The End of the Great Depression

“What exists now is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done; there is nothing truly new on earth. Is there anything about which someone can say, “Look at this! It is new!”? It was already done long ago, before our time… I, the Teacher, have been king over Israel in Jerusalem. I decided to carefully and thoroughly examine all that has been accomplished on earth. I concluded: God has given people a burdensome task that keeps them occupied. I reflected on everything that is accomplished by man on earth, and I concluded: Everything he has accomplished is futile—like chasing the wind! What is bent cannot be straightened, and what is missing cannot be supplied.”

Ecclesiastes 1:9-10, 12-15

The world of Ecclesiastes is old, stale, and hopeless. Solomon, husband of many wives, victor of many battles, possessor of great wealth, wonders if any of it is worth it. If the wise die in the same way as the foolish, if the rich suffer the same fate as the poor, if the good man fares the same as the evil man, why even make an effort? Even his last words carry the same sense of melancholy and hopelessness. “The end of the matter; all has been heard. Fear God and keep his commandments, for that is the whole duty of man. For God will bring every deed into judgment, with every secret thing, whether good or evil.” Fear God and obey him, because it is your duty: it will not help you in life, it may not help you in death, you will still die the same as an evil man… but it is your duty nonetheless.

And that was the end of the matter. There was nothing more to said, nothing more to be heard, because even the words of the wise were vain and meaningless.

And then something happened that had never happened before. A new star appeared in the heavens and a company of angels sang to the shepherds of Bethlehem, because God had been wrapped in swaddling clothes and was lying in a manger. A living child had been born into a world of skeletons. Here, finally, was something new, something that that was not vanity and a chasing after the wind.

God was a child. He had friends, he played games with them, he skinned his knees, he was hungry and thirsty and tired. And then God grew up and was a man. He was sarcastic and biting towards some people and utterly kind and gentle towards others. He was enraged at the misuse of the temple and driven to tears by the death of a friend. He had friends and ate and drank and slept under the stars when he could have had an angelic canopy.

And as we think about these things we must remember one simple truth: God does not do meaningless things.

And this does not just apply to his “kingdom work.” The ultimate proof of this is his very first miracle in John 2, unplanned and spontaneous. This is evident from his response to Mary: “What does this have to do with me? My hour has not yet come.” Such a response indicates that the forthcoming miracle has nothing to do with “his hour,” his primary purpose. But he does it anyway. He has the jars filled with water and by the time the first cup reached the master of the feast, it is no longer water but the finest wine that had yet been served.

God does not do meaningless things. There were any number of ways to make his disciples believe in him, if that was his only goal. There were many ways to demonstrate his power, his authority, his deity. He could have made the water disappear: he could have turned it into grape juice (as some Christians fervently wish he had). But instead he chose to turn it into wine, and not  just any wine; he turned it into the finest wine of the feast, wine so good that it made all the other wine pale in comparison. We must acknowledge this amazing truth: that God did something not just to further his mission, not just to make his disciples believe in him, but to help people celebrate a wedding with the best wine of the feast, the ultimate example of extravagance.

God does not do meaningless things. And that means that the world of Ecclesiastes is gone forever.

Because of Christmas, everything is no longer vanity and meaningless: instead, everything assumes a colossal importance. Even “neutral” things like eating or sleeping become full of meaning when we consider that God himself has done these things as well. When we eat, even a snack, we are reminded that God has done the same. When we sleep, we are reminded that God did too. When we attend a wedding, we remember that in doing so we walk in the footsteps of Christ.

Life is full of meaning: I might even say full to bursting. Serving God is no longer a mere duty; it is instead a privilege, an honor, a gift, as we walk this new world and think of Christ taking his first steps in Bethlehem.

The Great Depression

The Old Testament tells a lot of stories. Sad, heartbreaking stories; miraculous, uplifting stories; and stories of life, love, friendship, and epic heroism.  But behind all of the stories, behind the travels of Abraham, the trials of the Israelites, behind even the victories of David and the temple of Solomon lies what Blindside calls the Great Depression, what T.S. Eliot describes as the land of the hollow men. Behind all of the stories lie the sin of Adam, the wail of Ecclesiastes, and the Valley of Dry Bones.

The sin of Adam haunts everything. Every birth, every field, every death is a reminder that mankind and even the very ground itself is cursed: All men die eventually, and what then? Dust, mere motes of earth floating for a while in the breeze, waiting to be dispersed. The kingdoms of man, built with blood and sweat, will last but a little longer than those that built it. Everything fades.

And worst of all, nothing can be done about it. It’s possible to forget about it, for a time. It’s possible to lose sight of it in battle, in worship, in life. But it is always there, waiting to be remembered again. And that’s what Ecclesiastes is: Ecclesiastes is the book that the wisest man in the world wrote when he ran out of distractions. Ecclesiastes is what happens when war, women, and wine lose their novelty, and the greatest intellect in the world is forced to look, really look at the world, and ask what good it all is.

