Solomon asked some hard questions about the meaning and purpose of life. This daily devotional looks at his belief that everything was futile.
Nuggets
- Solomon, for all his wisdom, determined that everything was futile.
- We need to find God’s purpose for our lives.
- Being a disciple does not allow us freedom to sin.
Devotions in The Meaning of Life series
What’s the Use?
What Time Is It?
Why Listen?
Where Is the Balance?
Facing Death
What Is Life About?
Let's Put It into Context
“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and discipline” (Prov. 1: 7 CSB)
“For in much wisdom is much vexation, and he who increases knowledge increases sorrow” (Ecc. 1: 18 CSB)
What happened! King Solomon, David’s son, wrote both Proverbs and Ecclesiastes. He’s done a complete 180 degree turn in the time between.
This is the guy who asked God for wisdom. “So give your servant a discerning heart to govern your people and to distinguish between right and wrong. For who is able to govern this great people of yours?” (I Kgs. 3: 9 NIV).
We get that 180-degree switch within Ecclesiastes itself! Talk about confusing.
Gibbon argued that this is a debate between two different people — or at least warring factions within one person! He contended it was one side writing for the first four chapters and another beginning in Chapter five.
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Forsyth took it another way. Elaine-speak. We are not going to be up on the mountain-top 24/7/365/our whole life. There are going to be some valleys. Proverbs is the mountain top. Ecclesiastes is the valley.
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Everything Is Futile
“I, the Teacher, have been king over Israel in Jerusalem. I applied my mind to examine and explore through wisdom all that is done under heaven. God has given people this miserable task to keep them occupied. I have seen all the things that are done under the sun and have found everything to be futile, a pursuit of the wind. What is crooked cannot be straightened; what is lacking cannot be counted” (Ecc. 1: 12-15 CSB)
Solomon, for all his wisdom, determined that everything was futile.
Ecclesiastes 1 is a depressing chapter. Solomon got it right saying life on earth was temporary, but he looked in all the wrong places for the meaning of life.
The Sunday Morning Bible Study series skips a lot of Solomon’s searches. We basically get a summary statement.
Wardlaw brought up a good point, though. To gain knowledge, we have to work for it. We must find it first. Then we must read or listen to it or access it in whatever for it is in.
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That is just the start. Next comes the evaluation. We must determine how it informs our current knowledge. Or does it challenge our current beliefs?
Finally, we must decide how the new knowledge will impact our future.
No, it usually is not an easy, quick process.
That can derail the process. We like quick. This is a world of instant gratification.
The not easy part is what drags it out sometimes. When that cuts into areas we would rather not look at, it is easier to stop the process than put in the work to gain the knowledge and wisdom.
Another reason the pursuit for wisdom and knowledge has fallen apart is because of the vanity associated with it. Maude described it as, “‘All is vanity;’ that is, all things are so in themselves, when not used aright, when not employed to God’s glory, or to the benefit of those around us, or in reference to our future and everlasting welfare.” The vanity leads to emptiness.
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Wardlaw also said this process butt heads with our pride. Pride is a unrealistic high opinion of oneself.
Jordan brought up selfishness. That is also another quick way so derail the process.
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I can see that. Why have knowledge if we are just going to use it for ourselves? We need to use it for others.
I keep reading this over and over and shaking my head. “… God has given people this miserable task to keep them occupied” (Ecc. 1: 13 CSB).
Inside me is screaming, “NO!!!!!”
God isn’t wanting to keep us occupied. He is wanting us to keep being sanctified.
- Sanctification is the transformation of mind, body, and soul, which begins with regeneration, gradually changes our nature through the promptings of the Holy Spirit, and ends with perfected state of spiritual wholeness or completeness.
- Regeneration is being changed from spiritually dead to spiritually alive and the internal requickening in us that God brings about through the work of the Holy Spirit to give us new character.
- Spiritual death is the separation from God that occurred as a consequence of Adam and Eve’s original sin. The spiritually alive are those who have ABCDed, so they are no longer separated from God.
- The perfected state indicates the combination of the spiritual graces which, when all are present, form spiritual wholeness or completeness.
- Spiritual graces are worldly morals that have been submitted to God to further His kingdom instead of enhancing this world.
The ABCDs of Salvation
If you have not become a believer in Christ, please read through the
Plan of Salvation and prayerfully consider what God is asking you to do.
A – admit our sins
B – believe His Son Jesus is our Redeemer
C – confess God as Sovereign Lord
D – demonstrate that commitment by making any changes needed in our lives to
live the way in which God has called us
The Disciple’s Job Description
Glossary
Did Solomon not get any of it? Was his wisdom just surface wisdom? Just worldly wisdom?
Solomon said something interesting right before this passage. “There is no remembrance of those who came before; and of those who will come after there will also be no remembrance by those who follow them” (Ecc. 1: 11 CSB).
We know that isn’t true. Solomon — and us — remembered, David. We remember Moses and Abraham. We remember Adam.
We remember Ezekiel and Jeremiah. We remember Peter and Paul.
Most importantly, we remember Jesus. We remember and we imitate Him.
We must remember that the crookedness comes from our sinful nature. That comes from being made in Adam’s image as well as God’s image.
To read a related devotion, click the button below.
I read what Newton wrote about this and agreed with the first thing and thought ooo, baby about the second thing. He wrote, “But when our hearts are made straight, how are we to keep them straight? Two things are necessary for this: — we must get Jesus to help us, and we must help ourselves.”
