For a change, here’s a quote to begin this Booster:
- ‘Mankind finds futility very hard to stomach. People find all sorts of things to give their brief lives meaning. Religion, football, astrology, social media. Valiant efforts all, but everyone knows, deep, deep down, that life is both a random occurrence and a losing battle. None of us will be remembered. These days will all be covered in time, by the sands’ – Richard Osman in his 4th book in the series, ‘Thursday Murder Club’
Clever and entertaining, the series based around four elderly pensioners living in an exclusive retirement home is flush with murders and intrigue, along with a visiting fox! Often insightful, Osman weaves his observations of life into the conversations and actions of his characters. Garth is a mysterious tall Canadian who collects antiques and kills people for greed but who is beginning to think more about acts of kindness after Elizabeth, a former spy, shares her grief on losing her husband Stephen. Osman continues a thought from Garth: ‘Because, once you really accept the hollowness of everything, it makes it an awful lot easier to kill someone’!
Albeit a fictitious murderer, Garth personifies someone who has given up on the sanctity of life and, with that, any sense of purpose. That cynical position is one devoid of hope for all is meaningless. You don’t have to go far through history to find brutal dictators and mafia bosses who lived like this – Adolf Hitler, Augusto Pinochet, Mao Zedong. The modern day has its own examples. Come to that, many of us may have felt something approaching this dictionary definition – ‘When you can’t see the point in even trying, that’s the feeling of futility, the sense that no matter how much you work at it, nothing good will happen, so you might as well give up’.
- ‘The dread of futility has been my life-long plague’ – Maya Angelou
- ‘While one might laugh at the meaningless boredom of people a decade or two ago, the emptiness has for many now moved from the state of boredom to a state of futility and despair, which holds promise of dangers’ – Rollo May
- ‘The Internet is so big, so powerful and pointless that for some people it is a complete substitute for life’ – Andrew Brown
- ‘Death threatens our speech with futility because death is not just a biological event – it is a reality we fear may rob our living of any significance’ – Stanley Hauerwas
Fishing may be important to one person but futile to someone who is passionate about football. Clearly it is not wrong to like both but what does it really matter in the long run how big the fish was or how many goals were scored? Sport Commentator Sam Matterface was evidently very excited when he claimed The Three Lions were ‘One step from immortality’ after the winning second goal scored by Ollie Watkins against The Netherlands Wednesday 10th July 2024! England went on to lose to Spain in the final. What do you think is of eternal significance and would you like that for yourself?
Augustine was a passionate young man born 13 November 354 AD who looked for fulfilment through indulging his sexual appetite. It was not enough for him and he became restless like so many are today. Dissatisfaction with futility was part of his path to God and his famous realisation: ‘You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in You’. King Solomon also looked for meaning by indulging all his physical appetites having 700 wives plus 300 concubines (1 Kings 11:3) but he too realised that was not enough to satisfy his deepest needs and quell his restlessness. There are countless examples of people with insatiable longings for more money, sex and power accompanied by the trail of sorrows, broken relationships and tragedies which followed them.
- ‘Remember your Creator while you are young. Your old age is coming when you will have many troubles. When that time comes, you won’t have much to enjoy’ – Ecclesiastes 12:1
- ‘One thing I ask from the Lord, this only do I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze on the beauty of the Lord and to seek him in his temple’ – Psalm 27:4
- ‘For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain. If I am to go on living in the body, this will mean fruitful labour for me. Yet what shall I choose? I do not know! I am torn between the two: I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is better by far; but it is more necessary for you that I remain in the body. Convinced of this, I know that I will remain, and I will continue with all of you for your progress and joy in the faith’ – Philippians 1:21-25
Philosophy cannot save you, only a Saviour can give life and renewed purpose – this is the promise of Jesus Christ. A futile existence can be exchanged for a life to the full where everything makes sense. One step from immortality indeed!
Here’s a song from Graham Kendrick that may help you to consider these things –
For more reading: The Whisper of God – Connect4Life
TAGS – rationality, enlightenment, reason, hope, transformation