, And he who increases knowledge increases sorrow.

It's nice to know that this is not all there is. Oh, yes, the increasing numbers of so-called "atheists" and works-based religions, they all are pursuers of vanity and emptiness. Thanks be to the Lord our God that we have so much more to look forward to in what is to come!

 

[Via dolarossa]

In my book, humour helps in times like these.

Maybe the Lord just doest want me to take the things that happen to me all that seriously, since it's not the final destination...

 

[Musicmaster]

Vanity presents itself through so many expressions in this fallen world of ours.

Perversity, the pride in it, the practice of it, the promotion of it and celebration of it!

Vanity pushes so deeply into the level of hypocrisy that it has become the bandwagon of the masses!

What of all those who say they are Christians?

Well, the acid tests we may apply in order to know their fruit, the word of God lays out for us throughout the Gospels and the epistles of Paul, and various of the writing of the other apostles.

 

[kdm1984]

I've always loved Ecclesiastes.

I went through an agnostic period when younger, well over 20 years ago now. What I found was a whole lot of meaninglessness. Solomon saw that everything apart from God was vanity. He was right.

People without faith chase after vain things, blown about by every wind. Nowadays, politics is a big thing with the irreligious of my generation and younger. They think they're so much more just and righteous than previous generations, and boast about their presumed empathy and deeds for marginalized groups. Not long ago, our culture was saturated with the lukewarmness of "live and let live," or pleasure-seeking, which we saw of a lot in the latter part of the 20th century. The sexual revolution didn't work; now we have the asexual revolution. Young people in the United States think, if we were just like Sweden, we'd have Utopia. Well, Sweden is dealing with ramifications of someone burning the Quran! Nowhere is perfect. Socialism, capitalism, all of man's systems never satisfy. Nations rise and fall, political ideologies come and go, people chase after this thing and that thing, and the unbelievers are never content. We have so much food, so much amazing technology, yet so many people have mental health trouble. This world just can't satisfy.

 

[Musicmaster]

I've always loved Ecclesiastes.

I went through an agnostic period when younger, well over 20 years ago now. What I found was a whole lot of meaninglessness. Solomon saw that everything apart from God was vanity. He was right.

People without faith chase after vain things, blown about by every wind. Nowadays, politics is a big thing with the irreligious of my generation and younger. They think they're so much more just and righteous than previous generations, and boast about their presumed empathy and deeds for marginalized groups. Not long ago, our culture was saturated with the lukewarmness of "live and let live," or pleasure-seeking, which we saw of a lot in the latter part of the 20th century. The sexual revolution didn't work; now we have the asexual revolution. Young people in the United States think, if we were just like Sweden, we'd have Utopia. Well, Sweden is dealing with ramifications of someone burning the Quran! Nowhere is perfect. Socialism, capitalism, all of man's systems never satisfy. Nations rise and fall, political ideologies come and go, people chase after this thing and that thing, and the unbelievers are never content. We have so much food, so much amazing technology, yet so many people have mental health trouble. This world just can't satisfy.

Good post, kdm.

The one stabilizing reality for me is that:

1) God is in control.
2) Nothing will happen outside of His Sovereign Will.
3) Nations will only go down into the dusts when God allows the forces of evil in those nations to become too powerful for believers to be salt and light in the world, and when the Church can no longer knock down the gates of Hell, as promised by the Lord Himself.
4) For those who think the West is doomed, go back to #1 and start over again...

The gloom and doomer preaching out there almost never acknowledge God's Sovereign control over everything. They will retort with, "The world is the kingdom of Satan.

Well, to that I say that they underestimate the Power of the Almighty, because it is His Throne that Satan wanted to elevated up to, and was never able. So, again, I will point them to #1 above, and let it all sink in.

MM