And today we continue in our sermon series through
the Old Testament wisdom book of Ecclesiastes.
And so I invite you to turn to chapter two of
Ecclesiastes and follow along there. Ecclesiastes
is a difficult book. There's no doubt about it.
but it is a book of incredible wisdom. And so
we should take it to heart. And so again, please
follow along. This is chapter two. The bulletin
has us going through the end of the chapter.
I'm actually going to stop that at verse 23.
Ecclesiastes two, beginning verse 12. 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 perceive
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 striving after wind
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 is 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 the 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 the night his heart does
not rest. This also is vanity. Let us pray. Father,
we come gathered around your text and we ask
that you would illuminate it for us and that,
Lord, you would help me to be faithful to this
text and apply it well for the sake of all who
hear it. We pray these things in the name of
the one who is the word, Jesus Christ. Amen.
Do you ever have that situation where you know
something is wrong with a loved one, and you
want them to tell you what's going on, but they
won't? Spouses, we have this. You know something
is going on with your wife. Something's bothering
her husband, right, or vice versa. And you want
to know what's going on with them. Or children,
sometimes. Brothers and sisters, you know something's
up with your sibling or a friend at church or
at school. You want to know what's going on,
and you feel like you have to pry it out of them.
Do you ever have that situation? Something is
eating at your loved one. Well, something is
eating at Solomon here in Ecclesiastes. And along
the way, he has told us what's bothering him.
But we perhaps get a clearer picture in the second
half of chapter two with what is really going
on with Solomon. He's going to return to wisdom.
He's going to share with us that that ultimately
doesn't solve his biggest problem. Earlier in
chapter two he went after self -indulgence. He
tried to cheer himself with all sorts of things.
And he said that this also is vanity and is striving
after wind. didn't really help him. And so there's
something more that's going on. And we need to
hear what it is. And it's this. It is death.
The second half of chapter two is about death.
The hevel of life, that word that gets translated
to vanity, the hevel of life is that it ends.
And that when life ends for our loved ones, it
hurts. Many of you know that this week I was
up in Connecticut visiting my grandmother. I
love her very much. And she is, she's not doing
well. And that was probably my last time of seeing
her, this side of glory. We had a good time together.
We drove around, saw the sights of Madison, Connecticut.
It's a beautiful little coastal town. She pointed
out to me where her church is and where the senior
center is. We went by the old house where I used
to play. And it was a great visit. I took her
to her favorite seafood restaurant. We had fried
shrimp. It was delicious. But when we got back
to her apartment, her assisted living home, there
was this heaviness, this weightiness over the
thing. Because she knows what's ahead for her.
She knows that she's going to die. You all know
what that's like. You have experienced loss,
and if you haven't, you will. That there is just
this fallenness to humanity and it's death, right?
And it's not supposed to be this way. For you
remember that death is a consequence. It's a
result of sin. Romans 6, 23. For the wages of
sin is what? It's death. Today, we're gonna see,
like I said, that death is really what is bothering
Solomon. And wisdom and toil, also known as work
here, cannot deliver him, and it can't fully
deliver us from evil, from death. And so what
we're looking at is wisdom and work. Now, we
saw this earlier in chapter two. Solomon... being
weighed down with all of these things, he sought
to self -indulge. And if Solomon cannot find
ultimate meeting and self -indulges, then guess
what, you can't either. Because Solomon had it
all at his fingertips. Solomon had access to
everything a person could possibly want, and
he says, no, it's fleeting, it goes away, it
does not have lasting permanence to it. And so
after checking out all of that, He goes back
to wisdom. Look in verse 12. So I turned to consider.
The word turn here has this idea of facing something.
He is facing yet again wisdom head on to see.
Maybe I need to retrace my steps. We saw it at
the end of chapter one. So I'm gonna retrace
my steps. I'm gonna go back to wisdom and see.
Maybe if I contrast wisdom with madness and folly,
I will realize that yes, it really is all about
wisdom. And he seems to show to us that as he's
looking at wisdom, he does this for the benefit
of others. He says, for what can the man do who
comes after the king? Only what has already been
done. So he's saying here, I've tried this for
you, and all you can merely do is copy what I
do. He's trying to figure it out, not just for
himself, but for others. And when he looks at
wisdom, he sees there is incredible gain there.
