Ecclesiastes 2
Notes
Transcript
Last week we talked about how life is absolutely meaningless if you to do not have God. We learned that all the wisdom found in this world, “under the sun”, cannot scratch the itch of death that everyone of us has. That spiritual void cannot be filled with wisdom. And the more you try to fill it with wisdom the more hopeless you feel. “He who increases in knowledge increases in sorrow”.
So, a life that is not centered on God is pointless. It is actually very depressing.
It is pointless. It is actually very depressing.
Today we are going to look at Solomons attempt to fill his spiritual void with pleasure.
And before we dive into it
Let’s pray over this lesson this morning:
At the end of this lesson my prayer is that we see this:
Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
But before we taste this good refreshing drink....we are going to look at the waterless wasteland this Pastor tried out first. Because remember, there is no good news without bad news.
Not only was Pastor Solomon the wisest man and the richest man to live he was really a polite guy.
Pastor Solomon is really a polite guy. The first two verses here he tells you what he did and what he soon found out.
Solomon, in the first 2 verses, is going to tell you what he did and what he found out.
Basically, what he is saying is, look you can stop right here and take my word for it or I can give you some nasty details about the things I did.
He is an open book. Verses 1 and 2 are like, “look, this is basically what I did and this is what I found out”. Then, he’s like, “but Im not scared to tell you all the details…I don’t really care.” And you know we like the details don’t we.
He’s like, “look, this is basically what I did and this is what I found out”.
You want to know the details? Fine. Whatever. He’s like, “Im not scared to tell you all the details…I don’t really care.” And you know we like the details don’t we.
As we read this section…notice how much he talks about himself and what “he” did...
Ecclesiastes 2:1-
I said in my heart, “Come now, I will test you with pleasure; enjoy yourself.” But behold, this also was vanity. I said of laughter, “It is mad,” and of pleasure, “What use is it?” I searched with my heart how to cheer my body with wine—my heart still guiding me with wisdom—and how to lay hold on folly, till I might see what was good for the children of man to do under heaven during the few days of their life. I made great works. I built houses and planted vineyards for myself. I made myself gardens and parks, and planted in them all kinds of fruit trees. I made myself pools from which to water the forest of growing trees. I bought male and female slaves, and had slaves who were born in my house. I had also great possessions of herds and flocks, more than any who had been before me in Jerusalem. I also gathered for myself silver and gold and the treasure of kings and provinces. I got singers, both men and women, and many concubines, the delight of the sons of man.
So I became great and surpassed all who were before me in Jerusalem. Also my wisdom remained with me. And whatever my eyes desired I did not keep from them. I kept my heart from no pleasure, for my heart found pleasure in all my toil, and this was my reward for all my toil. Then I considered all that my hands had done and the toil I had expended in doing it, and behold, all was vanity and a striving after wind, and there was nothing to be gained under the sun.
18 times he says, “I”
he says, “my” 13 times
“me” 4 times
“myself” 4 times
I mean, we all know self-centered people right…I might be one of those you know…but let me tell you something. This dude put the breaks on EVERYTHING in his life and focused TOTALLY on his own pleasure.
It was ALL about him.
When he said in verse 1 “I said in my heart, “Come now, I will test you with pleasure”…the guy meant every single word of it. I mean we all talk a big game sometime but this dude wasn’t joking.
Verse 2:
The point here isn’t that laughter and pleasure are bad things but when it comes to the major issues of life itself it is pointless. “What use is it?”
So what is this all about anyway? It’s in verse 3:
“to see what was good for the children of man to do under heaven during the few days of their life”.
That is a sobering statement isn’t it? We think we are going to live forever. But your’e not. Generations come and generations go…but the earth remains forever.
Lets look again at verses 4-8 together (ON THE SCREEN)
I made great works. I built houses and planted vineyards for myself. I made myself gardens and parks, and planted in them all kinds of fruit trees. I made myself pools from which to water the forest of growing trees. I bought male and female slaves, and had slaves who were born in my house. I had also great possessions of herds and flocks, more than any who had been before me in Jerusalem.
I made great works. I built houses and planted vineyards for myself. I made myself gardens and parks, and planted in them all kinds of fruit trees. I made myself pools from which to water the forest of growing trees. I bought male and female slaves, and had slaves who were born in my house. I had also great possessions of herds and flocks, more than any who had been before me in Jerusalem. I also gathered for myself silver and gold and the treasure of kings and provinces. I got singers, both men and women, and many concubines, the delight of the sons of man.
This is Solomon’s own Garden of Eden. This is the Garden of man…not of God.
“I made great works”
“I built houses”
“I planted vineyards”
“I made myself gardens and parks”
“I planted fruit trees”
“I made myself pools”
This is what Adam was told to do in . To work the garden and subdue it, to be fruitful and multiply…to cultivate the garden.
But Solomon’s garden doesn’t have a forbidden fruit.
