Sunday, August 1, 2010

Vanity or Futility

First I want to tell you how good it is to be back. My time at Newport passed quickly, which attests to the amount of energy and activity that flows through that particular group of people into their community – not unlike all of you here at St. Luke’s. While Sheri kept me aware of how the Holy Spirit was moving through this community, I was blessed to be in a similar situation. My internship was a remarkable, growing experience, full of lessons taught and learned, discernment continued and my path keeps evolving. Through this I can affirm that the Holy Spirit is alive and well at The Church of The Nativity, just as it lives and breathes in this community.
Next I would like to take the opportunity to pass on Sheri’s and my sincere thanks for all of your prayers and wishes during her time in and out of the hospital. I’m sure it was confusing for most people to be hearing one day that she was home and all was well from an operation, and a day or two later receiving word of her being back in the hospital. I can tell you that nothing or nobody was or were more confused than our two dogs. Each time I pulled into the driveway it appeared that they sat in futility on the back of the couch, staring out of the window, anxiously awaiting the return of the queen of their pack. Their anxiety at times seemed to be full of complete helplessness…that same helplessness we often feel overcome with in times of uncertainty and unknowing. One of the common threads that weave in and out of our lives is so often the thread of fearing what we don’t know – looking for known comforts to hold onto – and creating ways to avoid facing the future.
That is one of the facts of life that the writer of today’s Old Testament story tries to convey to us. Our interpretation of Ecclesiastes uses the word “Vanity” and instills visions of an ego riddled culture full of materialism and grasping at every whim under the sun. So much grasping for “stuff” that even the wind is not safe from trying to be controlled. And as we read the Gospel with “vanity” freshly planted in our minds, it further grabs us and forces us to conceive of a world full of greed and want and laziness. That is what the parable seems to be saying. A man was blessed with many things. Those things multiplied. He wanted to save and horde them all for himself. He built a bigger warehouse for storage so he’d never have to work again and sit back and live the “good life”. Some might say, well, yes, he earned it; it’s all his, he can do what he wants with it. Others might say, well yes, but if he’s as good natured and as happy as it appears in the story, why doesn’t he want to share any of it? (Note that we don’t know if he did share or not). Jesus gives us an answer and a moral to go with the story; however, I’m still left back in Ecclesiastes wondering how someone gets to a place where their ego is so big they want to chase the wind.
Enter another interpretation of the Old Testament. Our own definitions of words today and the age we live in are very important players when reading the bible, so I turned to the Jewish Study Bible to view how a Rabi would read the text from the original translation. Where we read “Vanities of Vanity” Says the teacher, “Vanity of vanity, all is vanity” … I see this: “Utter futility! – Said Koheleth – Utter futility! All is futile! Suddenly my views changed and the entire direction of my study changed all because of one word! Vanity to me is ego. Futility to me is something that is worthless. While ego may be worthless, there is a big difference between deeming an act wrong for the sake of greed and want, then from the standpoint of having no value at all.
Ecclesiastes is from the Jewish cannoned texts in the Kethuvim, or Wisdom books, along with Job, Proverbs and a few other texts. Koheleth is the name used to reference King Solomon, to whom the writing is credited. Throughout Ecclesiastes we have a theme of how nothing we humans do in life is deemed to be worthwhile. Life is beyond our comprehension to see the hand of God in the mundane acts of life. Solomon says no matter what we do, all is hard work under the sun. We are born, we live, we suffer and toil, and then we die. And without even a slight notion of an understanding of where God fits into our lives, it can be nothing but futility. It is as crazy as trying to catch the wind!
This would be the perfect place where one of the many preachers of the Gospel of prosperity and success would jump in and say “Wait! That’s your problem! You’re thinking wrong! God WANTS us to be successful and rich and happy and have everything we want, He says so and Jesus says so! I have the Secret! For a nominal price I’ll tell you what it is!” (My own thoughts there, not the church’s) But there IS a silver lining to the dark cloud of despair and futility, and Koheleth gives us the answer as we continue reading Ecclesiastes. He declares that all IS toil and the only thing that IS certain of our humanness IS death. There IS no clear cut line between what type of person the rain falls on or who wins the Powerball. BUT we don’t have to be laborious in our work and toil. What DOES matter is how we treat each other in the process of living out the events in our lives. What does matter is how we react to the unfolding of events as they happen. What does matter is that we place God front and center in our lives and allow our work to become Holy. In that context, nothing will be futile or vane.
I had an experience the day I helped out with lunch at St Barnabas School. All of the food was set out on the table and the counselors were determining who could go and pick up their plates. Two little girls, presumably sisters, tried to hide behind each other as they approached the table, very timid and unsure about what they were allowed to have. I could not help but wonder if their hesitation was from being shy or from being deprived. Watching their eyes open wide as I told them it was okay to have watermelon, and watching their hands hold it as if it were the most precious thing in the world, made me shiver as I saw what true appreciation and excitement was. There was nothing futile about the work involved in that small act of giving that so many people contributed to. There in that moment was something as simple as providing someone a treat, that will endure for as long as I can remember, and hopefully for the two little girls, also.
Both Jesus’ parable in the Gospel and Solomon’s words of wisdom in Ecclesiastes give this same principle. The purpose of our lives is to do our work for God and all else will be taken care of. There is a higher purpose and higher place for us to be in both now and in the future, so stowing away our riches for that rainy day when we’d like to be lazy – while it won’t hurt as long as we’re using it for God’s work – sure won’t help if we don’t use any of it now, today, for others that do need it, now, today.
Amen! 8/1/2010, Peter M. Gdula

1 comment:

  1. You write with a genuine, clear, and humble voice. How we live our lives - loving, supportive, cherishing who we are so that we might cherish others - so easy and so very challenging. Peace

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