Our Lives are Spent in Vanity

It was a happy thought, for it made me freer....it happily struck me that all our lives here are so very vain, as He says in Ecclesiastes and elsewhere, that the best any one can do outside of the Lord working in them to preach His Word and walk in His Spirit, doing His will, all else otherwise is very vanity.  Parties, social life, etc. the rich and poor, it is all vain glory and so much vanity.  So I went here or there....I experienced this and that.....we get together and gossip or complain or boast....and when all is said and done, what have we accomplished really?  What does any of it matter in the long run?  When the rich man is on his death bed what does it profit him that he experienced and tasted everything he did?  If I get the things or experiences I covet, and for all the ones I had already, what profit is it all to me?  Or anyone else for that matter?  We get together and generally engage in provoking one another to vain glory, envying one another....it is so amusing, and commonplace.  Makes everything I ever think to want or fret over or love here so vain that I do verily care much less, which makes me say, it was a happy realization.Then again, it could make me sad.

Our lives are spent in vanity; 

But then, whose is not here? 

Yet on we go, unwittingly? 

Of all we miss each year.

We say we think our lives are full...

It's 'them' who miss out here...

With all our sports, activities, 

We fill our lives each year

With more than we could ever do; 

So staving off the fear

That we might ever face the Truth

Of vanity down here.  

And those who think they've faced that truth

Live out despairing lives

Of seeking, searching, missing You, 

Yet never knowing why.

So onward pressing towards some goal

That naught could ever reach

The pinnacle of all our hopes

Is being god like Thee.

Denying God we can't succeed

In living worthwhile lives; 

Condemned by Thee for unbelief

In Jesus' sacrifice.

We live dead lives ne'er knowing life

In Jesus Christ...decieved, 

We think this world with all in sight

Is all of life achieved.

To tell us there is life in Thee

Is frankly gibberish; 

We cannot know or e'er perceive

Of any more than this.

Though some will think there's other life

Beyond wherein we live

And some do think....opinions rife

To serve some old spirit.

There's nought that seeketh after Thee

Nor understanding know

That life and hope and surest peace

Are found in Thee alone.

That all these days of vanity

In Thee some worth regain; 

The works which wrought of aught in Thee

Have their reward ordained.

Yet this alone is far from all.....

How shall I tell of Thee? 

Of life incomprehensible, 

So rich and full in Thee? 

We haven't much, yea naught at all

Who have not Christ received.

We haven't life though we have all, 

If we've not Thee believed.

Our lives are spent in vanity

Though oft we 'them' do jeer....

We miss so much, futility

Is all we can know here.

20MAR01