The Vanity of Life - ECCLESIASTES START

On the heels of Solomon's great expose on wisdom - the book of Proverbs, we find ourselves in Ecclesiastes, the book Solomon wrote near the end of his life after pursuing all his heart desired was finished. And how does this book open?

Ecclesiastes 1:2 (ESV) Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, vanity of vanities! All is vanity. 

The word vanity is the Hebrew word "habel" which can mean "vapor" or "breath" but in this context - "emptiness." I'm writing a book on this concept that without God our lives are just that - vanity, fleeting and empty. 

Now we know that's what Solomon is talking about in these first two chapters because he repeats a phrase "under the sun" to implicate the status of our lives without the One who is over the Sun. 

He opens with a simple visual examination of the world - everything keeps going regardless of whether we live or die. Humans, for as much as they seek to make themselves the center of the universe, are temporary and fleeting and without God - vapors that inevitably evaporate. 

Ecclesiastes 1:4 (ESV) A generation goes, and a generation comes, but the earth remains forever.

You get to a point in life where Solomon arrives here - eventually, you ask - "What for?" What did I really accomplish? What do I have to say about my life? The end eventually comes for all and the deeper questions of life are often examined in the end far more than in the beginning. That's why we do well to consider this book as perhaps Solomon's most important.

Solomon admits that although we desire and pursue, there's really nothing gained without God. 

Ecclesiastes 1:8–9 (ESV) All things are full of weariness; a man cannot utter it; the eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing. 9 What has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done, and there is nothing new under the sun.

Never before has a generation been able to live with as much information available to us as now. We are all on the internet, scrolling videos at lightning pace, disconnected from each other more than ever, finding our reality absorbed in digitization. Always observing, seeing and hearing but really never increasing in substance. This is life without God. 

Solomon introduces himself and his quest:

Ecclesiastes 1:12–14 (ESV) I the Preacher have been king over Israel in Jerusalem. 13 And I applied my heart to seek and to search out by wisdom all that is done under heaven. It is an unhappy business that God has given to the children of man to be busy with. 14 I have seen everything that is done under the sun, and behold, all is vanity and a striving after wind.

He then begins to unpack the "emptiness" quests of his life. 

Ecclesiastes 1:16–18 (ESV) I said in my heart, “I have acquired great wisdom, surpassing all who were over Jerusalem before me, and my heart has had great experience of wisdom and knowledge.” 17 And I applied my heart to know wisdom and to know madness and folly. I perceived that this also is but a striving after wind. 18 For in much wisdom is much vexation, and he who increases knowledge increases sorrow.

What did Solomon learn? There's nothing to what we pursue when our pursuits are disconnected from the one who formed us for Himself. All we get is more information and consequent indigestion. The more we learn about wisdom, the more we see the crooked and lacking (see verse 15). Social media affords us first-hand accounts (through a screen) of just how awful the world really is. And if we are wise, we will get to an Ecclesiastes appointment with ourselves and see the emptiness around... in order to look to the One who can fill and straighten it all - beginning with us.