Glowsticks

I hate glowsticks. I really do. Sure, the concept of glowsticks is fun. A stick that glows in neon colors. Really, it's ingenious. When I was a kid, glowsticks were the second coolest thing on the face of this planet (the first obviously being Mario Kart). So when I was handed a glowstick, I got this huge grin on my face and bent the thing in half, watching in awe as it slowly lit up.

Glowsticks are fantastic creations. I'm not denying that. They're pretty and just plain cool. They have so much potential – you can connect them to other glowsticks and create a long, multicolored line of light, you can loop one around your neck and call it a necklace (although, to be fair, it looks and feels more like a noose), and you can keep one in your room as a nightlight – albeit a pathetic one.

But, as fun as glowsticks are, we have to be very careful with them. When that glowstick was given to me, I cracked it a little too forcefully. I guess I didn't know my own six-year old strength. Before I knew what was happening, something wet and sticky was oozing over my hands and gluing my fingers together (which may or may not be the reason I don't like glowsticks anymore).

Even if we don't break the glowstick, though, it's not like it lasts for more than a day. We never take a glowstick, thinking, “Great! I'll be able to use this for my birthday party next year!”

Glowsticks don't last.

And, as much as we are loathe to admit it, neither do we.

Ecclesiastes 9:1-10

9 But all this I laid to heart, examining it all, how the righteous and the wise and their deeds are in the hand of God. Whether it is love or hate, man does not know; both are before him. 2 It is the same for all, since the same event happens to the righteous and the wicked, to the good and the evil,[a] to the clean and the unclean, to him who sacrifices and him who does not sacrifice. As the good one is, so is the sinner, and he who swears is as he who shuns an oath. 3 This is an evil in all that is done under the sun, that the same event happens to all. Also, the hearts of the children of man are full of evil, and madness is in their hearts while they live, and after that they go to the dead. 4 But he who is joined with all the living has hope, for a living dog is better than a dead lion.5 For the living know that they will die, but the dead know nothing, and they have no more reward, for the memory of them is forgotten. 6 Their love and their hate and their envy have already perished, and forever they have no more share in all that is done under the sun.

7 Go, eat your bread with joy, and drink your wine with a merry heart, for God has already approved what you do.

8 Let your garments be always white. Let not oil be lacking on your head.

9 Enjoy life with the wife whom you love, all the days of your vain[b] life that he has given you under the sun, because that is your portion in life and in your toil at which you toil under the sun. 10 Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with your might,[c] for there is no work or thought or knowledge or wisdom in Sheol, to which you are going.