Look in verse 13. There is more gain in wisdom
than in folly. And this is a really important
statement for us to consider. Because he has
previously said that wisdom can't solve, it can't
fix everything. And he's going to say it again
later. But he still upholds the goodness of wisdom.
Look in verse 15. So he upholds wisdom, but then
he notes something about it. I said in my heart,
what happens to the fool will happen to me also.
Why then have I been so very wise? So Solomon
indeed is the wisest man, but then he recognizes
the limits of wisdom and says, it can't keep
my heart ticking, right? Because death is coming
for us all. But he still says it's better to
walk in the light than in the darkness. It's
better to be wise than a fool even though wisdom
will not ultimately save you. And actually as
we go further into the book of Ecclesiastes,
you'll see something that's even more perplexing
than this. You'll see that sometimes those who
exhibit the most wisdom will die and die first.
I want to take you to Genesis chapter four. If
you want to turn there, we have noted all of
the parallels, not all of them, there's still
more to go, we have noted many parallels between
Ecclesiastes and Genesis. We've actually, each
Sunday that we've been in Ecclesiastes, we've
also been in Genesis. And so Genesis four, You
probably remember this situation. I'm going to
read verses one through about eight. Now Adam
knew his wife Eve, and she conceived and bore
Cain, saying, I've gotten a man with the help
of the Lord. And again, she bore his brother
Abel. Now Abel was a keeper of sheep and Cain
a worker of the ground. the course of time Cain
brought to the Lord an offering of the fruit
of the ground and Abel also brought of the firstborn
of his flock and of their fat portions and the
Lord had regard for Abel in his offering But
for Cain and his offering he had no regard Cain
so Cain was very angry and his face fell and
the Lord said to Cain Why are you angry and why
has your face fallen if you do well? Will you
not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin
is crouching at the door. Its desire is contrary
to you, but you must rule over it. Cain spoke
to Abel, his brother, and when they were in the
field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel
and killed him. This is the first murder recorded
in Scripture, but I want to show to you why Abel
is a fitting name for this person. Because if
you were to look at this in Hebrew, you would
see that actually the name Abel is really Hevel.
The very word that is used throughout Ecclesiastes
is the same word that's used for Abel. And so
how is he like Hevel? Well, we've said what Hevel
means. Hevel is a breath. It is a mist. that
is there for a time and then goes away. It's
it's vapor. It doesn't it doesn't last. Well,
we can see from Genesis chapter four that Abel
does not last. And the perplexing thing for Solomon
over and over again through Ecclesiastes is that
sometimes the righteous are the ones who are
the have meaning they are the ones who are fleeting.
While the unrighteous live on through. Solomon
through his eyes, you can see that this is very
perplexing to him. It's very much like what one
commentator said, able of ables, everything is
able. Because friends, everyone will die. Everyone
is able. And so Kohelet, the teacher, the preacher,
the one that we call Solomon, he reflects on
what he observes that all will die. And then
he says, verse 17, look there. that he hates
life. I hated life because what is done under
the sun was grievous to me. As you come upon
a statement like that in Scripture, it's shocking,
isn't it? You might think, can you really say
this in the Bible? Can you really say that I
hated life? Are these really inspired words from
the Holy Spirit? Well, the Bible is full of shocking
statements, isn't it? Like the time that Job
cursed the day that he was born or like the psalmist
who said how long Oh Lord, will you forget me?
There are shocking statements because they reflect
the disastrous effects of the fall into sin after
all isn't perhaps the most shocking statement
the one that Jesus says on the cross my God my
God Why have you forsaken me? Perhaps it doesn't
carry the shockiness The force of it because
we're used to that but consider that the father
really did have to turn his back upon the son
In order that we would have salvation. And so
yes, there are shocking statements within scripture,
but there is reason for these things So let's
understand the context of this statement for
Solomon Solomon doesn't say that he hates life
for likes on Facebook He doesn't say this to
get for click bait or to sell newspapers or something.
