When Life Doesn't Seem Worth Living, Jesus is Worth Living For

I feel like as Christians we often neglect the book of Ecclesiastes, or perhaps that is merely true of me. I remember the one time I heard a sermon on a part of Ecclesiastes it made me uncomfortable to hear of such hopelessness recorded in God's Word. I sat in the service thinking, "But life isn't meaningless because of Christ." Very true. But at that particular time I was an ideal college student looking toward a successful career as a teacher. I was going to change students' lives through my future classroom and I believed my darkest days to be in my past.

"What advantage does man have in all his work which he does under the sun?A generation goes and a generation comes, but the earth remains forever." (Ecclesiastes 1:3-4) 

Now after losing my classroom and experiencing another season of spiritual and emotional darkness, I believe I have a better understanding of the point of Ecclesiastes. It is so easy to say and believe that life has meaning when possibilities stretch before you, when you are doing what you love for a job, when you're emotionally stable, but oh, how hard it is to speak and believe such a hope at other times, especially "when faith fails" (Done).

Over the past three weeks God has taken me down to the very depths of my soul. As I experienced a severe period of deep depression I was forced to wrestle with the question: what is the purpose of life? But as if that was not enough to wrestle with I was also faced with a sudden lapse in faith in God's existence. As I lay on my couch doubting whether God was real, drowning in hopelessness and purposelessness, reading the Psalms in earnest, and watching episode after episode of M*A*S*H, I had to face the uncomfortable question: why was I living? I was not contributing to society in any way. Nothing seemed pleasurable or could remotely lift my spirits. I could not give anything to anyone. I had nothing and I felt like I was nothing.

"I said to myself, 'Come now, I will test you with pleasure. So enjoy yourself.' And behold, it too was futility." (Ecclesiastes 2:1)

However, what if like in the book of Ecclesiastes this despair was merely preceding the pondering of a greater question. What does it mean to have nothing but Jesus? Is He enough? But what would I have without Him? 

"I tried to live this life on my ownBut emptiness was beating down the doorYeah I rose up like a floodUntil my dying days were doneThey are no more 

Nothing makes sense without youIt's like waking up in the darkI didn't have a songUntil you came along..." (JJ Heller)