Solomon created a life with NO FORBIDDEN FRUIT. He was seeking after his own pleasure to see if there was any fulfillment.
Isn’t that what the world does who doesn’t believe in Christ? Tries to live in a world that they create without him in it? Isn’t that what we all did before we came to know Christ? Are you living in your own Garden that you have created right now?
Verse 8 goes by really fast but when it says that he had silver and gold and the treasure of kings and provinces…he means he had some silver and gold. We don’t have time this morning but you need to read and wrap your mind around how RICH this Pastor was. Joel Olsteen, Kenneth Copeland, and all the other ones combined couldn’t come close to what Solomon had. And he just mentions it in one small sentence in passing.
He had it all…live radio, and “many concubines”. He had 700 wives, Princesses for political reasons but he had 300 concubines for other reasons…he calls it for “the delight of the sons of man”.
But what did he find through all of this? He summarizes it in verses 9-11
So I became great and surpassed all who were before me in Jerusalem. Also my wisdom remained with me. And whatever my eyes desired I did not keep from them. I kept my heart from no pleasure, for my heart found pleasure in all my toil, and this was my reward for all my toil. Then I considered all that my hands had done and the toil I had expended in doing it, and behold, all was vanity and a striving after wind, and there was nothing to be gained under the sun.
See, Pleasure has a way of promising more than it can produce doesn’t it?
Listen to me: Especially yall who are in college and in highschool…If you could have ALL YOU EVER WANTED…IF YOU COULD HAVE ALL YOU DREAM ABOUT....IT WILL NEVER BE ENOUGH! If you are the CENTER of your world then you are going to be miserable.
It might be hard for you to believe a guy who wrote this 900 years before Christ…and if it is then BELIEVE ME! When I put myself at the CENTER of my WORLD I am MISERABLE! IT is a horrible place to be! TRUST ME!
But believe Solomon over me. Listen to his words. You can feel it because at a much smaller degree you have experienced it. We have all lived like this in our life. Even as believers we find ourselves here again, battling with our flesh when we take our eyes off of Christ.
This is the most self-centered, selfish man who happened to be the richest and wisest man to ever live telling you. This is King Solomon.
But think of King Jesus. Who never put himself first. He never lived in a world where God wasn’t on the throne. He never bowed the knee to his own desires. King Solomon was looking for meaning and happiness in a world where he shut God out. King Jesus says this right here:
You make known to me the path of life;
in your presence there is fullness of joy;
at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.
You CANNOT find your own way through this life and you CANNOT find fullness of joy or TRUE pleasure outside of his presence…the presence of Christ Jesus.
So he chalks up pleasure seeking as vanity and striving after the wind and turns back to wisdom again...
Look at verses 12-16
So I turned to consider wisdom and madness and folly. For what can the man do who comes after the king? Only what has already been done. Then I saw that there is more gain in wisdom than in folly, as there is more gain in light than in darkness. The wise person has his eyes in his head, but the fool walks in darkness. And yet I perceived that the same event happens to all of them. Then I said in my heart, “What happens to the fool will happen to me also. Why then have I been so very wise?” And I said in my heart that this also is vanity. For of the wise as of the fool there is no enduring remembrance, seeing that in the days to come all will have been long forgotten. How the wise dies just like the fool!
Ecc 2:
So I turned to consider wisdom and madness and folly. For what can the man do who comes after the king? Only what has already been done. Then I saw that there is more gain in wisdom than in folly, as there is more gain in light than in darkness. The wise person has his eyes in his head, but the fool walks in darkness. And yet I perceived that the same event happens to all of them. Then I said in my heart, “What happens to the fool will happen to me also. Why then have I been so very wise?” And I said in my heart that this also is vanity. For of the wise as of the fool there is no enduring remembrance, seeing that in the days to come all will have been long forgotten. How the wise dies just like the fool! So I hated life, because what is done under the sun was grievous to me, for all is vanity and a striving after wind.
verse 12 is a hard one isn’t it? There is so much disagreement on what this verse is saying so we are going to go with this explanation. It’s an old one and a popular one and it seems to make contextual sense.
Look at verse 12 again:
So I turned to consider wisdom and madness and folly. For what can the man do who comes after the king? Only what has already been done.
He isn’t going to leave wisdom behind but now he want’s to add a little madness and folly.
He says, “For what can the mad do who comes after the king? Only what has already been done.”
Well,
Let me back up just a bit: Vanity of Vanities right? Life is hear for a short while and gone right? Generations come and generations go. Vanity of Vanities.
There is more there than we ever realized. Vanity in Hebrew is “hebel”. When he is writing this through the Spirit of God this is a word that would remind the Israelite of another “hebel”. That life is short, death comes to us all… Cain and “hebel” or “Abel”.
So what is he meaning in verse 12?
