Ecclesiastes 5:1-20

So I'm going to remind you of a few things about this book that we've been talking about a lot. And hopefully that page will be helpful to think about what is going on in this book. So the man who wrote the book calls himself Coheleth.

Coheleth: The preacher, collector of sayings, wise man, sage and author. The wise man is teaching us. He intends to drive us to God by highlighting the difficulties of life.

Our language is probably translated best by the teacher. But it means a person who assembles people in order to teach them wisdom. It's a very unique

position. It has both an ecclesiastical, in other words, a church, spiritual side to it and a government side to it. This is like the king and the chief priest kind of rolled into one. And he calls himself Coheleth. Most people believe that he himself was Solomon.

The title of the book in English is Ecclesiastes. Which comes from the Greek word for church ecclesia or gathering. So we we use ecclesiology and this

word is a gathering, a gathering of people. So the Cohelelth is gathering the people. His famous open line “vanity all is vanity.” The word is Havel HEBEL. It's a Hebrew word that means mist or puff of smoke. It means just something that's fleeting, like you might say breath elusive, he's saying. Sort of fleeting. All is fleeting. Everything is mist. Life is going away quickly and life is like trying to grab a piece of mist. It's that elusive for us as we really start to understand it and think about it. Life passes in a flash and you can't get hold of a lot of stuff.

So I said last time. Days are long but decades are short. I have had some days that exhausted me. I thought they would never end and now I've used up 7 decades like that. David Gibson, the author of the book we've been referring to, not this David Gibson, another David Gibson. “Our lives are like a whisper spoken in the wind, here one minute and then carried away forever.

The next. He said we live our life under the sun, meaning in time. We're bound by time. This is not how we live life in eternity. That's going to be different.

But while we're living in time, this is the fleeting nature of life. And his main question is what advantage is there to man for all of his striving? The word advantage means what's left over. You knock yourself out and there's not much left over. Give an illustration. We first came to this passage about my buddy and I cutting down two trees over Christmas when I was in college.

Trying to make some money in between messing up the air conditioner and ruined chainsaws and renting chainsaws. We had about 11 bucks apiece left after a week of work. Knocked ourselves out climbing ice covered trees for a

week for 11 bucks.

One writer named Robert Lewis said, “There is a time-release futility pill in every one of us.. My van is in the shop again. Oh my goodness, wear me out.

So Ecclesiastes is destroying the notion that I can find something meaningful in life. Apart from God, Coheleth says to me, listen, you can't enjoy even the simplest pleasures without God. He says to us in the course of this book. You can't discover the meaning and purpose of life without God. In fact, you can't even figure out what God's up to. What's he doing in my life? I have to be connected with him.

Greatest movie of all time? Princess Bride. Let's just agree on that right now.

“Hello, My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die.” Here's what Cohela says. Hello, you live in a fleeting world, prepare to die. That's Coheleth. Maybe you can remember Coeleheff now that we've tied him to an ego. Montoya.

I want to read a little longer quote here for a moment from David Gibson, the front of his book. “He said I'm going to die. By the time you read these lines, I may even be dead. It's not that I have a virulent disease or terminal illness. I don't know when I will die. I just know I will. I'm going to die, and so are

you. But here's why I wrote this book. I am ready to die. I myself am not afraid of dying. There is nothing about my death or the state of being dead that distresses me.” Excerpt from “Living Life Backwards.”

Ecclesiastes has changed my death, but it is an enigma. It has baffled scholars and pundits with its repeated refrain. Vanity of vanities. All is vanity in my opinion, he said. Part of the brilliance of Ecclesiastes is that it teaches us life often slips through our fingers and eludes our comprehensiveness by itself being elusive and perplexing, he says. What better way to teach how slippery life is and how confusing life is than by writing a book that is slippery and confusing. He's just writing about life and the way we experience it.

Sometimes we don't admit it, but he argues that Ecclesiastes Coheleth is teaching us to live life backwards. What is the one certain thing in my future?

