Love the Unexpected

“Vanity of vanities,” says the Preacher; “vanity of vanities, all is vanity.”

Ecclesiastes 1:2 NKJV

So begins the book of Ecclesiastes. Nestled in between Proverbs and Song of Songs, just before the major prophets, the author is unknown, but speculated to be King Solomon.

According to 1 Kings 4:29 (NIV):

God gave Solomon wisdom and very great insight, and a breadth of understanding as measureless as the sand on the seashore.

If Solomon was the author, he was the wisest man on Earth.

If you don’t read to the end of the book, you might find yourself feeling a little discouraged. The author reviews every aspect of life that he’s chased after, looking and hoping to find meaning and escape from the futility of life that haunts him. In every pursuit, he finds the same truth: pleasure, wisdom, folly, toil – it’s all vanity; all in vain. It’s all “grasping for the wind”.

In the end the author comes to this conclusion:

Now all has been heard; here is the conclusion of the matter: Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the duty of all mankind. For God will bring every deed into judgement, including every hidden thing, whether it is good or evil.

Ecclesiastes 12:13-14 (NIV)

You may wonder what started this dive in Ecclesiastes.

If you’ve ever experienced post-partum, you’ll know that it can be a somewhat … challenging time for your self-esteem.

I’ve had three babies in the last three years and it’s safe to say that at thirty-one, I do NOT look like I did at twenty-five and in spite of copious amounts of exercise and “clean eating”, I don’t think it’s likely that I’ll ever look that way again.

Over the last few months, I’ve found myself looking a little despairingly in the mirror, longing for that pre-baby body to miraculously reappear. Each time, I eventually sigh, shrug my shoulders and turn away with the words, “all is vanity”.

Truthfully, I didn’t know where it came from. If you had told me it was Shakespeare, I probably would have believed you. Whoops. Trust me, I’m just as embarrassed as you.

After hearing the phrase run through my brain a couple hundred times, I finally looked it up. In my defense, the specific phrase “all is vanity” appears in the NKJV translation, while the NIV translates to “everything is meaningless” – considering both adds a richness to our understanding of the passage and hammers home the meaning of a term used about 35 times in this book.

The definition of meaningless is (quite obviously) having no meaning. Vanity has a couple of definitions. It can mean something is vain (marked by futility or ineffectualness), empty or valueless; it can also mean inflated pride in oneself or one’s appearance.

The second meaning best applies to my habit of staring down the mirror. I knew somewhere in my subconscious, that the discouragement I was feeling was stemming from a sense of pride that I had once held in my appearance. But what depth of meaning it takes on to realize that the same word means empty; valueless; meaningless.

Now, thanks to the two translations we’ve looked at, we can see that it was the first meaning that the the author of Ecclesiastes was driving at. The writer says that ALL is in vain; empty; meaningless apart from God. If that is so, then I believe inflated pride in appearance would certainly fit into the category of ALL.

If I think back to when I was twenty-five, though I may have taken pride in how I looked, I was still never fully satisfied in my appearance. There were always a few more pounds here or there that I figured I could stand to lose. If only my hair was a little thicker or a little different colour. If my eyes were shaped just a little wider.

I can look back now and think … wow, I looked great! But the point is that regardless of what weight the scale has read back to me, I’ve experienced the futility and emptiness that comes from seeking satisfaction from the admiration of others and myself in the mirror. That makes a lot of sense in the light of these verses from Ecclesiastes – appearances have never been where I’m supposed to find meaning.

The author of Ecclesiastes finally concluded after searching down every avenue, that the only way to find meaning in life was to fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man.

Apart from God, life is meaningless – yet because we serve a good God – an Almighty God who loves and cares about all the details of our lives, a God who not only created us with a purpose and a plan, but sacrificed his only son on the cross and raised him from the dead that we might know Him personally – life is entirely meaningful. What an incredible hope and what a joy to serve such a God.

Now, acknowledging that my worth is not stemmed in my appearance and that placing my pride in my appearance is not only the definition of vanity but totally empty, at this point, it would have been really tempting for me to say, “Great! Time to let myself go!” and live in a perpetual state of track suits and snack foods.

But, something about that didn’t sit right either.

In Proverbs 31:22 (NIV), it says

she makes coverings for her bed; she is clothed in fine linen and purple.

