“I had an interesting talk with a customer at work yesterday,” my husband shared with me at breakfast this morning. “She said she had worked at a sewing factory in Blackwell for over 30 years, making cloth dolls.” He went on to say the woman shared that she had been a faithful employee, rarely if ever missing work in all those years. “ ‘I was a hard worker, and a good worker,’ ’’ Howard repeated her words.
“Once I hurt my leg, but it didn’t interfere with my work. Then suddenly I was let go,” she had said, shaking her head. “They replaced me with somebody else,” she finished bewilderingly.
“Probably somebody younger,” I surmised, knowing how heartless the working world can be. But he said the new employee had been only one year younger.
Life can seem so meaningless sometimes. Just this morning, today’s daily Bible reading selection, which began in the book of Ecclesiastes, started with Solomon saying the same thing. He had tried everything and found it meaningless. He was jaded on life and seemed to conclude chapter 3, verse 22, on a fatalistic note that this life is all there is.
In the read-through-in-a-year Bible I am using, the next portion of scripture was from Paul in II Corinthians 6:1-2. He had a much more optimistic view of life and eternity, holding out the promise of God’s grace to us. The scripture there says, “We then, as workers together with him, beseech you also that ye receive not the grace of God in vain. (2) For He saith, I have heard thee in a time accepted, and in the day of salvation I have succoured thee: behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation.” It is a time accepted, or a time of God’s favor.
That is the way we must look at life. Disappointments and injustices will always come, but they are nothing in the light of God’s salvation. Paul concludes verse 10 with words that refer to himself and God’s servants “as having nothing, yet possessing all things.”
The next scripture passage is Psalm 46:1-11. It is filled with reassurances that God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble, and that though the earth be removed and the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea, there is a river, whose streams make glad the city of God; He is in the midst of it. The Lord of Hosts is with us and the God of Jacob is our refuge. We are told to “Be still, and know that I am God,” verse 10. That is the key to dealing with our frustrations and questions, no matter how we are treated by the world.
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