Enjoyment of Life Under the Sun

Transcript

GR 2121
03/31/19
Enjoyment of Life under the Sun
Ecclesiastes 1:12-18
Gil Rugh

We’ve launched into the Book of Ecclesiastes in our studies together so if you’d turn to the Book of Ecclesiastes chapter 1. We use the expression, life’s lessons, when we talk about our children and we tell them we have a life’s lesson for them. This is God’s life lessons for people on earth, and we as God’s people especially benefit from it. Truths presented here tell you about life on earth, how it is, how it will be, and ultimately how you can have the most joy and satisfaction, in the life you live on this earth.

The book is themed by the statement in verse 2 of chapter 1, as we’ve noted a statement that’s repeated in chapter 12 at the end of the book as well, “All is vanity.” “Vanity of vanities! All is vanity.” We’ve noted that word translated vanity is a word that in Hebrew literally means breath. All is a breath, breath of breath, all is a breath and rather than vanity being the translation of it, it is better-translated temporary, because the breath is expressing the fact that it is temporary. It is not lasting, and we’ve looked at reasons for that in other places in the Scripture as well. So, what he’s talking about is the brevity of our lives, the life we live on this earth or as is put in verse 3, “under the sun.” Life here on earth and the challenge is verse 3, “What advantage does man have in all his work…” We toil, we work, we labor. What’s the purpose, what’s the advantage if all is but a breath? We’re here for a short time and we’re gone. As he said in verse 4, a generation goes, dies, another generation comes, but the earth remains forever, and the earth has been here from the beginning of creation, and the nature that God created is part of this earth and this earth’s system.

The sun rises every day, the wind blows, the rivers run into the ocean and the ocean is not full and the cycle goes on. Verse 8, “All things are wearisome…” Now we continue to work and to toil, but we’re here for a brief time, and we don’t make a difference. Verse 8 we can’t exhaust the knowledge of it, we can’t learn enough about it, and what we do know we forget. The next generation forgets. We can’t make it endure and, why do I keep going on like this? Well, it’s what God has appointed for us. This is a reality check. When God speaks to us about our life here, it’s as it is. Our physical life on this earth is what Ecclesiastes is talking about, and the labor and the toil that is associated with that, and what’s the purpose of it all? We’re here for a short time and we’re gone, and we can’t change the things that really matter. How many people have lived on this earth and have died and been long gone? The sun still comes up, the wind still blows, the rivers still flow into the ocean, and the ocean is not full. Everything is wearisome, it goes on. Every generation goes through it. They work hard, they toil, they experience the pressures of life, the frustrations, the stress, only to go to the grave and another generation picks up.

That’s what God is using Solomon to tell us about, the reality of life. Not running and hiding from life, not trying to pretend it’s not what it is. Not trying to make it a make believe world, but the real world of everyday life. How are we to live it and what does God intend for us? You know we take a study like this piece by piece as we go through the book, and we don’t get maybe the overall picture and so I just want to take a moment and remind you that Ecclesiastes has a strong emphasis on we should enjoy our lives. We should enjoy the days of our brief life.

God hasn’t called us to a monastic kind of retreat. He’s called us to live these days of trial, of stress, of labor and yet get enjoyment out of them. I’m going to walk you through seven times through this letter, he reminds us. We ought to be pursuing joy in the life we’re living on this earth. God intends us to have enjoyment, while at the same time He’s reminding us, your time here is brief, and it’s going to be characterized by stress by pressure, by labor, by toil. Enjoy it. He’s laying out how that is possible. So, let’s walk through some of these passages, which recommend to us, have joy in your life. We won’t talk much about the context; we’ll pick that up when we get there.

The first time is in chapter 2, verse 24, “There is nothing better for a man than to eat and drink and tell l himself that his labor is good.” Now note, that’s just not a cynic. “This also I have seen, that it is from the hand of God. For who can eat and who can have enjoyment without Him?” He doesn’t say that we don’t have labor. He says well, we ought to enjoy the fruits of our labor that is from the hand of God for us. The labor is and the fruits of the labor, but you really can’t experience this enjoyment, without God, so that becomes a point in Ecclesiastes. The realities of life are the same for everyone, God’s children and those who are not His children, those who have believed in Him and those who have not. We still all have the same grind. Believers have to get up on Monday morning and go to work. Believers have stress at their job and as we’ve talked about; believers get sick like unbelievers get sick and all these things. Inequities press in upon us. Things don’t always turn out the way we would have liked or hoped, but we can have enjoyment, in seeing the hand of God in it all.