And  he comes up empty. He searches all the world–wisdom and folly, indulgent pleasure and productive work, righteousness and sinfulness–and finds nothing but a huge, terrifying void. Mankind throws everything it has into life and fails to make a single dent in the ever-looming Nothingness. The sun rises on hopeless humanity toiling away at their meaningless existence and by the time it sets, there has been no change. Well, no change save one: everyone is now one day closer to death, to Sheol, to the place where good and evil alike must inevitably go, never to be seen again. Almost all of Ecclesiastes can be summed up in one verse: “What is bent cannot be straightened, and what is missing cannot be supplied.”

The wisest man in the world sets out to find meaning, and he comes to the conclusion that there is none. Existence is a dull, bleak thing, not to be thought of because the thinking of it is too terrible.  And Ezekiel’s prophetic vision of Israel offers a similarly bleak diagnosis. “The hand of the Lord was on me, and he brought me out by the Spirit of the Lord and placed me in the midst of the valley, and it was full of bones. He made me walk all around among them. I realized there were a great many bones in the valley and they were very dry… Then he said to me, “Son of man, these bones are all the house of Israel. Look, they are saying, ‘Our bones are dry, our hope has perished; we are cut off.’”  Israel, the Chosen People of God, the singularly blessed nation, is no more than dusty bones. Their hope has perished, and they are utterly cut off.

Skeletons, going through life hoping to one day not be skeletons… but knowing, at the bottom of where their hearts should be, that such a thing is entirely impossible. Skeletons chasing the wind, clutching at it with bony fingers, collapsing into the dust into which, with a little patience, they will soon dissolve. This is the state of the entire world before the first Christmas. This is the state of every man, woman, and child before Something New came into the dead, never-changing world and changed it forever.

God does not do meaningless things

“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. Is there a thing of which it is said, ‘See, this is new?’ It has been already in the ages before us... I have seen everything that is done under the sun, and behold, all is vanity and a striving after wind. What is crooked cannot be made straight, and what is lacking cannot be counted.” Ecclesiastes 1:9-10, 14-15

The world of the author of Ecclesiastes is old and stale. Nothing has any meaning or creates any lasting difference—the author questions, then, whether it is worth it to do anything at all. If the wise die in the same way as the foolish, if the rich suffer the same fate as the poor, if the good man fares the same as the evil man, why even make an effort? Even his last words carry the same sense of melancholy and hopelessness. “The end of the matter; all has been heard. Fear God and keep his commandments, for that is the whole duty of man. For God will bring every deed into judgment, with every secret thing, whether good or evil.” Fear God and obey him, because it is your duty: it will not help you in life, it may not help you in death, you will still die the same as an evil man… but it is your duty nonetheless.

And that was the end of the matter. There was nothing more to said, nothing more to be heard, because even the words of the wise were vain and meaningless.

And then something happened that had never happened before. A new star appeared in the heavens and a company of angels sang to the shepherds of Bethlehem, because God had been wrapped in swaddling clothes and was lying in a manger. This was, without a doubt, the most important thing that had happened since creation. And what this meant was… everything.

God was a child. He had friends, he played games with them, he skinned his knees, he was hungry and thirsty and tired. And then God grew up and was a man. He was sarcastic and biting towards some people and utterly kind and gentle towards others. He was enraged at the misuse of the temple and driven to tears by the death of a friend. He had friends and ate and drank and slept under the stars when he could have had an angelic canopy.

And as we think about these things we must remember one simple truth: God does not do meaningless things.

And this does not just apply to his “kingdom work.” The ultimate proof of this is his very first miracle in John 2. This miracle was not planned: this is evident from his response to Mary: “What does this have to do with me? My hour has not yet come.” But he does it anyway: he has the jars filled with water and by the time the first cup reached the master of the feast, it is no longer water but the finest wine that had yet been served.

God does not do meaningless things. There were any number of ways to make his disciples believe in him, if that was his main goal. He could have made the water disappear: he could have turned it into grape juice (as some Christians fervently wish he had). But instead he chose to turn it not only into wine, but into the finest wine, wine so good that it made all the other wine pale in comparison. We are forced to realize this amazing truth: that God did something not just to further his mission, not just to make his disciples believe in him, but to help people celebrate a wedding with wine, the ultimate of extravagant beverages.

God does not do meaningless things. And that means that the world of Ecclesiastes is gone forever. 

Everything is no longer vanity and meaningless: instead, everything assumes a colossal importance. Even “neutral” things like eating or sleeping become full of meaning when we consider that God has done these things as well. When we eat, even a snack, we are reminded that God has done the same. When we sleep, we are reminded that God did too. When we attend a wedding, we remember that in doing so we walk in the footsteps of Christ. Life is full of meaning: I might even say full to bursting. Serving God is no longer a mere duty, but a privilege, an honor, a gift, as we walk this new world and think of Christ taking his first steps in Bethlehem.