The search for meaning

Epiphanies are strange. They come at the most unexpected times. For me, it was yesterday morning at uni, when I was on my way from the footbridge to Bosch; I was halfway down those wide steps facing The Square between the Education Building and the Old Teachers' College, and I suddenly realised....I feel empty. I'm not sure if initially it was a just realisation that I had finished digesting my breakfast...but gastrointestinally related or not, it led to me being able to make a vague attempt at putting what I've been feeling for the past few months into words...

When you don't really know where you're heading, and you get the impression you're somehow missing something everyone else has...what is it? Why do I feel there is something more? Why do I feel...nothing?

What's even weirder was that we looked at pretty much these sorts of issues at bible study last night. Ecclesiastes....when wisdom fails....the ability to discern new things in this life is so restricted that everything becomes meaningless, and the desire to find the answer is never satisfied. Pity I was kind of zoned out for most of it, thanks to staying up 'til 4am on Wednesday night, I mean, Thursday morning...I hate the effects of sleep debt accumulation....why am I always tired for the most interesting studies? (Just on a tangent: I recommend not combining lack of sleep with 4 hour Friday afternoon labs that require you to skip lunch, take drugs that slow your heart down and do semi-strenuous exercise. Even though they are kind of fun. Just get enough sleep first. Ahem, anyway...)

What really confuses me is being Christian and feeling like this....I mean, what more is there? Being certain of salvation, the coming of a new creation that will last for all eternity, a relationship with God, being able to serve Him and His people, having fellowship with them....is there something I've missed? What am I doing wrong? How can life still be meaningless? What hope is there for the rest of us?

So this is kind of what King Solomon expresses in Ecclesiastes: "...I have seen all the things that are done under the sun; all of them are meaningless, a chasing after the wind..." (1:14) Everything just happens over and over again, and there's no way out. You can have everything, and have nothing. You can have nothing, and still have nothing.

Argh...I'm confused. I probably need to approach this from a different angle. Read the Bible more. Pray more. Get more sleep. I don't know.

I feel so stupid and insignificant...I wish the answer to Life, the Universe and Everything really was as simple as something like 42.