Over to chapter 3 verse 12 or down to chapter 3 verse 12. “I know there is nothing better for them than to rejoice and to do good in one’s lifetime; moreover, that every man who eats and drinks sees good in all his labor—it’s the gift of God.” This is God’s plan. Are you enjoying your life? Are you enjoying the days of your life? Even in your labor and toil, you see it’s good. You see the hand of God, this is what—you know we sang about the sovereignty of God and His control and all. It’s from His hand, that’s what’s going on in Ecclesiastes. The trials, the difficulties, the troubles are from God. The blessings and ability to enjoy life even with its troubles is from God.

Down in verse 22, “I have seen that nothing is better than that man should be happy in his activities, for that is his lot.” But a reminder, who will bring him to see what will occur after him? That’s where we started earlier in chapter 1, your brief life. So, he doesn’t take away reality, but enjoy your life. Well how can I enjoy it? Boy, I could, you know, be gone. I may not see my great, great, great grandkids. I mean life’s bad. No, life is good. It’s from the hand of God. Enjoy it!

Chapter 5 verse 18. “Here is what I have seen to be good and fitting: to eat, to drink enjoy oneself in all one’s labor in which he toils under the sun during the few years of his life which God has given him; for this is his reward.” You see the balance, it’s good and fitting, eat, drink, enjoy yourself, and all your labor and toil. He doesn’t take away the labor and the toil during the few years of your life. It’s a breath, but this has all been given to you by God, and this is His reward that you enjoy your labors.

Chapter 8, verse 15, “So I commended pleasure, for there is nothing good for a man under the sun…” He’s talking about now living our life here on earth. The day-to-day living, we all experience and go through, except to eat, to drink, to be merry. This will stand by him in his toils through the days of his life and that expression, the days of his life. He doesn’t say through the years of his life, because it’s a constant reminder we’re a (making the sound of a breath) breath. We’ll be here and gone, so enjoy it. It’s passing. This is what God has given him under the sun.

Look at chapter 9 verse 7. “Go then, eat your bread in happiness and drink your wine with a cheerful heart; for God has already approved your works. Let your clothes be white all the time, and let not oil be lacking on your head. Enjoy life with the woman whom you love all the days of your fleeting life (of vanity, life of breath).” A fleeting life gives the idea. It’s a life which is but a breath, “…which He has given you under the sun; for this is your reward in life and in your toil in which you have labored under the sun.” You see then, enjoy your life. But with that, there’s a reminder, it is a brief life. And that’ll be put in the broader context that we’ve talked about. You fear God, because when all is said and done, and this brief life is over, you will give an account to the God who is your Judge.

Come to chapter 11 for the last of these seven references. Verse 7, “The light is pleasant, and it is good for the eyes to see the sun. Indeed, if a man should live many years, let him rejoice in them all…” And that emphasis, joy, enjoy, rejoice. “…and let him remember the days of darkness, for they will be many. Everything that is to come is a breath” and it’s not to be discouraging. You see its real life. You know how sometimes when your kids as they’re growing up, think that they ought to get to do everything that’s just fun and sometimes you’ll tell them that’s not the real world. You’re going to have to learn to deal with trouble. You’re going to have to learn that not everything is going to be your way. We give them these little lessons. That’s what God is telling us. Enjoy your life and don’t let it be spoiled just because everything doesn’t go your way. All that matters is, it’s going God’s way, and God’s way is what is good for you, so come back to chapter 1.

This again, this going, moving into Ecclesiastes, because it a takes awhile to get to these, and since we take it in pieces, I just want to have a little bit of the picture. This life, we’re talking about, that we’re living that’s filled with toil, what advantage do we have in our labor and toil? It’s a wearisome life. But it’s not to be a life without joy. I mean, we say well, it’s a paradox. Well yes and no, it’s the life we have to live, we might as well enjoy it. In effect we’re saying, and God is revealing how to enjoy it, and key to it will be understanding He is sovereign, and He brings the trials, the struggles, the toil the stress. It comes from His hand, but so does the enjoyment through all of that.