Prepare to die. I'm going to die. And so I know I'm going to die. So I start working backward from that and say then how do I want to live? What I want my memorial service to be. Do I want my kids standing on this platform saying my dad was a hypocritical jerk? No, I don't want him to say that. I got to work backwards from whatever day that happens. I got to work backwards and live in a way that I finish well. And so Coheleth is talking to us about these issues to the degree that my life is connected to God.

It has meaning and it will matter. To the degree that's connected with God. So with that, by way of background up to speed a little bit on Ecclesiastes, we're into chapter 5 today. It's 20 verses. I have a timer. I know how much time I have. I will not belabor any of it, but Ecclesiastes chapter 5 and here's what Coheleth says to us today.

Ecclesiastes 5:1-20 “Guard your steps as you go to the House of God and draw near to listen rather than to offer the sacrifice. Fools, for they do not know that they are doing evil. (2) Do not be hasty in Word or impulsive in thought to bring up a matter in the presence of God, for God is in heaven, and you are on earth. (3) Therefore let your words be few, for the dream comes through much effort, and the voice of the fool through many words. (4) When you make a vow to God, do not be laid in paying it. For it takes no delight in fools. For what? Pay what you vow. (5) It is better that you should not vow than that you should vow and not pay. (6) Do not let your speech cause you to sin, and do not say in the presence of the messenger of God that it was a mistake. Why should God be angry with you on account of your voice and destroy the work of your hands? (7) For in many dreams and many words there is emptiness. Rather fear God.

(8) If you see oppression of the poor and denial of justice and righteousness in the denial of justice and righteousness in the province. Do not be shocked at the sight, for one official watches over another official, and there are higher

officials over them. (9) After all, a king who cultivates the field is an advantage to the land. (10)He who loves money will not be satisfied with money, nor he who loves abundance with its abundance. This too is vanity. (11) When good things increase, those who consume them increase. So what is the advantage to their owners except to look on? (12)The sleep of the working man is pleasant whether he eats little or much, but the full stomach of the rich man does not allow him to sleep.

(13)There's a grievous evil which I've seen under the sun. Rich is being hoarded by their owner. (14) When those riches were lost through a bad investment and he had fathered his son, then there was nothing to support him. (15) As he had come naked from his mother's womb, so he will return as he came. He will take nothing from the fruit of his labor that he can carry in his hand. (16) This also is a grievous evil. Exactly as a man is born, thus will he die. So what advantage to him who toils for the wind throughout his life? (17)

He who eats in darkness and with great vexation, sickness, and anger.

(18) Here's what I've seen to be good and fitting. To eat, to drink, enjoy oneself and all one's labor in which he toils under. Done during the few years of his life which God has given him. For this is his reward. Furthermore. (19) As for every man to whom God has given riches and wealth, he has also empowered him to eat from them and to receive his reward and rejoice in his labor. This is the gift of God, (20) for he will not often consider the years of his life, because God keeps him occupied with the gladness of his heart.“

Father, may we have your clarifications? We think about this chapter. I pray that you would help me have a good flow of thought, good understanding, and a good ability to make this clear. I pray, Father, you would work in us. I pray you'd start in my heart whatever you have for me personally today, that each one of us would submit ourselves to your will, to your word, to your book. We need your help in Christ name, Amen.

Listen: My grandparents homesteaded a piece of ground in northwest South Dakota in 1916. They got 80 acres and they started fighting the homestead fight in dry land farming. My mother was born in their homestead shack in 1926. She was the fifth of six children. One of them died in childhood. The other five have now passed away. And homesteading for them was a hardscrabble deal. It was blizzards. It was snakes. Grasshoppers, Prairie fires, drought, too much rain.

Bad prices. It was survival. My mother's Christmas gift for years was an orange. 6 stockings on the Mantel, and then five stockings on the mantel, and in the bottom of every one of them an orange.

