Day 514 of 1000
I have always loved to read the book of Ecclesiastes in the Bible. I arrived there today in my current read through the Old Testament. It is traditionally attributed to King Solomon and it seems like there are a lot of parallels to his life and what is going on in the world today. Back then, the average man did not have access to as much free time and access to knowledge to pursue whatever whim the think might make them happy. Since that is now available, it seems like a lot of people are attempting to acheive self-fulfillment in pleasure, fame, accumulation of knowledge, accumulation of wealth, and a lot of other vain pursuits. Solomon rightly identified all these as vain pursuits.
How does this apply to “doing hard stuff”? Well, the point I hammered home to the kids that it is not worth going to college unless you are going to do something that is both academically difficult and that will lead to a good job. I think the reasons for that are self evident and will not go into that now. I still think that is good advice, but my start into Ecclesiates helped me remember that even this is a vain pursuit if it is not accompanied by the admonition at the end of the book:
Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man.
The kids are probably in the hardest semester of their entire college career right now. They have no time to do anything but study. It consists of large volumes of work understanding very complex material–Mathematical Statistics, Analysis, Modern Algebra, programming, electrical engineering. Hard, hard stuff. It will help them get a good job. I will probably help them build character and a work ethic. The problem is that if it develops into pride of self, it is self defeating; it does not conform to the admonition.
The best part is that if we are applying the admonition, even a “bad” job can become a “good” one because there is better purpose than the job itself – the people we live in front of. This has been a hard lesson God has been trying to teach me for a very long time. I think I am finally really starting to get it. God is good – always. 😎
Thank you Conrad! I think that is exactly right. I seem to miss that point a LOT. Now, every time I think I do not like my job, I am reminded of when I was working at the mill or in the woods. I will have to remind myself that it is OK to realize I have a better job than I did before, but the bigger take-away is that, even if I did not have a better job than before, I need to do it as onto the Lord for His sake, for others sakes, and for my own sake.