The Sun Also Rises
how perspective changes with experience and growth
"The sun also rises."
~Solomon and Hemingway
I love the title of Ernest Hemingway's classic The Sun Also Rises, which I borrowed here. It is taken from the Bible. Hemingway borrowed it from Solomon’s writings.
5 The sun also rises, and the sun goes down,
And hastens to the place where it arose.
6 The wind goes toward the south,
And turns around to the north;
The wind whirls about continually,
And comes again on its circuit.
7 All the rivers run into the sea,
Yet the sea is not full;
To the place from which the rivers come,
There they return again.
8 All things are full of labor;
Man cannot express it.
The eye is not satisfied with seeing,
Nor the ear filled with hearing.
9 That which has been is what will be,
That which is done is what will be done,
And there is nothing new under the sun.
10 Is there anything of which it may be said,
“See, this is new”?
It has already been in ancient times before us.
11 There is no remembrance of former things,
Nor will there be any remembrance of things that are to come By those who will come after.
Ecclesiastes 1:5-11, New King James Version of the Holy Bible
I admit that Solomon’s observations are melancholy. They take the "more things change, the more they stay the same" approach. This includes the notion that life is a series of monotonous repetitions coupled with the idea that what we learn from history is that we don’t learn from history.
Ecclesiastes is unique among the sixty-six books of the bible in that it views life from "under the sun." It is a very human viewpoint and has to be understood in that light.
Which of us has not taken such a view or felt that twinge of despair?
In my first stab at this subject, I took a different tact and tone than I will in this one. As much as the line the sun also rises can be expressed in despair or disillusion, it can also be an encouragement. No matter how dark or long the night, how uncertain the immediate outcome of an experience, or how chaotic the world may seem, the sun also rises. There is a certainty, an order woven into God’s creation.
That is comforting.
Digging through the Hemingway book, which I first read a long time ago and recently rediscovered, I found some quotes on which to hang a few observations.
Hardship tests dogma.
“It is awfully easy to be hard-boiled about everything in the daytime, but at night it is another thing.”
~Ernest Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises
Doesn’t perspective change with circumstance? Faith is easy on the mountain where it is least needed and difficult in the valley where it is needed most. God has plenty of what American patriot Thomas Paine called "summer soldiers" and "sunshine patriots." More than enough people are thumping their chests about their staunch beliefs and deep faith when things go their way. But when the worm turns, what then?
I love the late great evangelist B.R. Lakin’s admonition: "Never doubt in the dark what you have believed in the light."
Just because you cannot see Him doesn’t mean He isn’t there. Just because you cannot make sense of a thing doesn’t mean there is no divine purpose or plan.
Can you trust when you don’t understand?
“I did not care what it was all about. All I wanted to know was how to live in it. Maybe if you found out how to live in it you learned from that what it was all about.”
~Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises
This reminds me of the preacher with cerebral palsy, David Ring, and his sermon, “Don’t say why, say what.” His premise was that we are not always meant to know the why of things, but we are meant to find out what we ought to be doing and what God requires of us, given the circumstances, or despite them. It is about learning to say something like...
“God, I don’t have to know what this is all about. Just tell me how to live in it. Show me what You want me to do.”
That is a simple prayer, I think, and a good one.
Get busy living. You aren’t dead yet.
“I can’t stand to think my life is going so fast and I’m not really living it.”
~Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises
11 The words of the wise are like cattle prods, painful but helpful. Their collected sayings are like a nail-studded stick with which a shepherd drives the sheep.
12 But, my child, let me give you some further advice: Be careful, for writing books is endless, and much study wears you out.
13 That’s the whole story. Here now is my final conclusion: Fear God and obey his commands, for this is everyone’s duty.
14 God will judge us for everything we do, including every secret thing, whether good or bad.
Ecclesiastes 12:11-14
In other words, Solomon concludes:
Everyone has something to say about everything. Don’t believe all of it.
Having to understand why about everything in your life or the world can wear you down.
Regardless of your circumstances, your relationship with God retains a two-fold requirement: trust and obey.
God’s got this.
What is Truth?
I pose this question to you:
Is a thing true because you believe it, or do you believe it because it is true?
The first scenario is subjective truth. Something may be true to you that is, in fact, not accurate. It is a matter of perspective. Join in any political or college football online debate and experience this phenomenon for yourself. One person argues the greatness of MAGA or 'Bama football and the other argues from a different perspective altogether. Who is right? Is either right? You can say Tom Brady is the GOAT. Or, if you are from my generation, You may argue that it is Joe Montana. (Of course, we all know it is Roger Staubach.)
Is it true because you believe it?
Or do you believe it because it is true?
2 + 2 = 4.
That is objective truth, and it will remain true throughout your lifetime and ten thousand lifetimes. It is immutable, verifiable, quantifiable truth.
As one grows and matures, beliefs will change. Some things you knew were true in kindergarten were a lie by middle school.
Right, Santa?
Some truths you know by faith. Everyone has faith. Even those who reject faith do so by having faith in something else or in themselves. We all reach a point of "I do not know for sure. Science cannot tell me. My parents cannot tell me."
This is how Paul defined biblical faith:
"Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." ~Hebrews 11:1
Faith is not blind, but it goes beyond what we can see. Each of us must choose what to believe about what we do not know or cannot prove by observation or experience.
The Apostle Paul despite his great suffering and being constantly judged, misjudged, and misunderstood (to a criminal degree), decided where his faith would lie:
For which cause I also suffer these things: nevertheless, I am not ashamed: for I know whom I have believed and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day.
~2 Timothy 1:12
The sun also rises.
Thank you for your support!