Just some early morning thoughts from me to you…

“So I became greater than all who had lived in Jerusalem before me, and my wisdom never failed me. Anything I wanted, I would take. I denied myself no pleasure. I even found great pleasure in hard work, a reward for all my labors.  But as I looked at everything I had worked so hard to accomplish, it was all so meaningless—like chasing the wind. There was nothing really worthwhile anywhere.”                  
Ecclesiastes 2: 9-11 (NLT)

“That’s the whole story. Here now is my final conclusion: Fear God and obey his commands, for this is everyone’s duty. God will judge us for everything we do, including every secret thing, whether good or bad.”                  
Ecclesiastes 12: 13-14 (NLT)

I wonder how we will be remembered.

As others look back at your life and mine. What will they see?

How will you and I be remembered?

Maybe they will remember us by all the stuff we accumulated. 

The size and number of our homes and cars, the size of our bank accounts, the championship rings and trophies, the lengthy resumes of accomplishments and business successes.

Solomon’s reflections looking back on his life, recorded in Ecclesiastes, caused him to come to an unhappy disappointing conclusion. 

Nearing the end of his life and reflecting on what he had viewed as a successful life, he shared these candid words—

“But as I looked at everything I had worked so hard to accomplish, it was all so meaningless—like chasing the wind. There was nothing really worthwhile anywhere.”

Solomon looked back and saw that his life was all about him and what he wanted, and what he wanted to do, aligned with the pull of the world. 

That even though the world saw him as wise, wealthy, and wonderful, he realized way too late that he had missed too many moments in his life to walk with God.

It was all meaningless, like chasing after the wind, he wrote. 

Another translation records his reflections, that in his life “all was vanity and grasping for the wind.”  

And as a result, he had missed all the fullness, purpose and meaning of the life He could have had, and was created to have, aligned with God and God’s will for his life.

The world calls us to align with its values and priorities. To bow at the altar of things, success, image, championships and more. The more the better. 

Solomon found out that was all meaningless, vanity, like chasing the wind.

He wasn’t the only one, though. 

Moses doubted God, thinking it was about what he could or could not do. Joshua had to be told three times to be strong and courageous as God called him forward. God scooped Jonah up in a fish to cause him do what God wanted him to do with his life.

David went off on his own too many times but kept looking and returning to God to be who he was created to be. Peter denied Christ three times, was forgiven, restored, and realigned with Christ to live the life God created him to live. 

Solomon finally got it, though, when he shared—

“Here now is my final conclusion: Fear God and obey his commands, for this is everyone’s duty.”

Calling out to himself, and to you and me, to align our lives with God, and to be all who God created us to be, and to do all He intends for us to do. 

Remembering God is always there, in all those times when we feel like we’re sinking deeper and deeper, to pull us up and send us back out. 

In those times when we can’t seem to find a door to where we should go, He opens one before us. 

And when it seems like every road we travel leads to emptiness, regret and disappointment, He places our feet on the road to all we can be with Him.

When life seems empty and meaningless, look to Him.

That is how we will be remembered—aligned with God.

In His Name–Scott

Enjoy this song video of “Look to Him” by the Whitney Houston.