We pick up with verse 12 of chapter 1. He’s given something of an overview, and we are a breath, and the earth and the nature that characterizes this earth, if I can put it that way. They were here before we came, they’ll be here after we’re gone, and we don’t change the big things that matter. The day after I die the sun will come up, the wind will blow, the rivers will flow down to the ocean, and the ocean won’t be too full. The process will go on. I won’t have changed anything under the sun that really is enduring and lasting.

Now he wants to turn and talk about his own experience. That’s what he picks up with verse 12, when he says, “I, the Preacher…”and then he’ll say verse 14, “I have seen all the work, which have been done…” Verse 16, “I said to myself…” verse 17, “I set my mind…” Chapter 2 verse 1, “I said to myself…” verse 2, “I said of…” and that goes on. Now I want to tell you my personal experience. I, as the man God set aside to be king. I, the one with the greatest wisdom. So I applied myself to know everything I could know, to be as wise as I could be, to experience all I could experience in life, and God had me now write this down and pass it on to you so you could learn how to live and enjoy life with all of its trouble, all of its misery, all of it is toil.

Now “I, the Preacher…”, remember Qoheleth, the one who brought the group together, so he could teach and instruct, and we talked about Solomon is the one. Here he says in verse 12, “I…have been king over Israel in Jerusalem.” Remember there were only three kings who ruled over all of Israel. Saul, but he never ruled from Jerusalem, because Jerusalem did not become the capitol until David established it. The second king, which begins the Davidic line and then his son Solomon who is the writer of it. So, it only could refer to David or Solomon, and there is no doubt that Solomon is the one in view here. He’s the one who’s the king in Jerusalem.

After Solomon’s reign is done his son Rehoboam had neither the knowledge or the wisdom of his father. The kingdom will divide, and then you’ll have a king over Judah and a king over the northern 10 tribes called Israel, but Solomon is the second and last king to rule over the united kingdom from Jerusalem. “I have been king over Israel in Jerusalem.” Have been doesn’t mean he’s not any longer, but that’s that perfect tense. It happened in the past and it continues to the present. Probably most agree he’s writing later in life because he writes about his life’s experiences. I want to write and tell you about what I have learned, with all the knowledge I acquired, all the wisdom all the experiences I have had, and I could have it all because of my position as king, the wealth and the wisdom. Here is what life is all about, and how you enjoy every day, even with its troubles and burdens.

“I set my mind to seek and explore by wisdom…” and these are intense terms. Now you know that intense seeking, that serious exploration by wisdom concerning all that has been done under heaven. That’s talking about the same thing, as he’ll mention down in verse 14 under the sun, under heaven. I want to talk to you about living your life here day by day on earth like we all have to. You have to live today what faces us. We have to deal with today. That’s what he’s talking about, life under heaven. And what does he summarize here, “It is a grievous task which God has given to the sons of men to be afflicted with.” It’s a grievous task. Man’s work is toilsome, wearisome, and yet you understand where It comes from, “…which God has given to the sons of men to be afflicted with.” Here without any real development, but simple recognition, God is sovereign. His sovereignty, His control, we sing about it, but sometimes we forget. You know here, the works that we do to explore all that has been done. That’s activity, the things we’re doing. “It is a grievous task…” This working our way through life day by day that’s a tiresome, it’s a sorry task. It is characterized by labor and toil. I mean Solomon can say that, he’s king. You think well, he’s got the good life, he’s got the easy life. But it had its own pressures, its own stresses, his own difficulties.

Now does anybody say today, “Well if I could only be President of the United States I’d have a life without trouble, without problems and without stress?” No, it may be a different kind, but it’s there, it characterizes human life. This is “…what God has given”. You ought to underline that, “God has given”. It is not well, look what you know. That’s why we have to be careful, that we who understand and are going to function dealing with life, with wisdom, that’s why the troubles, the trials we can accept what, from the hand of God. Yes, this is a day, the Lord has appointed for me. That takes some of that frustration out of why this happened. If they hadn’t done that, if only this had been done, as through some how they bypassed God. No. “…God has given to the sons of men to be afflicted with.” Trouble and trial are part of God’s plan.