It was a fight. Now it wasn't cool to homestead. Then it was work. Now homesteading has become cool in America and there's a new homesteading movement and a lot of people are getting into sort of urban gentlemen, gentlewoman homesteading. And they're doing this in part for, you know, let's be self-sufficient. Let's have a sustainable life. They're doing it in part because of the economy and the rising prices. They're doing it in part because of the

distrust of the government and I think, doing it in part because there is a growing dissatisfaction with the American Dream. There's people who are saying I can't have the American dream, why would I even try? People who are saying basically I have the American Dream and it's hollow. People who are saying I'll never get there, or I watched my parents get there and I watched how Hollywood was for them. And people who are struggling with the question of either I don't have that level of wealth, I never will have that level of wealth, or I have it and it is frustrating.

So this passage, this chapter, I want to warn you, the American dream takes it on the chin today, takes it on the chin twice today. And Coheleth is addressing

is there really fulfillment in a bigger house, nicer car and more money?

14th vacation to Europe, is that really a better way to go about it? Isn't that maybe there's a better way to address? With materialism and material things. So Coheleth says to us, there is a better way. There's a better way that you can attack all of life. And he starts by saying these verses one to three.

First, draw near to God to listen far more than to speak (v1-3) Friends, there are two. There are two very major ways that are surefire ways to offend God. And the first one is every time you think about him or talk to him you're engaged with him. You're talking. And never listening. Always talking to God, always having something to say to Him, always have something to ask of Him, and always have something to complain about. I'm thinking about God. I'm in the presence of God. I'm praying and I have got a problem that I need Him to fix. I'm exposing my heart when I pray. When I pray, I'm showing God all of my cards. I'm showing Him what I care about, what's important to me, by what I pray for, how often I pray for it, and by who I pray for. If my heart is continually about me and my stuff and my dreams, I'm showing him my heart and I have drawn near to offer what he calls the sacrifice of fools. I'm just here in Yammer. I'm just here to tell God what needs to happen. Isn't this insane? The all knowing, all wise, all power for God of the universe. And I'm here to explain to him how he's not getting it done. I'm offering to him simply

the sacrifice of fools, he says.

Second, make very few promises and keep them all. (v 4-7) The way to offend him is that every time I show up and worship, my body has come here, but my mind and my heart are not all here. I'm physically here, but I'm not all here. There's nothing more annoying to me in the world to be in a conversation with a person who is talking to you and surfing their phone. It annoys the tar out of me. And you know they realize I'm annoyed. They say I'm listening. Go ahead, I'm listening. No, you're not listening.

Divided attention is no attention at all. And if I'm in worship and I'm half listening to the words that I'm singing, or I'm half listening to the message and the other half of me is doing this on the phone. Or the other half of me is

thinking about the game and what we should have done last night. Or the other half of me is thinking about, I wonder how long the wait will be at Bartona today if I'm thinking about that stuff. I'm not here. Divided attention

is no attention at all. And when I show up, God is saying don't show up to Yammer at me. Listen. 

Don't offer me the sacrifice of fools. Listen to me because to the degree that I listen to God, my life will be ordered. Why is our world in a mess? There is so little listening to God. Why is my life in whatever degree a mess it's in? Because I haven't listened to God enough? Don't show up, he says, to offer the

sacrifice of fools. It's far more important what God has to say than what I have to say.

Friends, I think that the applications show up and worship and focus. Go home, open your own Bible and focus. It's that simple. 100% there. When I am there, it's called presence.

Second thing he says to us verses four to seven, make very few promises and keep all of them. God is the God of integrity. He's indivisible. He's always the same being and He's calling us to be people who are people of integrity cannot be divided. I'm the same guy on Sunday morning as I am on Tuesday

morning as I am on Thursday night as I am on Friday night. As I am on vacation in Cancun, just the same guy, he wants me to be that kind of a person. So he wants me to be a person who makes few promises, who keeps all my promises. In fact, he says it's better not to swear and break your vow. It's better just to not make a vow. But if you do make one. Follow through, only making a few promises would do all of them. Here's Jesus' statement and the Sermon on the Mount. 

