Been There. Done That. Now What?
01/29/2006 - Swimming in Circles
I love to swim. I grew up swimming. Both my parents were swimmers and so I guess I had no choice but to like it. I started swimming competitively when I was about six or seven years old. At that time, swimming wasn't my favorite sport, baseball was. And I played baseball too right up through eighth grade.
But when I got to high school and was barely five feet tall I thought I might have a better chance making the swim team than the baseball team. So I went out for swimming. And because I wasn't very big I didn't do well in the short races, the sprints. Instead, I figured that I stood a better chance swimming longer races. In fact, the longer the race the better I seemed to do.
So in high school I was the shortest kid on the team who swam the longest race, the 400 yard freestyle or sixteen lengths of the pool. Another reason I swam that race, quite frankly, was because no one else wanted to. They figured it was a lot easier to swim a race that was over in 30 seconds or less than one that took over four minutes or more. But I wasn't that smart!
After I graduated high school I continued to swim in college. I grew a little bit by then, but still found I did best at distance events. However, in college the distances increased. Instead, of swimming one event of 400 yards in dual meets, I swam two events one 500 yards and the other 1,000 yards. The 1,000 yard freestyle is forty lengths of the pool and takes about ten minutes to finish. It's the event where all the spectators leave and go out to get a snack or check out the basketball game. Although, my mother, God bless her, stayed in the stands to cheer me on!
And in championship meets the distance got even longer. It increased to 1,650 yards which is sixty-six lengths of the pool, about a mile, and that race lasts sixteen or seventeen minutes. That's a long time to go back and back, back and forth, back and forth. In fact, for that race you needed a counter, somebody who holds cards in the water to remind you what lap you're on so you don't get lost along the way. Even my mom would leave during that event!
Now I'll be honest with you. To be a distance swimmer you have to be mentally … ill. You have to be sick, which probably explains a lot about me! It's extremely boring. Believe it or not the race is the exciting part. The training is monotonous. When I was swimming at my peak I would train as much as five hours a day, swim as many as 20,000 yards a day, that's 800 lengths, alone, head underwater, staring at the bottom of a pool!
And when you swim on a team or even do laps at the YMCA you “circle swim.” That means you swim in circles, up one side of the lane and down the other so you don't crash into anybody. Around and around and around in endless circles. … expending all kinds of energy, but going nowhere.
Why am I telling you all this? Because it's part of my therapy! No, I'm telling you this because life is a lot like swimming in circles. We can expend a whole lot of energy going around and around and around and after awhile start to wonder, “What's it all for? Where's it all going? Why do I feel like I'm getting nowhere fast?”
Life, like distance swimming, can get monotonous after awhile. Certain things just get repeated over and over and over again. You do three loads of laundry, the basket is empty, by day's end it's full again. You clean up the kitchen, put everything away, the next morning it's dirty again. You empty your inbox, answer all your emails and the next time you boot up it's full again! You get up, go to work, come home, watch TV, go to bed. Get up, go to work, come home, watch TV, go to bed. Except on Friday's when you get up, go to work, come home, watch a video, go to bed.
Sound depressing? It is! If that's all there is to life. But is that all there is to life? This morning we continue our series on futility called Been There. Done That. Now what? It's a series that's going to take us through the book of Ecclesiastes. If you have a Bible please turn to Ecclesiastes 1.
The word Ecclesiastes, we said last week, means “preacher” or “one who addresses an assembly.” In this case, the preacher is King Solomon the wisest, richest, most powerful man of his time, perhaps of all time, and this book is his journal in which he records his observations about life.
So let's see what he records in Ecclesiastes 1:1-11, The words of the Teacher, son of David, king in Jerusalem: “Meaningless! Meaningless!” says the Teacher. “Utterly Meaningless! Everything is meaningless.” 3 What do people gain from all their labors at which they toil under the sun? 4Generations come and generations go, but the earth remains forever. 5The sun rises and the sun sets, and hurries back to where it rises. 6The wind blows to the south and turns to the north; round and round it goes, ever returning on its course. 7All streams flow into the sea, yet the sea is never full. To the place the streams come from, there they return again. 8All things are wearisome, more than one can say. The eye never has enough of seeing, nor the ear its fill of hearing. 9What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun. 10Is there anything of which one can say, “Look! This is something new”? It was here already, long ago; it was here before our time. 11There is no remembrance of people of old, and even those who are yet to come will not be remembered by those who follow.
Meaningless! Meaningless! Everything is meaningless! What's the point of getting up and going to work everyday? Solomon opens his journal by telling us that he's frustrated with the circle of life. Swimming in circles has him depressed.
He looks at people and all he sees is an endless parade of cradles and coffins, coffins and cradles. Generations come and generations go, but the earth remains the same. We're born. We die. Other people are born. They die. Nothing changes. Life moves forward, but goes nowhere. We were created to rule over the earth and subdue it. Yet it's the earth that remains while we disappear.
