Dim Windows to the Soul

Ecclesiastes 5:10-15

"Whoever loves money never has money enough; whoever loves wealth is never satisfied with his income. This too is meaningless. As goods increase, so do those who consume them. And what benefit are they to the owner except to feast his eyes on them? I have seen a grievous evil under the sun: wealth hoarded to the harm of its owner, or wealth lost through some misfortune, so that when he has a son there is nothing left for him. Naked a man comes from his mother's womb, and as he comes, so he departs. He takes nothing from his labour that he can carry in his hand."

I must admit, Ecclesiastes is a very difficult book to grasp as a whole. It gives me more questions than answers, it seems like that paradoxes sprinkled throughout the passages. The verses I have quoted here are about money, material (and probably some non-material possessions too), but generally about material prosperity and wealth. The funny thing is that it reminded me of "Parkinson's Law" (basically says work expands to fill the time available for its completion). The more interesting corollaries to this law are the following: (a) Consumption expands along with increasing income, (v.11) and (b) Data storage requirements expand to meet the available storage capacity (Terrabyte hard drives, anyone? My 32GB iphone storage never seem to be enough). I'm not sure if it is really a 'law' in a strict sense, but it does present a tidy explanation of our certain experiences. The apostle John talked about the three particular lusts that we have to be wary of, and one of them is the lust of the eyes (1 John 2:15-17) – exactly the covetousness described in Ecclesiastes, things that we may "feast our eyes on" (v.11). The beauty found around us the pleasure and satisfaction that our possessions, that our accomplishments, relationships, knowledge and that our experiences give us are not so bad in themselves, after all it is a "gift from God". I certainly hope and generally think that no person derives all meaning from possessions alone, but the degrees of which vary from person to person. It is undeniable though that the World is full of "eye candy," glamour, and gaudiness. Materialism beckons with its promise of happiness and fulfillment. A media-saturated society bombards us with advertising campaigns that might as well say, "Covet this!" And there is a subtle and slow death of meaning in this, G.K. Chesterton once said something like 'meaninglessness doesn't come from being weary of pain, but by being weary of pleasure' that certain things and experience at a certain point reach their limit of pleasure and get reduced to vanilla boredom. Boredom –that 'greatest evil' of our generation, that state in which "the existential vacuum mainly manifests" (Frankl) – it seems, just comes around to haunt us back, after running wildly away from it. As good existential philosophers, Mick Jagger and the Rolling Stones were, the song that said "I can't [sic] get no, satisfaction.." was just so spot on. Brothers, 'all that glitters is not gold' and add to that, not our fancy experiences, not our expansive knowledge, maybe not even 'the good life', etc, etc, etc. Instead, our goal is, the Bible says, "to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings" Our eyes are set on Jesus. Our view: Eternity.

Philippians 3:3, 7-11

"For it is we who are the circumcision, we who worship by the Spirit of God, who glory in Christ Jesus, and who put no confidence in the flesh...But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of  my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead."

~30.09.2014

resources: Michael S. Houdmann, www.gotquestions.org "Lust of the Eyes"