I want to say something about sons of men. That’s not a plural, men. That’s the word man. You know what the Hebrew word for man is, Adam. You know in the beginning, back in Genesis 1 God said, “Let us make man in our image.” You know what the word was, Adam, and the first man He made, out of the dust He named man because his name Adam, in Hebrew means man. So, if you just translate this as it is, “It is a grievous task which God has given to the (sons of Adam), sons of man…” but Adam. As soon as you hear “…the sons of Adam to be afflicted with”, well boy, that’s talking about trouble, difficulty, trial coming into my life. God’s given that to all the descendants of Adam.

We’ve been here before but come back to Genesis 3. The world is always trying to come up with a solution that will make life pleasant, easy, enjoyable for everyone, but you can’t do it. Come to chapter 3 of Genesis verse 17. As a result of Adam’s sin, along with his wife Eve, Adam here, is being called to judgment. God says to him, “Cursed is the ground because of you; in toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life. Both thorns and thistles it shall grow for you; and you shall eat the plants of the field; by the sweat of your face you shall eat bread, until you return to the ground.” You’re going back to dust. I made you out of the dust, you’re going back to the dust. The earth endures. We saw that earlier in Ecclesiastes 1, we come and go. Now what is our characteristic while we’re here?

God has appointed as a result of sin, that life be difficult, that we have to toil, we have to labor. So, all these that offer a life and a view of life, and have said everybody will have plenty, and we’ll all enjoy life. It’ll just be crowded on the sand shore as we are all basking in the sun, and of course, the sun won’t cause cancer because we’ll have fixed that too, but it’s not the life we have. You know Solomon’s been dead for 3,000 years. You know what, the sun still comes up and all that goes on. You know what, you’ll still get up and go to work tomorrow morning, get up to take care of your house, get up to get the kids off to school. To do this and you’ll say, “Shoo, you know I’m tired!” It’s been a difficult day, and nothing has changed, and when your brief life is over, the next generation will come, and the cycle will go on. This is what God has given but He hasn’t sucked all the joy out of it. That’s why we looked at those passages ahead because if you just stopped here and said, well I read as far as I want to go in Ecclesiastes, I’ll read something that’s a little more positive. But you can’t take the pain out of life. You can’t take the toil out. You can’t take out the pressure.

You know, it’s amazing. We have a country where we have prosperity. We have so many people trying to get in they don’t know what to do with them, and we have drugs being brought in. I was listening to someone not too long ago and they were saying, down in Latin America they don’t take the drugs, they send them up here, because they have such difficult lives. They’re working so hard just to get through every day and provide what they need that they don’t have time to get into the drugs for recreation and all that. They bring them up here because we have time on our hands, but somehow, it’s not satisfying.

You read about people that have more money than they’ll be able to spend and can do whatever they want without having to have hard work, but they’ve still got the kind of pressure and stress. They’re looking for something. What are you taking drugs for? Did you ever watch anything on drugs? Do you see what they do? You mean you’ve got all this money and that’s what you want to do with your life? Why? You can’t take away what God says He has appointed as a result of sin. It’s a curse, so the frustration, the trials, the pressure are there. God has given a grievous task to the sons of Adam to be afflicted with. That’s the reality of life.

That doesn’t mean there’s not joy. That’s the way we looked at those passages. Solomon goes on in verse 14. “I have seen all the works which have been done under the sun…” So, we’re talking about what’s been done. We’re talking about what we do, our activity under the sun, under heaven. That same emphasis and you know what, all is a breath. Everything man does. He doesn’t say the earth is just a breath; the sun is just a breath. All that man does is just a breath, all that work, that toil, that labor. I mean Solomon built the most magnificent temple there ever was. You look at the cost of the temple and the beauty of what he paid to construct it. It’s in the equivalent of billions of dollars today. You know he had money to spend. Where is it? If you go to Jerusalem, you can see some remnants of the temple that Herod expanded, some of the foundation stones and little pieces. Where’s all the beauty? Where’s all the gold? Where’s all the—gone? It’s all a breath, whatever man does, characterized by a breath. His life is a breath and all we really know about Solomon is what we read in the bible, (Making the sound of a breath) gone, temporary, and striving after wind.

