For who knows what is good for a person in life, during the few and meaningless days they pass through like a shadow? Who can tell them what will happen under the sun after they are gone? – Ecclesiastes 6:12

Today’s Scripture Reading (November 6, 2019): Ecclesiastes 6

Mixed Martial Artist Vitor Belfort argues that “Legacy is not what I did for myself. It's what I'm doing for the next generation.” I struggle with the idea that life is supposed to be easy. We seem to make many decisions based on what kind of an effect that our actions might have on the ease with which we can live our lives. But that shouldn’t be the point. Our Legacy should be about how we endure pain and hardship so that the ones who follow us can have an easier time. I worry about the legacy that my generation is leaving for the next one, a legacy that includes massive public debt and a climate that is on the edge of death. We can take many positions on both of these issues. But the reality is that the deniers are ignoring the facts. Debt is at an all-time high, something that a simple look at the balance sheets of the Western nations will confirm. We might argue over how bad that debt is going to be for us, but it is really an argument about whether the public debt is bad or really bad or a five-alarm fire, all hands on deck, moment in our culture. The debt that we are handing off to the next generation is, at best, bad.

As far as climate change, the Northwest Passage, which killed explorers 150 years ago, is now wide open and creating a rush of players who are trying to expand their dominion over this newfound area. (Thus, the United States tries to buy Greenland.) Only about a four-hour drive from my house is a glacier that I remember visiting as a child. But the glacier that is there now is a fraction of the size of the one that I visited earlier in my lifetime. The massive glacier that I visited as a child does not exist for my grandchildren to visit. We can’t deny the difference that our own eyes reveal. This is the legacy that we are leaving for those who follow us.

The Teacher, along with other philosophers of his day, did not have a clear understanding of the afterlife. And so he makes this depressing comment about our short time on the stage. Our days are meaningless, and they pass like a shadow. And no one knows what tomorrow might hold after our short time on the earth has passed. And the teacher is only partially right. There is no doubt that our time is short and limited. But it is not meaningless. Our time on this planet is filled with meaning and purpose. What we do here is very important, and we need to make the most of every moment we are given.

And we don’t know what will happen under the sun after our time has ended. But we have a responsibility to leave those who follow us with the best that we have to leave them so that they can do their best with their time “under the sun.”

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Ecclesiastes 7