All is futile.
One thing I have learned is that what our society deems important, is not always important.
Growing up in America, you learn that there is a lot of emphasis placed around finding success early on. There is almost an expectation to do better than the generation before did and “better” is often defined as “more money, bigger house, and more comfort.”
It was apparent as I went through high school and there was the pressure early on to choose a college and/or career. After all, the earlier you choose a life path, the more successful you can be in it.
It was ever more obvious in college when I felt a calling to vocational ministry and changed my degree plan to Christian Studies and I received a lot of, “Why? Don’t you know you probably won’t make much money doing that?”
And now, as I have graduated college and most at this point in life would be expected to get a job, settle down and begin their career, I have signed up to go overseas on an eleven month mission trip that no, doesn’t pay, and yes, I have to raise over $16,000 for. Again, there has been a lot of “Why?” and “Are you sure that is wise?” and “You know you won’t have a place to live, a car, or a job when you get back, right?” and “You know that can be dangerous, right?
Maybe life wasn’t meant to be safe. Maybe my success on this Earth isn’t measured by the amount of money I made, the amount of stuff I accumulated, or the praise of my peers. Maybe more comfort than the generation before me isn’t what I should be pursuing. Maybe we have ultimately placed value on the wrong things in life.
(*Really, you can scratch out all the maybes in this paragraph)
All of us have a calling. You can ignore it and pursue the world, or you can acknowledge it and seek to use it to glorify God. Frederick Buechner says that the place God calls you is the place where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet.
Right now, my calling is to go on the World Race. Twenty years from now, I don’t know. That time isn’t promised to me. I will live for where God has called me to be right now and trust Him to handle the future.
Ultimately, we have to realize that worldly success and gain are futile. The only reason worth living is to fulfill the purpose for which we were made. That is, to answer our calling. For that to truly happen, our motivation in life cannot be society, money, peer praise, or any of the like, but instead must be a reverential fear of the Lord in all things.
“When all has been heard, the conclusion of the matter is: fear God…” Ecclesiastes 12:13
Who are you living for?