Now we had to do a different translation of the Hebrew word translated “vanity” since it really means, breath and the metaphor pictures brevity, transience. We’re temporal, striving after wind. I don’t think that’s the best translation of this either. This pictures that we’re chasing the wind, literally desiring the wind, and there’s an element of truth. You’re chasing after nothing, but I think the better translation here, and for those of you who are grammarians you can have an objective genitive or a subjective genitive. They’ve translated it as an objective genitive, your chasing the wind, desiring the wind. Subjective genetive, the wind has its desire, the desire of the wind. I think what you’re talking about, all is temporary, the desire of the wind, or as one has put it more picturesquely, the whim of the wind. Say that fifty times quickly, the whim of the wind. It’s out of our control. It’s temporary in and of itself. The wind continues on, but it comes and goes. We get up in the morning, look out, and say, oh, it’s a nice calm day. You go out to have lunch and say boy the wind’s picking up, or it’s been windy all day, and in the evening, you say oh, the winds died down, but you have no ability to control it. The wind has its own desire.

In John’s Gospel, chapter 3 verse 8, Jesus is talking to Nicodemus, and he said, “The wind blows where it desires and you hear the sound of it, but do not know where it comes from and where it is going...” It’s out of your hands. The wind blows where it desires. That’s the point. Here we are in life; our life is but a breath and the whim of the wind. It’s out of our control. Now we can’t even have the knowledge of all these things. We can’t control them, we can’t take over, we can’t do something to make it different. It’s the whim of the wind. All is brevity and the desire of the wind. In other words, you don’t control the wind. The wind does what the wind desires, personifying the wind. Obviously, we know that the hand of God is behind it all, but remember we’re talking about it just from this perspective right now, and as far as we’re concerned the wind will blow today as it wants to blow. As Jesus said, “The wind blows where it desires…” Now obviously He is the one involved in creating the wind and controlling the wind, but talking to Nicodemus, we can picture what it is. You have no control and no matter what you know, you can’t alter it. So, that’s the point here. All is brief and out of our control. We’ll see later that time and chance overtake everyone, so that’s life. If my life is so brief and I can’t control the things that matter or make a real permanent difference, it’s a grievous task given to us; that’s what he says.

After I have examined everything, and learned as much as I could, and had as much knowledge as I could, that’s what it comes to and he gives a proverb. Remember Solomon is famous for writing the Proverbs, over a 1,000 of them. What is crooked cannot be straightened. What is lacking cannot be counted. I think talking basically about the summary there. Everything that’s done, everything that is permanent that can outlast us will go on without us. The earth is here, the sun rises, the wind blows, the waters flow, but we keep working and we keep toiling. “What is crooked cannot be straightened…” You can’t control the wind, you can’t determine its direction. That’s as God has determined it, but the desire of the wind is there, it’s out of your control, it’s out of your desire. In verse 15, “What is crooked cannot be straightened and what is lacking cannot be counted.” My life is brief. You know he’s going to talk about that.

He talked about it in verses 10 and 11 and he’ll come out, we don’t control what follows us. You can’t count the days after your life, because there are no days on this earth after your life. You can’t count those days. I can’t say well, after they put my body in the grave, four days after that I’ll be having lunch at one of the restaurants. No, you won’t, you can’t count those days. They’re not there for you. Now I realize after this life; remember we’re just talking about our physical life on the earth, so you can’t count what’s not there, what preceded you what’s after you. People think they’ll control things; they plan for after.

Solomon with all his wisdom and knowledge had a son who had neither wisdom or knowledge. Rehoboam split the kingdom by stupidity, foolish decision, and now the kingdom’s divided. That’s what we’re talking about; we have no control over it. You can’t straighten what’s crooked, and you can’t count what is lacking, what’s not there. Our brevity of life makes little difference on the human level. We like to think we’re important. The Pharaohs, and others, built palaces, and buildings to be remembered. Now they’re just, if there’s anything left, they’re just items of interest to visit for tourists or to find something about that period of time. But you know, they’re gone.

