I Am Because You Are October 8, 2025 Devotional

ECCLESIASTES 1:1-4, 14-15 | ¹The words of the Teacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem. ² Vanity of vanities, says the Teacher, vanity of vanities! All is vanity. ³ What do people gain from all the toil at which they toil under the sun? ⁴ A generation goes, and a generation comes, but the earth remains forever.

¹⁴ I saw all the deeds that are done under the sun, and see, all is vanity and a chasing after wind. ¹⁵ What is crooked cannot be made straight, and what is lacking cannot be counted.

Nothing worth accomplishing can be done in a single lifetime, therefore we are saved by hope. This paraphrase of Reinhold Niebuhr hints at another aspect of living and dying addressed by Jesus’ claim to be the Resurrection. That is our sense of incompleteness and futility. There is not enough time to do all we want to do and dream of doing. There is not enough knowledge or will or energy to solve every problem we long to see solved. Every generation grows slower and becomes tired, still imagining a better, more just, more peaceful world.

But if there is life beyond life then there is an unbroken community of people joining the past, present, and future together. We take turns in God’s great and triumphant project of renewal and all our small efforts contribute to the coming kingdom.

Do something small and good today in Jesus’ name.

Gracious God,

You have made us signs of the new life of the Resurrection. Help us be bright in this dark world.

Amen.