Matthew 5:34. “But I say to you, make no oath at all, either by heaven, for that is the throne of God, or by earth, for it is the footstool of his feet, or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King. Nor shall you make an oath by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black. But your statement shall be yes or no, no. And everything beyond that is evil.”

Out of this verse, there's a concept that grows largely forgotten now in the Christian faith called simple speech. Simple speech, and what simple speech means is I say what's true. I'm honest in what I say, I say what needs to be said. I'm purposeful. I'm not verbose, I don't exaggerate, I'm not full of words. I speak with clarity and with brevity, and I say yes or I say no. I don't say I swear. It's so I don't say that. I just say yes or I say no. And people get to know me as the kind of person who was.

He says yes, he means yes, and when he says no, he means no. And I

develop in my life a simple speech. Friends, we do not live in a nation of simple speech now, do we? We live in a nation of craziness in the way we talk to each other and the way we talk about each other. God is an undivided being. He says what's true and he does what he says. I need to be an undivided being who says what's true and who does what I say. I'm just going to say

yes or I'm just going to say no. I'm not going to go on and swear about it.

Third, versus 8 and 9A. A ruler with a work ethic beats a bureaucrat without a conscience. Duh. That's all I'm saying about that. My wife is changing slides today. Thank you for helping me, darling. You see, when I'm up here trying to do this, we're never where I'm supposed to be.

Fourth, love of wealth is great, except it never satisfies. It draws scavengers, it leads to sickening opulence, and it never allows pleasant sleep. So in verses 11-15, he's not talking about wealth. Wealth is hard enough. Just having wealth is a spiritual challenge. This is talking about the love of wealth and he's saying to us there's there's quite a rap sheet on the love of wealth and I'll

talk about it in a second.

Proverbs chapter 30:7 to 9. “Two things I ask of you, Lord, do not rebuke me before I die. Keep deception and lies far from me. “Simple speech”. Give me neither poverty nor riches. Feed me with the food that is my portion. Don't make me poor and don't make me wealthy. Give me what I need is what this prayer is, is saying that I'd not be full and deny you and say who is the Lord? I have all I need. I don't need God or that I not want and steal and profane the name of my God.”

There's a sweet spot in money. It's enough. It's got a cap on it. It's enough. I'm not so poor that I'm tempted to do dishonest things to get what I need and therefore dishonor God. And I'm not so rich that I think I'm fine. What need do I have of God? I'll buy my way out of any trouble I have. There's a sweet spot in money. And so here's the trap of loving wealth, friends.

Number one, it is never satisfied. Even if you have a lot of it, even if you're independently wealthy, you don't have to work. You have so much money. You're a trust fund baby. You've been to Europe 40 times. You've been to every

continent. You've been, this is your third time to Antarctica. This is getting old. And when you have too much, everything becomes wearisome.

Everything becomes tiring. You've done this before, you've seen that before. I've been to the Christmas markets. I can't face another Christmas market over in Europe on the river cruise. It's just too much. And so it's diminishing returns for me in my life.

Blaise Pascal, a believer from France, wrote this. “What else does this craving do more and this helplessness proclaim, but that there was once in man a true happiness? Of which all that now remains is the empty print and trace. This he tries in vain to fill with everything around him, seeking in things that are not there to help. He cannot find in those things that are there, though none can help, since this infinite abyss can only be filled with an infinite and

immutable object. In other words, by God Himself.

The second problem on this rap sheet about the love of wealth? It draws scavengers out of the woodwork. Who wants some of it if you win the lottery? Friends. You have friends from three decades ago all of a sudden connected with you again. You have long lost cousins in all 50 states. Your angry neighbor is all of a sudden a great friend. Your kids and grandkids are dropping hints like a seed spreader. I mean, everybody's here for something. It just draws scavengers out of the woodwork. I've seen a couple of studies of people who won the lottery and Oh my goodness. It is a miserable mess.