Verse 16, Solomon’s not done. He persists and that’s what it’s going to take. It’s going to take persistence and he persists. “I said to myself, ‘Behold, I have magnified and increased wisdom more than all who were over Jerusalem before me…’” I increased it all. “…and my mind has observed a wealth of wisdom and knowledge.’” So, you know he was diligent, and he just didn’t do it for a short time. In this whole section here, now wisdom and knowledge are repeated, “increased wisdom”, “a wealth of wisdom and knowledge.” In verse 17, “And I set my mind to know wisdom and to know madness and folly…” In wisdom much grief, in increasing knowledge, wisdom. Knowledge, wisdom. I’m not just some fool out here talking. I’m interpreting Ecclesiastes. This is the emptiness of Solomon’s life apart from the Lord and it’s, I’m telling you, I’ve applied it with wisdom and knowledge. These observations of life, and evaluation, and conclusions, are real, and have been evidenced out in the 3,000 years since Solomon has passed away.

The same things go on and the things that men have done no matter how rich, no matter how powerful, they’re gone too. The Assyrians ruled the world. Name me three Assyrian kings. Well it’s not that important for me to know. Exactly! Now if you’re studying history and you want to interpret portions of the bible, you try to dig through to find it, but the reality of it is, that’s old history. We have a hard time having our young people interested in learning recent history. Well, they don’t care about the past. They don’t want to remember it as Ecclesiastes told us because they think they’re going to reshape the future. You know what, (Making the sound of a breath), they’ll go too and then another generation, and another, and another until the Lord finally intervenes. “’…I have magnified and increased wisdom more than all who were over Jerusalem before me; and my mind has observed a wealth of wisdom and knowledge.’” This is not artificial. This is you know, wisdom and knowledge, facts of life. This is the way life is under the sun, on this earth for everyone, a wealth of wisdom and knowledge.

“I set my mind to know wisdom and to know madness and folly…” He didn’t just look for the positives. He examined the negatives. We would say I looked at it inside and out. I looked at it from every side. I looked at the good and the bad. I looked at wisdom and knowledge. I looked at madness and folly. I want to find out what’s on both sides. Do I get different answers from one than the other, and you know what? The answer when you pursue wisdom and knowledge, and the answer when you pursue madness and folly is the same. That’s why sometimes it seems like the toil and the labor doesn’t have any advantage.

I shared with you we were in Colorado. They welcome street people, so every corner has people holding signs up and trying to get you to give them money or food. Some say, “I’m hungry anything helps”, but we appreciated the one young man standing there with a big sign. “I will not lie I want to get high.” (Laughter) Give him points for honesty. I don’t want to work, I don’t want to labor, but I want to buy some marijuana. Please give me money. Well I didn’t give him any (laughter), but at least he was honest.

But you know the reality of it is what Solomon’s conclusion is? Remember what he said in verse 14, “…all is vanity and striving after wind.” Now he picks that up after he talks about the wisdom and knowledge and he concludes verse 17, “…this also is the whim of the wind” (the desire of the wind). I couldn’t control and make things happen anyway, and the brevity of life comes and goes and it’s out of my hands. It didn’t matter what I knew, what I had, or how foolish I was, I still couldn’t control things, couldn’t make a difference beyond my temporary time.

Then he’s going to go back and pick up the other part. The end of verse 14 says “…all is a breath and desire of the wind.” Then he picks up that last statement at the end of verse 17, “…this is the desire of the wind.” Then down at the end of verse 1, in chapter 2, “…it was futility, it was a breath.” So, that emphasis, and we’ll see that going through. It will be not only that all is a breath; it’s all the desire of the wind. The wind blows where it wills, where it desires, and so these things I can’t control, and they’ll come and go. In that sense, it’s transitory. The wind is lasting but in my temporal life it comes, it goes, it changes directions and I have no control over any of it, and it becomes a picture of the reality of life. I don’t control these things that come and go. I can work on having a healthy life. I can work on exercising. That doesn’t mean I won’t get cancer. It doesn’t mean I won’t have a heart attack. It doesn’t mean that I won’t lose my job. It doesn’t mean I will be treated fairly all the time.