No, there's real reason behind these words. So
what does he hate? Zach Eswine says he means
that it is right and good to cultivate a distaste
for the misery, the sin, the death, and the evil
and the havoc of this life. It's very much like
what Psalm 97 10 says, oh you who love the Lord,
hate evil. And so friends, we need to understand
this, that the wise person loves God. The wise
person loves his neighbor as himself. The wise
person hates sin, but the fool hates people,
hates God and loves sin. And so let me ask you
friends, what do you love and what do you hate?
You remember Jesus has two great commands, to
love God with everything you've got and to love
your neighbor as yourself. You can only love
God though, and you can truly only love your
neighbor because God has loved you first in Christ
Jesus. And knowing that, knowing the love of
God and how you cannot be separated from the
love of God because of Christ Jesus, that's what
gets us through the heaval of this life. That's
what gets us through the miseries of this life.
That's what gets us through the loss of a loved
one. That our hearts are regenerated, we are
made new. And so we look at death differently,
don't we? The believer in Jesus Christ looks
at death differently. We take an eternal view.
We look beyond the miseries of this life to see
exactly what Jesus Christ is doing for us right
now. And he says, I go to make a place for you.
A place where there's no more death. But I know
what some may say, well, all that sounds really
good, but what about the here and the now? I
live right now in this fleeting world where there's
all of this sin. How am I to live? And so Solomon
tries something else here. Look in verses 18
and onward. He looks at the vanity of toil. And
he continues with a difficult statement, just
like he says that he hated life, now what does
he say? I hated all my toil in which I toil under
the sun. Now, we should note what's really being
said here. Sometimes we associate toil with work,
and I think that's fine to do, and I will call
toil work. But we're not just talking about our
nine to five job here. We're talking, when we
talk about toil, everything that we do under
the sun, be it our job, be it the raising of
our kids, be it our hobbies, whatever it may
do, all of the things that we do under the sun.
But because of sin, the things that we do under
the sun have been cursed. You should see this,
that work is not a result of the fall. Cursed
work is. Work is not a result of the fall. Cursed
work is. We know what happened in the garden.
Adonis, they ate the fruit, they weren't supposed
to, and God cursed their labor, right? Friends,
you may love your work. You may love what you
do, but it's not frustration -free work, is it?
No, if it is, please let me know how to do it.
And so the problem isn't punching the time clock.
It's that we serve and we work and we exhaust
ourselves to do the best with all that God has
given to do. And then Solomon says, but what
then? I do all of this and then what's the gain?
Look at the second half of verse 18. Seeing that
I must leave it to the man who will come after
me. Where's the gain in that? Death doesn't care
about your resume. Death does not care about
your resume. Eventually, unless the Lord comes
in our lifetime, we will all die. And the wise
person takes that to heart. So I was trying to
think about how to illustrate this. How to illustrate
this point that Solomon is making where we labor
and labor and labor and then it's just left to
somebody else. I was thinking about baseball.
It's spring outside. Right? Baseball's about
to start up. Think of it like this. A manager
of a baseball team. The season lasts forever.
162 games. What happens if the manager dies right
before the playoffs? He's led his team for 162
games. And that's just left over some other coach.
Someone else who will manage the team. And who
knows whether that coach will be a good coach
or a bad coach. That's what Solomon is saying
here. that all of our days will come to an end.
And if we have tried to place our ultimate satisfaction
in our work and the here and the now, we will
be left very, very disappointed because it ultimately
does not satisfy. Solomon knows his reign will
come to an end. Look at verses 22 and 23. 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 is toiled with
wisdom and knowledge and skill must leave everything
to be enjoyed by someone who did not toil for
it. And so all of this striving, all of this
working, trying to find satisfaction in our work,
what is the result? What does it ultimately give
us? It gives us what he says in verse 23. For
all his days are full of sorrow and his work
is a vexation. He cannot even sleep. Friends,
when you lie down your heads at night on the
pillow, does your mind race sometimes? Do you
have a hard time shutting off your brain? What's
the reward for all of the anxiety and the worry
that we have? The reward for this is just more
worry, right? Jesus speaks on this in Luke chapter
12. You may be familiar with this passage, a
parable of the rich fool, that there was once
a landowner whose land produced crops just plentifully,
and he outgrows all of the storage that he has.
