We've all seen people who work long hours, scurry over to make deals and negotiations, and do all sorts of things in the pursuit of earning more money and acquiring more things.

While being rich and earning a huge sum every month isn't bad at all, it's the striving that should make us think: What are we working so hard for?

What Are You Striving Hard For?

Many of us work hard to be able to earn a decent living. Some of us have already established a stable financial status. Some of us, on the other hand, are still striving for more. And all of us invest in things that we deem profitable – whether it be a phone, a car, a gadget, or a house.

Whatever your financial status is, it all boils down to one thing: We won't be able to take our riches with us when we go down the grave.

Ecclesiastes 5:13-16 reminds us of this sobering truth:

"There is another serious problem I have seen under the sun. Hoarding riches harms the saver. Money is put into risky investments that turn sour, and everything is lost. In the end, there is nothing left to pass on to one's children. We all come to the end of our lives as naked and empty-handed as on the day we were born. We can't take our riches with us. And this, too, is a very serious problem. People leave this world no better off than when they came. All their hard work is for nothing—like working for the wind."

Purposefully Empty-handed

My friends, the truth is that we came into this world purposefully empty-handed. We were born naked, weak, and frail. We had nothing. God meant that so that we would not exhaust ourselves trying to get rich without Him, but so that we would learn to depend on Him and make Him our ultimate pursuit in life, far more important than gold and silver.

Acts 17:26-28a tells us: "From one man he created all the nations throughout the whole earth. He decided beforehand when they should rise and fall, and he determined their boundaries. His purpose was for the nations to seek after God and perhaps feel their way toward him and find him—though he is not far from any one of us. For in him we live and move and exist."

Friends, we are but temporary sojourners here on earth. Our lives are fleeting, and we don't know when the end of our days will come. Thus, striving hard to get rich here on earth makes no sense. Doing our best to pursue God above all and through all that we do is what makes sense.