That’s what Jesus said on the Sermon on the Mount. Don’t worry about tomorrow, each day has enough evil of its own, enough trouble of its own. You can’t change anything anyway. You don’t have control over it. It’s the sovereignty of God. He clothes the flowers with all their beauty. Solomon wasn’t arrayed with that beauty and He continues to do it. Solomon’s beauty is long gone. The flowers of the field continue to flourish, continue to manifest the beauty. Jesus is giving the same life lessons to His disciples because that’s life. And we as God’s people ought to accept it and sometimes we end up in the same puddle as the world, because we begin to think like the world, and we shouldn’t because we know the sovereign God. We fear Him, we honor Him, we respect Him, we bow before Him. We receive from Him both good and bad, as Job said, “Shall we receive good from the hand of the Lord and not bad?”

That’s right, we live in a cursed world, and the curse is on us, as sons of Adam as it is on everyone else. So, verse 16 where all that he magnified is wisdom and knowledge and pursuing madness and folly. All came to the same point, it’s the whim of the wind. It’s not something I determine or control, and I am but a breath and there’s another proverb then given. There was a proverb given in verse 15, that little concise jewel of wisdom. “What is crooked cannot be straightened and what is lacking cannot be counted.” Let’s just pull this together in this nice brief statement. Now down in verse 18, “Because in much wisdom there is much grief, and increasing knowledge results in increasing pain.” You know what he’s saying, he doesn’t sugar coat things. Well, if people were as wise as me and as knowledgeable as me, they would enjoy life more. But he’s already said that’s not true, because increased wisdom and increased knowledge doesn’t necessarily make life easier. It can’t take the pain away, it doesn’t give you control over life. That doesn’t mean that there are certain things within our life that are one way or the other.

One of the wealthiest men of our day, the great inventor, died of cancer relatively young. Couldn’t he buy his way, couldn’t he change that? Couldn’t he come up? He was very intelligent, and he was worth billions. Couldn’t he have…? No, it’s the desire of the wind from the human level. It’s the sovereignty of God, as we know it. We’ll say more about that in a moment. So, “…in much wisdom there is much grief, and in increasing knowledge, there is increasing pain.” He doesn’t sugar coat reality. You know what he learned? The more he learned, the more he gave thought to it, so he could apply it. I’m just as brief as everyone else. I have no more control over these durable, enduring things like the earth than anyone else. I am part of a generation that goes and will be followed by another generation. So, wisdom and knowledge in that sense isn’t the answer. Now we want to be wise, we want to be knowledgeable in the spiritual sense, but where man functions and we talked about it. Well, man has been coming up with the answers to life. They’re coming up to the solutions. They come up with a solution, 10 more problems come up. And as we said, David said 3,000 years ago, the years of our life are seventy years and if we make eighty, there’ll be more difficulty and problems than what we are dealing with today.

Well, science, money, and wisdom, now we live an average of 432 years, the last I read. No, that’s not so! We’re still struggling with the seventy and eighty. Just life. So, increased wisdom, increased knowledge just brought me increasing pain. I, you know, what he’s saying, I realize how bad things really are. Some people live their life without realizing and not facing it, but he says I had my eyes opened. I know, I understand, I can’t change things. I understand I will soon be gone. Some people live their life pretending they won’t die.

Herod the Great had one of his sons executed within a few days of his own death. He was on his deathbed, but he heard that son wanted to replace him, so he sent for the executioners. He just can’t face the reality, but he can’t change it. A few days later he died. I mean he’s gone, so that’s what he’s saying, “In much wisdom there is much grief, and increasing knowledge results in increasing pain.” I want to take you back to verse 13. “It is a grievous task which God has given to the sons of men to be afflicted with.” We’re talking about these life lessons for human beings. We are all sons of Adam and every person is a descendant of Adam. Eve came from Adam. She was made out of a side part of Adam, and then everyone sins. So, we’re all sons of Adam and we have the grievous task, which God has given.

