What Are You Hearing?

Eccles. 1:2 3-9 13-14

WHAT ARE YOU HEARING?

It was found written on the walls of a library at a university “apathy Rules.” Apathy could mean indifference, boredom, laziness, lack of interest or concern.

Do we get excited about what God is doing in this world? Are we passionate for the things that God really cares about? Do we hear God when He speaks?

Education for the most part serves only to broaden stupidity, pump up self-satisfaction, and enhance lack of caution. Mencken wrote, “The basic fact about human experience is not that it is a tragedy, but that it is a bore. It is not that it is primarily painful, but that it is lacking any sense.”

Maybe you have heard some of these sayings that seem for the most part to be true:” Laugh and the world laughs with you. Cry and you cry alone.” “Every day in every way our world is getting better, better and better.” “There is a light at the end of every tunnel.” “Things never seem as bad as they seem so dream, dream, dream.”

Why do they tell us these things? “You just need to smile a little more, to believe, just grab for it, you’ll make it someday.” They would want us to believe that if we only keep hoping, there is a purpose in life. You know as I do that this world holds little hope. This world is corrupt, wicked and immoral. Much of what we do is not fun but is tiring and seems pointless. Many people that we meet are cruel, selfish and downright mean. If we choose to live here on earth with no upward look we find life void of purpose.

All worldly things are vanity. Not of themselves for they are God’s creation and therefore good, but in reference to that happiness, which men seek and expect to find in them. So they are unquestionably vain, because they are not what they seem to be, and perform not what they promise, but instead are the occasions of innumerable cares, and fears, and sorrows, and mischief. The writer says they are not only vanity but vanity of vanities, vanity to the highest degree. And this is redoubled, because the thing is beyond all possibility of dispute. All is unprofitable as to the attainment of that happiness which all men are enquiring after. By this restriction he implies that the happiness which in vain is sought for in this lower world can only be found in heavenly places. Men continue and that a short age, and then they leave all their possessions, and therefore they cannot be happy here, because happiness needs to be unchangeable and eternal; or else the certain knowledge of the approaching loss of all these things will rob a man of solid contentment in them. Man is more changeable than the very earth upon which he stands. Together with all the comforts which he enjoys, he leaves all behind to be possessed by others. There is nothing in the world but a continued and tiresome repetition of the same things. The nature and course of the beings and affairs of the world, and the tempers of men, are the same that they ever were and shall ever be; and therefore, because no man ever yet received satisfaction from worldly things, it is vain for any person hereafter to expect it. When Solomon came to rule he ruled for forty years without war in his country. He had money spend and time and energy. He comes to this conclusion: "Everything is meaningless," says the Teacher, "utterly meaningless!” So he asks: “What do people get for all their hard work?” Those who worship their work and play in their time of worship have gotten their lives broken up. They are getting depressed which I believe is a major disease today. Just look what kind of pills are selling the most today.

We have read here that things in this world come and go. Generations come and go. The Sun is constant every day. We hear the wind and see what it can do every day. We seem to never wonder about the water supply, even in drought we have found when we turn on the faucet there is still water. Things of this world do not give us much hope. Jeremiah says about God “Great is thy Faithfulness.” I have seen and heard of great people in my lifetime. They have had money, fame, popularity but they are gone and with it so has what they had. I have just recently read of Rachel who was very beautiful and the favorite wife of Jacob and that she died in child birth. Beauty did not keep her living or bring her long life. I know many who spend much money getting their hair fixed up and putting on make up and dressing up to look good who will still die. We can have record of when the sun rises and when it sets and does that really mean much to our lives?