Ecclesiastes and Humility

One of the funniest lines I ever heard from the animated television show The Simpsons was when Bart, a troublemaking scamp, is told by a charlatan traveling preacher that he has the power of the Holy Spirit. In a moment of uncharacteristic self-awareness, Bart replies “I’d think God would want to limit my power.”

I have returned to the book of Ecclesiastes, and I’m trying to dig into it more than I did on the first pass. The Preacher hits the same point over and over again, a point that I’ve been living for the last year: everything I thought was important is pointless. Everything I thought was pointless is of utmost importance. The most obvious example of this is the advice I’ve received over decades to: read my Bible every day, and relentlessly pursue God. I would talk to a preacher about my fitness plans, and they would respond with an encouragement to pursue God. It seemed so incomprehensibly impractical. How was pursuing God going to fix what was wrong with my health, or my finances, or my employment situation?

The author of Ecclesiastes (presumed to be King Solomon) answers all this. Be happy with what you have, and the work that you do, because those are God’s gifts to you.

I perceived that there is nothing better for them than to be joyful and to do good as long as they live; also that everyone should eat and drink and take pleasure in all his toil—this is God’s gift to man.

— Ecclesiastes 3:12-13

Putting aside the 10th Commandment for a moment, this verse in context with the rest of the book shows us why Envy is one of the Seven Deadly Sins. King Solomon had everything: the biggest house, the hottest women, the coolest toys. It was all pointless.

One of the dangers of being a cancer patient in a caring church that prays over people is succumbing to the lie that I am anything special, that my troubles are unique. People dote on me, and that feels very nice. At the same time there are others in our church in calamitous circumstances of their own: disintegrating knees, wretchedly bad backs, rare ailments that require the most highly specialized of medical care, and at least one other cancer patient in a similar degree of difficulty to my own. We in the West have made cancer into a bogeyman, probably because there’s an unspoken cultural assumption that, having solved most of the existential problems facing the rest of humanity, we should be untouchable, perhaps even immortal. The result is a sort of instinctive horror when someone says they’ve been diagnosed, as if we want to avoid the realization that Death is coming for us all.

As if to hammer home the point, during my last visit to OU Stephenson, the specialized cancer hospital in Oklahoma City, God saw fit to open my eyes. It’s a four-story building with massive waiting rooms on every floor, and every one is filled with cancer patients in various degrees of progression. It is the very thing that we imagine when people say the words “cancer ward”. I am not unique. I am not even suffering that much. There were people with real problems in those waiting rooms, using canes and crutches and wheelchairs, breathing through oxygen masks, frail and emaciated to the point of boggling the mind over how they’re still alive. And then there’s me, congratulating myself for being able to attend jiujitsu classes in the midst of this and feeling sorry for myself over my poor performance at those classes. If Solomon were here to see it, he’d probably say even cancer is just vanity.

Be happy with what I have.

I gave my team at work an update on my condition, and my boss who is a consummate caregiver offered to help with anything that needs doing. I have worked at vast impersonal corporations where my circle of friends was just the group that wasn’t too annoyed that I sat down with them for lunch. My boss is a true friend, and the nature of my job allows me to continue working productively through treatment. So many other people work at jobs where an injury or illness means they lose income for months at a time. I am truly blessed by my position and employment.

Be happy with the work that I do.

In spite of all these blessings, I am still failing at the one task Jesus gave us to do: make disciples of all nations. To be sure, I’ve made significant strides in that direction over where I was a year ago, but I feel Paul’s frustration when he writes that he will beat his body into submission. I could do more. I could say more. I could have stronger faith. Why don’t I? I think, in the same mode as that Bart Simpson quote, that God limits my power to what I am able to handle, until I become bolder and more faithful, so that’s what I pray for.

I had a conversation with another person in my church who is in what I call (in my head) “the dire straits club” — those of us with terminal or intractable conditions that will not be cured short of a miracle. I said that I am grateful for the prayers for healing, and that I join them, but as I look around the waiting rooms at the cancer hospital, what I really want are prayers for a stronger, deeper faith. If and when I reach the point of driving a motorized wheelchair to my appointments, I want those with spiritual eyes to see me standing steadfast in a rock solid faith. I don’t want to be the person who approaches the end of this mortal journey, having exhausted all attempts at treatment, and then succumbs to the temptation to shake their fist at God. I want to finish strong, whatever that looks like. I want my last efforts to be directed at love and praise for Him who has saved even a wretch like me.

She looked at me and nodded, saying “then that is what we’ll pray for”.