Well, let me start here. Don't play the lottery. It's a tax on people who are bad at math. Don't play the lottery. It's a waste

Third, the love of wealth leads to opulence and largesse that makes you sick.

From too many rich foods. You were going to bed on Thanksgiving night thinking, oh, that was good. I must say, 19,000 calories and you're thinking this is going to be a bad night. I'm bloated, I'm sick, I can't go to sleep, I got heartburn, and at 3:00 in the morning you're laying up in the recliner in the living room. Why'd I do that? Rich people eat too much rich food and they get sick. They can't even sleep.

This is really a stunning contrast because he said. This opulence, this largesse makes him too sick to sleep, as opposed to the the working man, the working

man who does labor all day and he gets home tired and he has supper, whatever he had. And then he goes to sleep and he sleeps to sleep with the dead. He's just like he's exhausted.

What a great way to spend the night exhausted and sleeping. Friends. I had a time fighting fire with a Park Service when I worked 28 hours in a row fighting fire. And I came back to the cabin, our wilderness cabin. I put my backpack on the picnic table, my boots on the picnic table. I laid on my bed.

I didn't take a shower, didn't take my clothes off, didn't get under the covers.

I laid on my bed and I was sleeping in the sleep of the dead for 10 hours. What did? Boom, I am done and out. What an enjoyment, especially if you can't sleep. It's a huge enjoyment. God wants us to enjoy and appreciate what we have.

Fifth, v.13-17 He says the hoarding of wealth is great. Except that we're talking about wealth, friends. We're talking about hoarding wealth. It's great, except that you can make bad investments. You lose the opportunity to support your family. It feels like you're chasing wind. It feels like you're eating in the darkness with great vexation, sickness and anger, and you finally die naked. That's the only problem. With all that, listen to this sheep. You're at risk of bad investment if you make a bad investment. You can't support your family. You're constantly chasing after stuff in the wind like you're chasing after a check in the tornado. You're eating in a dark place with great vexation, sickness and anger. And then you die naked. That's the result of hoarding.

Friends, I grew up semi poor. Now. I never went without food or slept in a cardboard box.

We didn't have a lot of money and we started out. We were renting a trailer house. I was five years old, Spearfish, SD. My dad had an entry level job in the Forest Service and my mother gave me a nickel. I had never had anything before. I had a nickel and I put in this huge heavy plastic Piggy Bank.

And I was so enamored with it, I shook it for two weeks and I broke a heavy plastic. Piggy Bank with a nickel. That's the problem with hoarding. It breaks stuff. If I'm a 5 year old with a nickel, it breaks stuff. If I'm a 65 year old with $10 million and I'm hoarding it, it just breaks stuff. It breaks my relationship. It breaks my heart. It breaks my ability to serve. We have a class coming up at FCBC very soon called Financial Peace University. Starts next Sunday 2:00 PM. Brilliant Class is written from a Christian perspective.

And I'm going to give you the overview of it. Here's Biblical finances 101. Number one, God is the owner of everything.

Number two, I am only the manager of his stuff. God gives me money so that I will give to him, pay my taxes, support my family, save for the future, give to others in need, and enjoy the good gifts He has given me. Now God wants me to save something. Proverbs, there's oil and precious treasure in the House

of the wise man doesn't want me to spend it all. When I'm gone, my wife's going to need some money and I've got to save something to be a good steward of that. But the bottom line is, friends, as a believer. It's his money and I'm expected to be more of a channel than a reservoir. More of a channel than a reservoir. Am I sharing with the people around me? There is a balance between share, saving and giving. It's more art than science. It's more art than science. You've got to depend on the Holy Spirit and say, Lord, what should I be doing here?

But the truth is, friends, God is a generous being. He is generous to a fault.

And if I want to be like him, I have to be a generous person. I have to be generous if I want to imitate God in that. I did a little research as I was getting this message ready.