Now there’s a lot more to the Proverbs 31 woman than what she wears. She is said to be clothed with strength and dignity (v25), to speak with wisdom (v26), among many other qualities.

But I find it interesting that the author makes a point of mentioning her dress. It says nothing about her beauty – she’s never described as beautiful. Nothing about her physical appearance other than the way in which she dresses is mentioned. In fact, he says that charm is deceptive and beauty fleeting, but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised (v30). So then, why does it matter how we dress or appear to others?

I believe the author is conveying that while it is a woman’s inmost character that makes her so valuable, there is a way in which the outward ought to reflect the inward. Not to be ostentatious, but also not to be slothful. In the same way that “from the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks” (Luke 6:45), so should our outward appearance reflect the state of our heart.

We are meant to be active, busy, generous, provisioners for our household, and in order to do that job, we must dress accordingly. Additionally, 2 Corinthians 5:20 (NIV) says:

We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God.

We have been made new creations in Christ and with that new identity we receive the ministry of reconciliation. We have been charged with sharing the gospel and acting as ambassadors of Christ, “always prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have.” (1 Peter 3:15, NIV) . The joy that we have in that hope should naturally outpour into the way in which we present ourselves.

Alright, I guess the permanent track suit rotation is off the table (sadly, since this would be my uniform of choice).

But what about diet and exercise?

1 Corinthians 6:19-20 (NIV) says

Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your bodies.

According to this, there is a way that we are to treat our bodies to honour the Lord.

Proverbs 23: 20-21 (NIV) says

Do not join those who drink too much wine or gorge themselves on meat, for drunkards and gluttons become poor and drowsiness clothes them in rags.

Interesting to see a connection being made between how our behavior affects our dress and the dangers of overindulging.

Philippians 3:18-19 (NIV) says

For, as I have often told you before and now tell you again even with tears, many live as enemies of the cross of Christ. Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is set on earthly things..

Based on these verses, I’m pretty convinced I’m going to have to let go of the endless snack foods concept.

1 Timothy 4: 8 (NIV) captures it so well:

For physical training is of some value, but godliness has value for all things holding promise for both the present life and life to come.

Our bodies do matter, and there is value in taking care of them. What we put in them and how we treat them matters – but it’s not our highest pursuit. If we can put our time and energy toward one thing, our pursuit of godliness should be it – to be made more and more in His likeness.

At the end of the day, going through this study hasn’t changed much about my behaviors themselves. I still try to exercise regularly, eat a well-balanced diet and make myself presentable when leaving the house (things are still touch-and-go if it’s an at-home day, and if running after two two-year-olds and a baby doesn’t call for athleticwear, I don’t know what does). However, it did open my eyes to how important the motives behind those behaviors are.

Exercising is a way for me to take care of the body God has given me, so that I can serve Him well for as long as He sees fit to use me. But doing it because I have a compulsion to fit back into a size four dress from six years ago is vanity. That is meaningless.

Feeding my body nourishing food, and not eating to excess so that I have the energy to do the daily work that He has assigned to me is important. Undereating for the sake of hopefully dropping some of the stubborn baby weight I’ve accumulated, so that I can be admired for my beauty, is vanity – that too is meaningless.

Putting some care into my appearance to reflect what’s in my heart – that I’m at peace with my identity in Christ, ready to tackle what may come my way – is important to show that I take my job as an ambassador of Christ seriously. Trying to make myself look perfect in an effort for people to think I “have it all together” is vanity. Meaningless.

In the end, I’ve come to this conclusion. Nothing that I’ve written here means that there aren’t still days that I struggle with self-esteem. In the time between writing, editing and publishing this post, I’ve still caught myself catching my eye in the mirror many times with a sigh. On those days and in those moments, the phrase “all is vanity” still runs through my mind.

However, that phrase now serves as a reminder for me. When I’m tempted to get discouraged with how I look before I walk out the door, I now ask myself – am I representing myself as an ambassador of Christ? Usually, the answer to that question is yes. If it’s a no, then that is an opportunity for me to check the position of my heart.

But if it’s true that I am going out into the world as an ambassador of Christ, then I can stand a little taller and walk with a little more confidence, because that is the motive that matters.