Well, he just described a garden that “HE CREATED”. And how it was “hebel”. So the Jews mind is right there…and as soon as he describes this garden of Man he jumps to “madness and folly. For what can the man do who comes after the king?” What king? Adam, the king of the Garden of Eden. He is saying that humans aren’t going to behave better or with greater wisdom than their first ancestor Adam, who came directly from the hand of God. “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree” you know what I mean?
So he can’t just use “wisdom” he must also understand FOLLY because that is the stuff of our human nature.
But he doesn’t spend MUCH time in Folly. In verse 13 He sees pretty quickly that wisdom is better.
At least the wise person knows he is heading for trouble where the fool is just blind and oblivious of what is coming.
So what did he really learn from wisdom and folly? Well, it is better to be wise than foolish but at the end of the day, when the game is over guess what…THE KING AND THE PAWN GO INTO THE SAME BOX.
It doesn’t really matter because death is coming.
Again…this is what life looks like in a world that you create without God. Not that you can actually “create” a world “without God”. This is what happens even to Christians when they find themselves focusing on themselves and not on Christ and others. This is what happens to all of us when we become the center of the universe.
Don’t think this can’t, won’t, doesn’t happen to you.
What I love about Solomon is he is an open book. He is brutally honest about who he is and where he is at. You know where he is at right now? The same place I have been when I take my eyes off of the King of Kings...
He found himself looking everywhere for meaning and couldn’t find it under the sun…and where did that lead him?
Look at verse 17:
So I hated life, because what is done under the sun was grievous to me, for all is vanity and a striving after wind.
Have you ever reached the end of your rope? I HAVE! It is a scary place. It is just a downward spiral from here. You start looking around and all you can see is the negative. Once your eyes are off of Christ it becomes absolute hopelessness.
Lets see what the wisest man in the world said after he “hated life”…
Look at verses 18-23 and pay attention to what is highlighted here...
I hated all my toil in which I toil under the sun, seeing that I must leave it to the man who will come after me, and who knows whether he will be wise or a fool? Yet he will be master of all for which I toiled and used my wisdom under the sun. This also is vanity. So I turned about and gave my heart up to despair over all the toil of my labors under the sun, because sometimes a person who has toiled with wisdom and knowledge and skill must leave everything to be enjoyed by someone who did not toil for it. This also is vanity and a great evil. What has a man from all the toil and striving of heart with which he toils beneath the sun? For all his days are full of sorrow, and his work is a vexation. Even in the night his heart does not rest. This also is vanity.
You know why his confession sounds real to you and me? Because it is REALISTIC! You know these words are true. BELIEVE ME!…I KNOW THEY ARE TRUE FOR ME.
I felt all of these ways this week…seriously. This was my week and here I am preaching these words this morning. Coincidence? I DOUBT IT.
And why do I find myself here? Why do you find yourself here sometimes? Because the apple doesn’t fall too far from the tree. When we turn our back on God and live in a world where we become the center of it LIFE soon becomes meaningless! Especially when you have tasted and seen the goodness of God.
We all live under the curse of Adam. We all have his humanity in us. He walked with God, he saw God but he turned his back on God. He didn’t believe His Word.
Remember verse 12… “what can the mad do who comes after the king? Only what has already been done”. And that is exactly what we do. It is what we all do. It is what I do. And when we do it could take us to the end of our rope where Solomon found himself.
But fi we hang on to the rope you know what you will find a the end of it? A sovereign God!
Look at verses 24-26
There is nothing better for a person than that he should eat and drink and find enjoyment in his toil. This also, I saw, is from the hand of God, for apart from him who can eat or who can have enjoyment? For to the one who pleases him God has given wisdom and knowledge and joy, but to the sinner he has given the business of gathering and collecting, only to give to one who pleases God. This also is vanity and a striving after wind.
God gives gifts and the ability to actually enjoy the gifts he gives. Those of us who belong to the King of Kings should have the capacity to enjoy life. It is when we take our eyes off of him and focus on ourselves where those gifts he gives us slips through our fingers.
We trust in him. When we feel that our lives are out of control we have to stop trying to take control and trust Him that he is working, he is shaping us, he is molding us more and more into the image of His Son.
Trying to fight against him, trying to take control of what is going on around us is just wearisome and tiresome. It is us going about the business of gathering and collecting and gathering and collecting. It is us being like the sun coming up and going down, up and down. It is like the wind coming from the North to the south, riding on its circuits never finding rest. It is us acting like the streams that continually flow to the sea but it never says enough…it is tiresome. We don’t live like the unbeliever. We live like children of God who trust that we can find rest in Christ and that The Father is in complete control. Otherwise it is just vanity and a striving after the wind.
Let’s close with the words of Paul and a prayer as Nate comes up to lead us in worship as we prepare for communion:
So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.
So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. Give no offense to Jews or to Greeks or to the church of God, just as I try to please everyone in everything I do, not seeking my own advantage, but that of many, that they may be saved.
Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ.
1 Corinthians 10:31
1 Co 10:31-11:1