Ecc 8:2-15 Obey the King

Obey the King

Kim Sang-Hwa* was 12 years old when she discovered a hidden Bible in her North Korean home.

“I knew this book was illegal. I had shivers throughout my body. I was so very afraid… But in the end, I chose to confront my father. That’s when he explained the Bible and the Gospel to me.”

Sang-Hwa made the radical decision to give her life to Christ – a decision that would lead authorities to spy on, threaten and attack her. All for following Jesus.

Today, more and more North Koreans are choosing to follow Jesus in the face of extreme persecution.

Kim had a chose would she obey the earthly head of State, the ‘superem leader’ Kim John Ung the Comunist Dictator of North Korea and expose her fatther to the secret police or would she obey the new king she that her father just introduced her to.

In Ecc 8:2 the teachers instruction is to obey the edict of the true Superme leader because you have taken an oath.

You have taken an Oath

Ecclesiastes 8:2–4 NIV

2 Obey the king’s command, I say, because you took an oath before God. 3 Do not be in a hurry to leave the king’s presence. Do not stand up for a bad cause, for he will do whatever he pleases. 4 Since a king’s word is supreme, who can say to him, “What are you doing?”

The King in verse 2 is not an earthly king. It is God himself. see verse 4. The only king who truely has a supreme word is God. No earthly leader has this power.

V2 The teacher says follow the kings command v 2

because you have taken an oath.

The oath in the context of the reader is the Jewish person the descendant of Abraham who is a part of the oath or the covenant with God. That Abraham was Goiven, that King Dav9d renewed and now Solomon the Teacger has remembered

see

Psalm 89:35 NIV

35 Once for all, I have sworn by my holiness— and I will not lie to David—

For the Christian we make an oath, join a covenant when we make a declaratio of faith to become a christian and believe in the promises of God.

Matthew 10:32 NIV

32 “Whoever acknowledges me before others, I will also acknowledge before my Father in heaven.

v3 Rushing a decision often means you make a istake verse 3.

Don’t make a quick decison to abandon God even in a tough situation like Kim found herself in.

If God is guiding our path and we find ourself in a difficult situation lets not abandon him to take an easy way out because we have taken an oath made a covenanenat a promise.

we live in a worldof injustice yet we are safe

Ecclesiastes 8:5–8 NIV

5 Whoever obeys his command will come to no harm, and the wise heart will know the proper time and procedure. 6 For there is a proper time and procedure for every matter, though a person may be weighed down by misery. 7 Since no one knows the future, who can tell someone else what is to come? 8 As no one has power over the wind to contain it, so no one has power over the time of their death. As no one is discharged in time of war, so wickedness will not release those who practice it.

V5-8

You are safe under the sun despite the hard things in life

Injustice v 9-13

Ecclesiastes 8:9–13 NIV

9 All this I saw, as I applied my mind to everything done under the sun. There is a time when a man lords it over others to his own hurt. 10 Then too, I saw the wicked buried—those who used to come and go from the holy place and receive praise in the city where they did this. This too is meaningless. 11 When the sentence for a crime is not quickly carried out, people’s hearts are filled with schemes to do wrong. 12 Although a wicked person who commits a hundred crimes may live a long time, I know that it will go better with those who fear God, who are reverent before him. 13 Yet because the wicked do not fear God, it will not go well with them, and their days will not lengthen like a shadow.

The righteous 14-15

not explicit but it is implicit that we do the opposite

Ecclesiastes 8:14–15 NIV

14 There is something else meaningless that occurs on earth: the righteous who get what the wicked deserve, and the wicked who get what the righteous deserve. This too, I say, is meaningless. 15 So I commend the enjoyment of life, because there is nothing better for a person under the sun than to eat and drink and be glad. Then joy will accompany them in their toil all the days of the life God has given them under the sun.

fear the lord

Ecclesiastes 8:15 NIV

15 So I commend the enjoyment of life, because there is nothing better for a person under the sun than to eat and drink and be glad. Then joy will accompany them in their toil all the days of the life God has given them under the sun.

luke 12 rich fool

rich to god

Isaiah 1:17 NIV

17 Learn to do right; seek justice. Defend the oppressed. Take up the cause of the fatherless; plead the case of the widow.

Micah 6:6–8 NIV

6 With what shall I come before the Lord and bow down before the exalted God? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old? 7 Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, with ten thousand rivers of olive oil? Shall I offer my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul? 8 He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.

Hospitality food for all

Coming up to aus day spotlight on the past

we are going on a fiendship visit to Aborigional friends. Michael Ducket

Practical help

Speek up for causes too.

only 1 pastor for the mission to First nations people.

some speek for refugees, abortion.

in all these things remember Kim annd our persecuted brothers and sisters

But with your support, they can be strengthened with the resources to survive – like food, medicine, clothing and shelter.

Give now and help persecuted Christians survive in the most dangerous places.

In all our causes as are these God’s fights

Acts 1:8 NIV

8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

“Ye shall be witnesses unto Me”—that means a life of unsullied, uncompromising, and unbribed devotion to the Lord Jesus, a satisfaction to Him wherever He places us.

remember the unhurried decision of Kim

Avoid discontent

v 12 judgement

v13

Ecclesiastes 3:11 NIV

11 He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end.