I just wanted to make note of that word God with you. He has given it, but it’s the word Elohim. We would bring it into English, E-l-o-h-i-m and the im ending; im is the plural in Hebrew. Like we put ‘s’ on a word to make it plural. You have a peach, or you have peaches, kind of thing, the plural. Well, the im is a plural, so this is the word that’s used of God creating and so on, so he’s talking about God here. The covenant name for God is YHWH, the four letters. YHWH and we put some vowels in there for pronunciation. We got YHWH or Jehovah as it was translated in our bibles. YHWH is the covenant name of God. It connects God to Israel in a covenant relationship with Him. Elohim is the name of God, as God. For example, it’s a common name for God in the ancient near east of the time of Solomon and others. Just like we use the word God, but you can talk to people of different religions and that when you use the word God, it’s broad in meaning, so here Elohim. Now we’re talking about the God that we know, but he uses the word that would be known by all humanity, because people of other groups outside of Israel and other religions would know what he’s talking about when you talk about Elohim, God. A plural, some say it’s indicative of the triune Persons that make up the Trinity. More probably, it’s just a plural of majesty as they call it and emphasize something of His greatness, His importance. But at any rate, what Solomon is writing about is the grievous work that has been given to the sons of Adam is universal.

If you go to a country where Hinduism is the religion, they still are grinding it out. They still labor and toil and perhaps harder than we do. You know, in different places of the world, the physical labor is harder. We have different kinds of stress, we need psychiatrists and psychologists to help us get by and the poorest countries, they don’t have those because nobody can afford them. So, they don’t need them, but we’ve got time on our hands and are still unhappy. We need somebody to talk to about our unhappiness and give me an unhappiness pill that makes me happy, but this is universal. That’s why some call Ecclesiastes an evangelism book because it addressed the problems that afflict everyone. But as a reminder, the true and living God, who is the God of Israel, He’s the God who created everything. You can back up even before the covenant relationship with Israel is established.

The God who in the beginning created everything and created the earth and the sun and the wind and the waters and everything, and humans, is the God who is given this task. Why? Because Adam rebelled against this God and brought the rebellion of sin into the creation, so now life is the same. We as believers need to understand that. I can’t tell you if come to trust Christ now, your marriage will be happy, your health will be good, you’ll do better at your job, you will succeed. Paul’s life went the other way. He said I had to come to realize that everything I had that was of earthly value, was just to be put on the dung pile, and I consider it worthless in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ. The truths that are presented here about life under the sun are true for everyone, but to get the enjoyment out of life that can be characterized by such difficulty, you need to know the living God. You need to know the One who is in control of all things. Who controls the things that we cannot control. He’s the God who says He can bring joy and enjoyment into a life even in its toil and part of the way that comes to us as God’s children is we recognize God’s hand in it. He causes all things to work together for good for those that love Him, to summarize Romans 8.

It’s the hand of God. How often I forget that. I get up, and I if something happens in a day and I say, what is wrong, why did that happen? Why did I do that what is going on? Why did they do that? You know, why did that come to me? Why, Lord, what’s wrong? Job went back and forth on this. He could say shall we not receive, shall we get good from the hand of the Lord and not bad. Then on other times, he says, Lord I need to talk to You, this isn’t right. I mean we go through struggles. That’s what the wisdom literature does. I want you to have life’s lessons, Ecclesiastes. God says so that you deal with life as I have ordained it because of the fall. Your wearisome labor, your stress, your troubles, the unfairness, the inequalities, the mistreatment. You’ll work hard and someone else gets the credit. You’ll work hard and someone else gets the money. It doesn’t overwhelm you and we learn to trust God with today and know tomorrow is in His control, because it’s the desire of the wind, in the metaphor, the picture, I can’t control tomorrow. That’s what Jesus said, but the God that I serve has my tomorrow, so He’ll take care of the days of my life. That doesn’t mean I am not diligent. I want to live my life for Him, in obedience to Him, to honor Him. I fear Him, but then what He brings today that’s my comfort, that’s my joy, and I want to enjoy every day in that light.

Let’s pray. Thank you, Lord, for Your word. Thank You for Your grace, in directing Your servant Solomon to write these life lessons for us. Lord, every one of us here, sitting here today, some of us are facing greater pressures than others have. Some have more disappointments, some have physical trials, some have financial pressures, some have issues of different kinds. Lord, we can’t escape the pressures that come as a result of being sons of Adam, living in a world that is under the curse of sin. But Lord, by Your grace You provide for us. You care for us and there is no testing, no trial that comes into our life, no pressure, no difficulty that You have not ordained for our good. You provide the grace; either to escape, to have it relieved, or endure it, grow through it. Lord we want to experience all You have for us every day of these brief lives and have the joy that we can have in knowing that You are doing what is best for us. We pray in Christ’s name. Amen