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Because of Jesus, our crooked ways can be made straight. He is the only way. “Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me” (Jn. 14: 6 CSB).
There is only one way we can help ourselves. God calls us to salvation.
- Salvation is the gift of life through the deliverance from condemnation and sin to acceptance and holiness and changes us from being spiritually dead to spiritually alive.
- Sins are actions by humans that disobey God and break one of His reasonable, holy, and righteous laws and commandments, goes against a purpose He has for us, or follows Satan’s promptings.
- Holiness is the transcendent excellence of His nature that includes elements of purity, dedication, and commitment that lead to being set apart. Purity means possessing God’s moral character, having eliminated the stain of sin.
Glossary
We must accept the gift. God does not force Himself on us. We can accept or deny His gift of salvation.
Accepting gives us an eternity of joy, peace, and hope with God. Denying gives us an eternity of pain in hell.
To read a devotion in the Hell Does Have Fury series, click on the appropriate button below.
Is It Worth It?
“I hated all my work that I labored at under the sun because I must leave it to the one who comes after me. And who knows whether he will be wise or a fool? Yet he will take over all my work that I labored at skillfully under the sun. This too is futile. So I began to give myself over to despair concerning all my work that I had labored at under the sun. When there is a person whose work was done with wisdom, knowledge, and skill, and he must give his portion to a person who has not worked for it, this too is futile and a great wrong” (Ecc. 2: 18-21 CSB)
We need to find God’s purpose for our lives.
The question Solomon was really asking here was: is life really worth living? I am probably going to blow my self-imposed quote limit, but I think we need to hear their words, not mine.
- James wrote, “Our pessimistic views concerning life are largely the result of our mistaken ideas of happiness. We are apt to imagine that health, leisure, and a splendid income are absolutely necessary to our happiness; and when there is a prospect of losing these permanently, life is no longer desirable.”
- Crawford wrote, “Christianity nowhere teaches that pleasure, or even happiness, is the end or object of life. On the contrary, our religion teaches that progress through suffering is the real end and object of our life.”
- Saurin wrote, “We are sometimes disgusted with the world through an excess of fondness for the world, and hate life through an over-valuation of it. Man enters the world as an enchanted place.”
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Saurin reminded us that Solomon had all the toys that should have made him happy. If he didn’t have it in his possession, he could have run out and gotten it. Things won’t make us happy.
Ooo, ooo, ooo. Have you ever wondered what I mean when I say that being a disciple doesn’t give us a license to sin? Selby explained what I mean.
Selby wrote, “Solomon’s life was complete from the naturalistic standpoint. He sought pleasure with a zest we should condemn as licence nowadays, but which the spirit of those times was accustomed to count lawful, at least for kings. And more than that, he gave himself to great and imposing enterprises, diligently seeking the welfare of his people as well as his own personal and family aggrandizement. And yet work upon an unspiritual plane of ideas could not altogether satisfy him. He had an unhappy forecast of pending changes, for Rehoboam was not an ideal youth.”
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So, what is this really saying?
• Solomon had it all.
• So, he thought he could do whatever he wanted — and he did it.
• He sought pleasure with a zest regardless whether it was what God wanted him to do or not.
• He may have been diligently seeking the welfare of his people as well as his own personal and family aggrandizement, but it wasn’t for God’s glory.
What Do We Get?
“For what does a person get with all his work and all his efforts that he labors at under the sun? For all his days are filled with grief, and his occupation is sorrowful; even at night, his mind does not rest. This too is futile. There is nothing better for a person than to eat, drink, and enjoy his work. I have seen that even this is from God’s hand, because who can eat and who can enjoy life apart from him? For to the person who is pleasing in his sight, he gives wisdom, knowledge, and joy; but to the sinner he gives the task of gathering and accumulating in order to give to the one who is pleasing in God’s sight. This too is futile and a pursuit of the wind” (Ecc. 2: 22-26 CSB)
Being a disciple does not allow us freedom to sin.
Finlaysen warned us to not equate these words with “Let’s eat and drink for tomorrow we’ll die.” He contended Solomon wasn’t talking self-indulgence.
Finlaysen argued that this was just a simple way of life. Verse 22 asks what do disciples get with all this work?
We get sanctification. We get a closer relationship with God. Our character is changed to imitate His.
Look what Finlaysen said. He wrote, “Amidst the many anomalies of life, Ecclesiastes clings to the assurance that there is a moral government of God in this world. There are indeed perplexing problems in relation to this moral government, which he felt he could not solve, and which led him to look forward to a world beyond death where the dealings of God with men would be completed and vindicated. But still, looking at the broad facts of human life, and excluding cases apparently exceptional and perplexing, he saw that God does make a distinction, even here and now, between the ‘sinner’ and the ‘man who pleaseth Him.’ The virtuous and godly man has an advantage, even in this world, over the wicked. He receives from God a ‘wisdom and knowledge’ which are associated with ‘joy.’”
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We’ve just gotten off of a bunch of devotions talking about joy, peace, and hope. We get there by following God and living in harmony with His children.
Making the Connections
Conner made an interesting observation. He wrote, “Joy comes after, not before, wisdom and knowledge …”
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That puts the progression wisdom, knowledge, joy, peace, and hope.
How Do We Apply This?
- We can’t focus on getting the best this life has to offer. We have to focus on our relationships with God.
- We must focus on the future — the future with God.
- Find the purpose God has for our lives.
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Father God. We know we can question You when we question in faith. You have a purpose for our lives, and You want us to find our purpose in You. We look to You to find it. Amen.
What do you think?
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