There’s More Than What’s Under the Sun

I love the book of Ecclesiastes because of the unique perspective it gives on life. It describes a journey with a lot of wrong turns and a lot of dead ends. A lot of looking for the right things in the wrong places. A lot of wandering, and a lot of wondering.

All to ultimately lead to a hopeful view of this world—and the one beyond.

The book lets us see the world through the eyes of its narrator, who has essentially set out to answer that classic philosophical question, “What’s the meaning of life?”

This narrator (often regarded as King Solomon) longs to find purpose—And haven’t we all?

He longs to find that there’s something more to this life “under the sun.” And he looks everywhere. He tries satisfying his pleasures and seeking out wisdom. And he tries something that I can especially relate to: pouring himself into his work.

Because sometimes when you’re pushing yourself hard, everything seems to fall into place. 

Sometimes when you’re running strong, everything suddenly seems right with the world. 

Sometimes when you’re running well, it’s like the world finally sees you for who you are.

But you’re more than that.

There’s more to life than that.

Sometimes it feels like you can run away and leave this broken world behind, leave your broken self behind. But the reality is that you’re trying to run from something that you can’t escape on your own—something that can only weigh you down.

And you may know what you’re running from, but do you know where you’re running to?

Belonging? Purpose? Freedom? You can’t find that on your own. You can’t find that here under the sun.

And you can only run so far. You can only run so far before you realize that you’ve been wandering in circles, running aimlessly.

A life under the sun is a life without direction. It’s “chasing the wind.”

You can only run so far before you hit a dead end—before you realize that everything you’ve been doing has been pointless.

“So what do people get in this life for all their hard work and anxiety? Their days of labor are filled with pain and grief; even at night their minds cannot rest. It is all meaningless.”

~Ecclesiastes 22:22-23, NLT

But it’s when you hit this dead end that you are forced to look beyond the sun.

I read the book of Ecclesiastes, chapter by chapter, when I hit a dead end in my life. And it spoke to me. It made me realize that searching for my place in this world would only make me feel more lost.

Because I wasn’t made for this world. And neither were you.

If you feel like you can’t find your place in this world, that’s because this world isn’t where you truly belong. You were made for something more.

If you feel like you can’t find your place in this world, that’s because this world isn’t where you truly belong.

Looking under the sun—at the things of this world—is a limited perspective. You have to look beyond the sun.

In life, it’s so easy to get caught up in a cycle of going through the motions.

The entire world lives and breathes this same cycle. The sunrises and sunsets. The ebb and flow of the tide. The phases of the moon. The changing of the seasons. 

It all keeps going through the motions.

The daylight becomes overtaken as nightfall comes. The waves grow weaker as the tide gets low. The moon loses its glow as it wanes into a crescent. And a season of dreariness arrives as the bitter winter wind blows through.

The world lives and breathes this same cycle of weakness. Of weariness. Of dying.

But the sun always rises again. The waves always roll back again. The moon always becomes full again. And the flowers always blossom again.

The world also lives and breathes a cycle of restoration.

This is what it means to look beyond the sun. It means to look at the world through this lens of hope—to believe that this broken world will someday be restored. And to believe that God will make into something beautiful.

“He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also, he has put eternity into man’s heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.”

~Ecclesiastes 3:11, ESV

In each of our hearts, we have that desire for purpose—that desire for something more. We have a longing for restoration, and a longing for eternity.

Eternity—It’s something that was only made possible through Jesus and His sacrifice. Hebrews 12:2 describes Jesus as “the founder and perfecter of our faith.” He’s the One Who made life’s road into something more than just a series of wrong turns and dead ends.

He’s the One Who gave life’s race its long-awaited finish line: heaven.

When speaking of life’s race, it’s only a journey with a greater destination. But that shouldn’t stop us from living with purpose as we run under the sun.

If you haven’t discovered your purpose yet, it is my hope that your next step in reality will be your first step towards eternity.

Because when we live with this purpose, when we embrace this hope of eternity, we don’t have to fear the moment when the sun will set down upon our lives.

We don’t have to ask, as the author of Ecclesiastes did, “Who can tell a man what will be after him under the sun?” (Eccl. 6:12).

Because after the sunset will come something more than just another day of life under the sun.

After the sunset will come the time to dance among the stars in the heavens.

Keep running this race of life under the sun. Keep running, but don’t ever forget that you were made for more.