Reflections with Andy - Ecclesiastes 6 - The Weight of the Soul
The teacher continues to look for things that can give meaning. But none of the things he looks at, even the good things, can bear the weight of the soul
In this reflection on Ecclesiastes 6, the Teacher continues wrestling with the emptiness of life when meaning is sought in wealth, pleasure, work, or achievement. Though these things are not inherently bad, they cannot bear the full weight of the human soul or provide lasting peace and purpose. The passage serves as a warning against building our identity on temporary earthly things—whether money, politics, sports, approval, or success—because all eventually fail under the weight we place on them. Only Christ can serve as the true “load-bearing wall” for our souls, providing the lasting meaning and identity we were created to find.
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Well, good morning. It’s good to be with you on this Tuesday morning. I hope you are doing well as we begin our time together in Ecclesiastes. Today we’re going to be in Ecclesiastes chapter 6.
I hope you’ve had a great start to your week. Things are rocking and rolling around here. I look around my office and it’s full of boxes, so the excitement begins and continues.
Today we’re going to read all of chapter 6. Once again, the Teacher—you’re going to see it again—is struggling. This is another very “90s grunge emo” reflection. Our guy is still wrestling with life. You know, Ecclesiastes is a love song to us overthinkers. It really is. Those of us who overthink have probably felt a lot of what Ecclesiastes is telling us.
So let’s read chapter 6. It’s a short chapter, just twelve verses.
“There is an evil that I have seen under the sun, and it lies heavy upon humankind: those to whom God gives wealth, possessions, and honor, so that they lack nothing of all that they desire, yet God does not enable them to enjoy these things, but a stranger enjoys them. This is vanity; it is a grievous evil. A man may beget a hundred children and live many years, but however many are the days of his years, if he does not enjoy life’s good things or has no burial, I say that a stillborn child is better off than he. For it comes in vanity and goes in darkness, and in darkness its name is covered. Moreover, it has not seen the sun or known anything, yet it finds rest rather than he. Even though he should live a thousand years twice over, yet enjoy no good—do not all go to one place?
All human toil is for the mouth, and yet the appetite is not satisfied. For what advantage have the wise over fools? And what do the poor have who know how to conduct themselves before the living? Better is the sight of the eyes than the wandering of desire. This also is vanity and a chasing after the wind.”
Once again, our guy just can’t find happiness. He can’t find peace. He is trying to find meaning and purpose in so many things, and he’s discovering that those things are not equipped to give him happiness or peace.
To me, Ecclesiastes is full of evocative lines—lines that just do something to you when they’re said aloud. It’s very poetic and very emotional. “Better is the sight of the eyes than the wandering of desire.” “This also is vanity and a chasing after the wind.” Those lines stick with you.
The Teacher is almost saying it’s better to desire something than to actually possess it, because once you possess it, who knows what’s going to happen? You’re going to die eventually, and who knows what happens to all the things you worked for after you’re gone? Then he says, “Do not all go to one place?” In other words, don’t we all die? The rich and the poor both die. The wise and the foolish both die. There’s an old joke: life has a 100% mortality rate. Nobody gets out alive.
It’s kind of become a running joke around the office as I’m cleaning out my office and giving things away. Somebody will ask, “Are you dying?” And I laugh and say, “Yeah, we all are.” From the moment we draw our first breath, we begin to die. That’s a very Ecclesiastes kind of thought, but it’s true. And you can see the Teacher wrestling with that reality throughout this book.
One thing I keep coming back to in Ecclesiastes is this: sometimes the Bible is a warning as much as it is counsel. I think Ecclesiastes is a warning for us about the foolishness of trying to build our lives on anything other than Jesus.
What I see over and over is the Teacher trying to place the weight of meaning on things that cannot support the weight of meaning. He’s trying to find life in things that simply cannot bear that load. Food, drink, work—none of these are necessarily bad things. But they cannot be the load-bearing wall for our souls.
The things of this earth cannot be the ultimate source of meaning. They cannot carry the full weight of our identity and purpose.
You’ve heard me say this before if you’ve heard me preach or teach: things cannot bear the weight of your soul. They just can’t.
The American political system cannot bear the weight of your soul. It will crumble under that weight. Sports cannot bear the weight of your soul. Now, those aren’t bad things. I think it’s good to be involved in the civic life of our country. I think sports and rooting interests can be wonderful things. But they cannot become ultimate things.
Only Jesus can bear the weight of meaning. Only our faith can be the load-bearing wall for our souls.
If you’re building a house and the load-bearing wall is not strong enough to support the structure, the house will collapse. That’s just physics. In the same way, if you try to place the weight of your identity, your meaning, and your purpose on something earthly that cannot support it, eventually it will crumble. And when it crumbles, it leaves us empty, angry, and dissatisfied.
That’s what I think we see happening over and over again with the Teacher in Ecclesiastes. He keeps asking things to do something they were never meant to do.
So I think the question for us is this: what are the things in your life that you are placing too much meaning into? What are the things you are allowing to define too much of who you are? They may not be bad things at all, but they cannot carry the weight of your soul.
The Teacher has tried it, and it failed him. It will fail us too.
So be careful. Don’t allow something other than Jesus to become the center of your life. Don’t allow something other than Christ to become the source of your identity and meaning. Because even a very good thing, if it takes the place that belongs only to Jesus, cannot support the weight.
Sometimes the most dangerous thing is not a bad thing, but a very good thing that slowly becomes an ultimate thing.
Today, make sure you have the right load-bearing wall for your soul. And that load-bearing wall is Christ and Christ alone. Jesus is the only one who can support the full weight of meaning.
Thanks for being with us today. Tomorrow we’ll continue in chapter 7, which is titled “A Disillusioned View of Life.” That certainly sounds on brand for our guy in Ecclesiastes.
Have a great day, and I’ll see you tomorrow.