King Solomon once said that everything was vanity, a chasing after wind. As the wisest man living at that time, I think he had good reason to say this. After all, he spent his life pursuing everything his heart desired. He denied himself nothing. He made silver so plentiful in Jerusalem that it lost its value as a rare commodity. He sought the gold of Ophir, which appears to have been the most highly favored, precious type of this metal available anywhere. In short, Solomon had it all. And he called it vanity. Worthless. Chasing the wind.
When Jesus walked the earth, He spoke truth as to what the future would hold for those who followed Him. He told of His own impending death and resurrection. He talked about losing your life to save it and taking up your cross to follow Him.
Jesus denied Himself everything.Solomon denied himself nothing.
And yet it was Solomon who realized that in the end all the wisdom in the world could not save him. Only God. Only trusting, serving, and obeying God mattered at life’s final call.
Jesus essentially taught us that men and women could chase the wind and gain the whole world, but to what end? What good does it do us to gain THINGS? All the power, money, prestige, property, reputation, and fame mean nothing when we face our last days. In eternity, none of this can save us.
So really…what DOES it profit us to gain the whole world if it means losing our very souls? Is not the soul of much greater value than material gain?
The ancients might have been buried with their gold and goods, but when we unearth their graves, those things are still there alongside their decayed bones or the dust from which they came.
What matters in the grand scheme of things is – what happens to the real us? The part of us that IS. The inner being of who we are? The person God made in His image. The personality that makes us unique.
The soul is the real “us”. Our bodies will decay but our souls live forever somewhere.
This is why Jesus asked this question. What profit is it to us if we chase the wind over every earthly thing and lose the one thing, ourselves, that matters most?
Gaining the whole world was what Solomon did and called it loss. Keeping our soul safe by following Jesus will mean much more to us in the future than anything else on earth.
~Selah #liveloveprayhopebelieve #gaintheworldlosethesoul #jesusisloveDevotions, Personal, BooksOctober 26, 2016