What are the relative giving levels of people in America? So the research

shows that if you get, if you have $15,000 a year, this is below the poverty line, $15,000 a year, you on the average give 9.8%. The most generous people in America by income level are the deeply poor.

They tend to be more spiritual. They tend to be more dependent on God. They tend to understand more. I need God's help. I can't make this happen. And they're the most generous people by percentage, by amount. They have to live on. We are people who are expected to be like God and therefore to be generous.

Sixth, here's Coheleth's summary. It's verses 18 to 20. I want to read it once again, please. Verse 18. Here's what I've seen to be good and fitting is to eat.

To drink, enjoy oneself in 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. Furthermore, As for every man to whom God has given riches and wealth, he has also empowered him to eat from them and to receive his reward and and

to rejoice in his labor. This is the gift of God, for he will not often consider the years of his life. Because God keeps him occupied with gladness. Of his heart.

So he's ending this by saying, listen, here's the good life. It's not the American Dream. Here,s  the good life, enjoying 100% of your current life as a gift from God. Here's what I currently have. Here's my food, my drink. Here's my job, here's my labor. Here's my current day. This day is a gift from God to me and the job I have is a gift from God. If I enjoy these things and connect to these things as a gift from God, my my outlook on life is completely different.

So he says, enjoy the food you have, the drink you have, the work you have, the life you have and the day you have. Developing in my own heart.

Discipling my own heart with gratitude. Saying Lord, I'm really, really grateful for this car I have. I got to work today. I got to church today. I got wherever I wanted to go today. It wasn't,  you know, a super fancy car, wasn't a brand new car, didn't have any leather seats and stereo, whatever. But it was transportation. Cars are transportation. They get me to a place.

 They don't make me a good person. Enjoying what I have depending on God and not on my stuff. Figuring out what my personal giftedness is before God.

What did God make me good at and how good did he make me at it?

And using that for His glory. Because when I'm doing what God make me good

at.  I'm having the most fun in my life.

Aptitude and enjoyment go together. I hate piano. I cannot play piano. I can't read music, keep time. I don't. There's a whole bunch of keys there. I don't know which one to choose. I mean, they make no sense to me. I hate piano.

But there's other things God made me good at that I love. Figure out what God made you good at and do those things. Figure out yourself. Understand that it's a calling for you. You're called to something, not only called a faith in Christ, but called to your work. And then understand your sense of place.

This is so critical to me, friends.

Psalm 131 one David said. O Lord, my heart is not proud, nor my eyes haughty, nor do I involve myself in great matters or in things too difficult for me. I'm content with my place, with wherever God's called me and put me. I'm very happy to be here and I'm deeply grateful to God for that.

Here's the outline of the good life according to Coheleth. In this, he's simply saying enjoy the life you currently have. It's a gift from God.

Here's the big idea I want to close with. What if the American Dream is a nightmare that will not end? What if the good life is enjoying your current life as a gift from God?

What if that's the good life? What if all is striving? Doesn't really matter. Coheleth is not saying it's a sin to strive. He's not saying it's a sin to have more money, not a sin to have a bigger house. It's not a sin to buy a new car. Those are not sinful things.

But what he really is saying is that if I'm loving wealth or hoarding wealth, it's not only sinful, it's stupid. It's stupid and he's also saying the good life is enjoying the life that he has currently given me.

This is the day the Lord has made. I will rejoice. I will be glad in it.

Let me pray for His friends.

Father, I pray you would help us to recalibrate around this question.

Thank you for all that you've given to us, Father. We are people who live in

amazing, amazing largesse compared to so many in the world. Thank you for all you've given us. I'm asking for myself and each one of us that we would be people who are content and grateful and generous. And mindful.

Mindful of today. Our family, our friends, our job, mindful that we have transportation and covering. Grateful of all that you've given us.

I pray we'd be people who are really grateful and connected with

the life you've given us today. We ask it in Christ's name, Amen.