And so he says, what am I going to do about this?
And so he says, I know. I'll build bigger barns
and I'll put all my stuff in the bigger barns
and I will just enjoy it for the rest of my life.
And then what does Jesus say within the parable?
God speaks and he says, fool, this night your
soul is required of you and the things you have
prepared, whose will they be? So is the one who
lays up treasure for himself and is not rich
towards God. Friends, we must be rich towards
God. We must work, but we must understand the
limits of our work. We must have the proper perspective
of our work. So much toil and so much striving
apart from the Lord only brings frustration.
It brings restlessness. But what does Jesus say
in Matthew chapter 11? Come to me, all who labor
and are heavy laden. We labor, but we do so in
the Lord, knowing the limits of our labor. But
with Jesus, we get what we really need. We get
true rest for our souls. Friends, I hope in your
labor, in your work, whatever it is God has given
you to do, I hope that you are so very successful.
And I hope that you do all to the glory of God,
but you must keep it in perspective. And that's
a tough thing to do in this country. In a country
where we've got the American dream, right? The
American dream is only a dream if you think that
you can have satisfaction apart from God. It
will not work. Take it from Solomon, who was
so very successful and yet at the end he realizes
all of his work, all of his life is punctuated
by the same event that punctuates all of our
lives, that of death. You remember how as I began,
I was talking about how we try and know what's
really going on with a person. We try and figure
out what's eating at them. The thing that we
sometimes do when people try and pry it out of
us is we just say, fine, I'm fine. Solomon here,
though, is not fine with it. He realizes the
problem is death. And he wants to know, how do
I live in light of death? Well, friends, I could
give you application that says, be wiser. Be
more knowledgeable. Don't be ignorant. I could
give you application. that says pray for wisdom,
read your Bibles, certainly do those things,
definitely do those things. And I could tell
you for your application to do all of your work
to the glory of God, be thankful for your work,
serve one another, and do those things. But the
real application of a text like this is not what
you do, but it's what you believe. I mentioned
Romans 6, 23. Let me give you the second half
of that verse. The free gift of God is eternal
life in Christ Jesus our Lord. Friends, the solution
to the problem of death, the vanity of life,
is salvation in Christ alone. Jesus went through
the death. He went through the hevel to grant
eternal life to anyone who would believe in Him
as the Savior of the world and of the Son of
God. Jesus doesn't take away death completely.
No, not yet. But he does take away eternal death.
You remember what Paul says, how Jesus removes
the sting of death. What Jesus offers is the
opposite of Hevel. He destroys Hevel. John Owen,
who is a fantastic Puritan writer, has a book.
And I'm not going to quote from the book. I'm
just going to tell you the title because the
title alone sums up what I'm trying to tell you.
The title of the book is The Death of Death and
the Death of Christ. The point is that Jesus
kills death and he destroys the one who has the
power over it. And this is communicated, and
I'll begin wrapping up now. This is communicated
in 2 Timothy chapter 1. verses 8 through 10.
Therefore, do not be ashamed of the testimony
about our Lord, nor of me, his prisoner, but
share in suffering for the gospel by the power
of God who saved us and called us to a holy calling,
not because of our works, but because of his
own purpose and grace. which he gave us in Christ
Jesus before the ages began and which now has
manifested through the appearing of our savior,
Jesus Christ, who abolished death and brought
life and immortality to light through the gospel.
Jesus comes to do away with death and what he
grants to you is eternal life. And so, friend,
the application Believe in Jesus. Believe that
Jesus was born to save us from our sins. Believe
that Jesus went to the cross for you. Believe
that Jesus really died, really was buried, really
rose, really ascended, and that Jesus really
is coming again. Why? To take us to himself and
to grant us eternal life with him forever. Let
us pray.