Have you ever noticed that death is both universal and democratic? Everybody dies. In 2005, funny people died like Johnny Carson. Actors died like Richard Pryor. Rich people died like John Walton heir to the Walmart fortune. Business leaders died like Frank Perdue the king of chicken. Religious figures died like Pope John Paul II. The “mother of the civil rights movement,” Rosa Parks, died. High profile journalists like Peter Jennings died. Their lives are remembered by some, forgotten by most, and quickly replaced by others.
Look at verse 5, The sun rises and the sun sets, and hurries back to where it rises. 6The wind blows to the south and turns to the north; round and round it goes, ever returning on its course. 7All streams flow into the sea, yet the sea is never full. To the place the streams come from, there they return again.
Solomon looks at the world around him and all he sees are cycles. The sun rises and the sun sets. The wind blows to the south and then turns to the north. Even without the aid of satellite photography, like we have today, Solomon sees the wind swirling around in circles just like we see it every night on the news.
He sees the water cycle. The streams flow into the sea, the sea evaporates, the water cools and forms clouds, the clouds drop rain that falls back to the earth and into the streams that flow back into the sea and over and over and over again it goes. It's monotonous to Solomon. It has no meaning for him. It's the same thing day after day after day. It's swimming in circles.
He has a totally different take on what he sees in nature than that of his father, David, who wrote in Psalm 19:1, The heavens declare the glory of God, the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Or then that of the prophet Jeremiah who wrote in Lamentations 3:22-23, Because of the Lord's great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning, great is your faithfulness.
And why is that? Because Solomon has taken God out of the equation. When he looks at creation all he sees is futility because he's looking at life strictly “under the sun.” But when David and Jeremiah look at creation they see the faithfulness and the love of God because they are looking at life from “above the sun.”
All things, he says in verse 8, are wearisome, more than one can say. The eye never has enough of seeing, nor the ear its fill of hearing.
Verse 8 explains why we can have 225 channels on Direct TV and say, “there's nothing on tonight!” It explains the addiction known as channel surfing, why we fight for the remote, why video games get old so quickly, and why pornography will never satisfy our soul. The eye has its own appetite that can never be filled.
And so does the ear which explains why the number one song doesn't stay number one very long. If the ear didn't have an appetite we'd all still be listening Elvis Presley's “You Ain't Nothing but a Hound Dog!” After all, he holds the record for 21 songs to hit number one. But the ear has its own insatiable appetite for music and for information and for gossip and for praise. “Nothing satisfies,” Solomon says, “and it's driving me out of my mind!”
Look at verse 9, What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun. 10Is there anything of which one can say, “Look! This is something new”? It was here already, long ago; it was here before our time.
Have you ever noticed how style and fashion comes in cycles about every twenty years? I have. That's why I hold onto my clothes as long as I can. I have a pair of cacky cargo pants that Jennifer gave me twenty years ago. They were in style and then they were out of style and then they were in style and they were out of style. And now I think they're back again. If I only could fit into to them I'd be set. Save your bell bottoms and your polyester leisure suits. They're coming back too!
There is nothing new under the sun. I heard that archeologists not long ago uncovered an ancient Egyptian hieroglyphic of a university professor written thousands of years ago which read, “My students are no good. All they do is carouse and drink beer!” Some things never change.
But what about technology you ask? It seems like things are changing all the time. And they are. Time magazines newest inventions for 2005 included cloning an Afghan puppy named, Snuppy, PlayStation's PSP, Nintendogs, the IPOD Nano, a dancing 5' 5” female robot, and Michelin's new airless tire.
Solomon's not denying human creativity or saying that nothing new will ever be invented or created. But the elements for these inventions aren't new. They've always been with us. We've just learned how to combine them in different ways. But even so our rapid advancements in technology prove his point. They don't satisfy.
First we wanted a cell phone. Then we wanted a cell phone that's smaller with a screen. Then we wanted a cell phone with a color screen. Then we wanted a cell phone with a color screen and a digital camera. Then we wanted a cell phone with a color screen and a digital camera and a video camera. And on and on it goes.
In verse 11 he says, There is no remembrance of people of old, and even those who are yet to come will not be remembered by those who follow.
On Wednesday night I took my mother to the Flyers game, just the two of us. It was a Christmas gift from Jennifer who gave it to us not so much to watch a game together, but to make a memory together. It was only recently that I discovered that mom was a fanatical Flyer's fan. She was so upset last year that the NHL went on strike because she loves to watch the Flyers on television, but she had never been to a game.
