The Vanity of Toil

 

 

Ecclesiastes 2:18-26

 

The Vanity of Toil

I hated all my toil in which I toil under the sun, seeing that I must leave it to the man who will come after me, and who knows whether he will be wise or a fool? Yet he will be master of all for which I toiled and used my wisdom under the sun. This also is vanity.   So, I turned about and gave my heart up to despair over all the toil of my labors under the sun, because sometimes a person who has toiled with wisdom and knowledge and skill must leave everything to be enjoyed by someone who did not toil for it. This also is vanity and a great evil.   What has a man from all the toil and striving of heart with which he toils beneath the sun?   For all his days are full of sorrow, and his work is a vexation. Even in the night his heart does not rest. This also is vanity.

There is nothing better for a person than that he should eat and drink and find enjoyment in his toil. This also, I saw, is from the hand of God, for apart from him^[ who can eat or who can have enjoyment?  For to the one who pleases him God has given wisdom and knowledge and joy, but to the sinner he has given the business of gathering and collecting, only to give to one who pleases God. This also is vanity and a striving after wind.

I’ve had to watch in my own life the results of building and leaving it to a person who did not manage what was given to them and lost all of my many years of work and investment in a few short years.  I had worked very hard to earn the trust and respect of many large corporations in my years at 3M in the industrial business in the Houston market, and yet the ones that followed me did not manage the gift of my toils and much of it has vanished, and I must agree with Solomon, that it was vanity.

Now let me be clear, I received the blessing of my hard work but the one it was left to is a younger generation that had not been instructed in the value of getting their hands dirty, in maintaining a working relationship with the plant engineers or the people who installed those great products.  It did not happen overnight but over time someone else got to spent time with them and took much of the business away.

Once more we see Solomon using the word vexation, he is angry or irritated over the thought of what might happen.

“There is nothing better for a person than that he should eat and drink and find enjoyment in his toil.”  I was blessed to have a dad that lived that out, that a job worth doing was worth doing well.  My dad never griped about his job, but I do believe he also never found enjoyment in it, his real desire was to coach young men in the game of football.

I was blessed to not only work for a great company but to have some great people invest in me to teach this uneducated person how to be good at the task, and I enjoyed my work.  I enjoyed the praise of my managers and to have upper management know that I was dependable, but I always knew that it was God who was the real source of my accomplishment.

 

From the Back Porch,

Bob Rice