So when I picked her up on Wednesday afternoon she was like a little kid. We went out to eat together and then we were the very first ones at the Wachovia Center. In fact, we were so early that the guard had to unlock the gate to let us into the parking lot. And even though the Flyers lost and I heard one player admit it was their worst game of the season, we had a ball. It was a night that I will never forget.
I'll always remember my mom, of course, and my kids will too, but if they have kids someday, they won't. Chances are they won't even know my mother or my father who died last year. There is no remembrance of people of old, and even those who are yet to come will not be remembered by those who follow.
And that's depressing, Solomon says. We live life. We work hard. We do our best to be parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, we try to make a difference in this world, and yet in a few years nobody even knows that we ever walked this earth. What's that about?
So in verses 4-11 Solomon's frustrated by life's endless cycles and the futility of human effort. Human effort, no matter what it is, will not last beyond the grave. And now in verses 12-18, he's frustrated by the futility of human wisdom.
Look at Ecclesiastes 1:12-18, I, the Teacher, was king over Israel in Jerusalem. 13I devoted myself to study and to explore by wisdom all that is done under heaven. What a heavy burden God has laid on the human race! 14I have seen all the things that are done under the sun; all of them are meaningless, a chasing after the wind. 15What is twisted cannot be straightened; what is lacking cannot be counted. 16I thought to myself, “Look, I have grown and increased in wisdom more than anyone who has ruled over Jerusalem before me; I have experienced much of wisdom and knowledge.” 17Then I applied myself to the understanding of wisdom, and also of madness and folly, but I learned that this, too, is a chasing after the wind. 18For with much wisdom comes much sorrow; the more knowledge, the more grief.
All Solomon's wisdom drove him crazy! The more he knew the more he knew he didn't know. Does that make sense? Wisdom, no matter how much you have, and Solomon had more than anyone who has ever lived, is not enough to make sense out of life. Solomon is applying all of his God given wisdom to solving the riddle of life. He's on a good and noble quest. One that the great philosopher Socrates would applaud who once said, “The unexamined life is not worth living.” Well, Solomon is examining life, but he's discovered that the examined life is not worth living either if God's not in it.
You see we can't find the meaning of life in life itself. In verse 14 he says, What is twisted cannot be straightened and what is lacking cannot be counted. In other words, I can't figure it out. There's so much wrong with this world that can't be fixed. There's got to be more than this. But more knowledge is not the answer.
Verse 18 says,For with much wisdom comes much sorrow; the more knowledge, the more grief. The more I know the more I discover I don't know. And that causes me grief. That's important for us to hear because we live in “the information age.” We've never had more information more easily accessible than today. And wisdom and knowledge are good things. The Bible says grow in grace and knowledge. But wisdom and knowledge will fail us if we make them our God.
So is there a way to stop swimming in circles? St. Augustine suggested a way when he said, “He who has God has everything. He who does not have God has nothing. He who has God and everything has no more than he who has God alone.”
There is a way to stop swimming in circles. God did not create us for a circular existence. He doesn't want us to just live a horizontal life “under the sun.” He wants us to live a linear life, above the sun, a life of meaning and purpose that's going somewhere. And it starts by bringing him back into the equation. It starts by looking at life from “above the sun.”
Is God part of your equation for life? Is there purpose and meaning in your existence or are you just going around and around and around? The answer depends on what you're listening to. Maybe this story will help.
The story is told of two men who were walking down the crowded sidewalks of Manhattan one day. One was a Native American Indian and the other a native New Yorker, born and bred in the city. The noise was incredible with cars and buses and horns and sirens and people talking loudly when all of a sudden the Indian said, “Stop. Listen. I hear a cricket. Do you hear it?”
The New Yorker thought he was joking and said, “Come on. You can't hear a cricket in the midst of all this noise. There are no crickets in Manhattan.”
“No, seriously,” his friend said. “Follow me.” So he took his friend by the arm and led him down the block and around the corner to a large cement planter where a tree was growing. He moved a few pieces of mulch and there was a cricket.
His New York friend was stunned and said, “How did you hear that?”
“My ears are different than yours,” he said, “I've spent my life living outdoors. I can hear a cricket over any other kind of noise. Here, watch this.” Then he took out a handful of change and dropped it on the sidewalk. And when he did, every head on the block turned around and looked in his direction.
You see we hear what we're listening for. Our ears pick up the sounds to which they are tuned. If it's the sound of a cricket or the sound of money or the voice of God we're listening for we'll hear it no matter how much “background noise” there is all around us. Solomon heard the noise, but he didn't hear God.
What are you listening for? Living under the sun is not enough. Under the sun living only has meaning when we know the Son who comes from above the sun. So let me close with the words of another preacher who had seen it all and lived to tell about it. He was a pretty smart guy too. His name was Paul.
And in Colossians 3:1-4 he writes, Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. 2Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. 3For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. 4When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.