Bible Survey - Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon

So you have two handouts here. We're going to try to whiz through two books because one is not too much to go through, but two is definitely not a challenge, right? The more we add, the easier it is. Is that how that goes when you cover books of the Bible in one fell swoop?

You're going to see we have Ecclesiastes and Song of Solomon. Despite their order in scripture being Ecclesiastes and then the Song of Solomon, I actually want to go through them opposite so you can actually look at your handouts and Opposite order there. We're going to start with Song of Solomon in part because it is the shorter book, but also because by chronology it would appear that that was written first. And so, because it seemed like a thing I could do because you could order your pages differently, I would do that. The Song of Solomon is actually named after the first few words in the book's text. So the first several words are the Song of Songs, which is Solomon's. Sometimes we hear it called Song of Songs, sometimes we hear Song of Solomon. The Song of Solomon, in rabbinical tradition, they would actually not let the priests read it until they were 30 or older, back in the time of the Old Testament.

It's sexual content, and I will try to keep this as G-rated as possible, given that I have some young ears in the room. It's sexual content. They were concerned it might actually inflame the lustful passions of the priests, which of course you don't need to have that kind of problem going on in the priesthood.

So, they would wait until you were 30 years old, which, now see, in our time, 30 years old, that's when a lot of people would say, oh, that's your full stride of adulthood, you're in your 30s. But historically, by the time you were 30, you were actually probably hitting old age at that point in time. So for us, we're like, 30? That's nothing. I'm 37 this year. That'd make me an old man, right? Well, I just remember Dad going to Uganda, and they hadn't seen someone in such amazing health at his age when he was there.

So they wanted to check him out and make sure he was real. 30 years old, that was a precaution. There was actually quite a bit of debate as I was studying this. There was debate between different schools about whether or not it should even be included in the canon, because it was so edgy. But, obviously the Holy Spirit did something, and it's part of the canon.

People have used the book allegorically, or interpreted it allegorically. Everybody is familiar with the term allegorical. Can anybody define allegorical? Allegory means to take something non-literally and to look for relationships between things that parallel and then try to draw those parallels out in teaching. So, allegorically, I'm trying to think of a quick and easy allegory.

It's essentially like the top stables. You're not intended to look at tortoise and the hare actually having a race. Yeah, it's not a literal thing. It's figurative. It's stated so that you end up having a lesson or a truth brought out that's not from the literal understanding. Yeah.

And the way that they would use it as an allegory as it described their relationship, relationship between the church and Christ or God and Israel. But it is a work of poetry that has very little context about a relationship between a man and a woman. And so we're going to take it at face value as a poem between a man and a woman. Additionally, it's not in the notes here, but one of the things that I came across is it was not uncommon, and we actually have records of Egyptian marriages having these poems between the man and the wife in the ceremony had very similar language patterns in them.

Since Solomon, as we talked last week, actually had at least one marriage into Egypt for political reasons, it wouldn't be a huge surprise that he would have exposure to that concept. He had a thousand wives and concubines. I'm not sure how some of the context of the Song of Solomon fits in there because he seems to have this description of this one singular love that is part of the poetry that doesn't reflect 999 other ladies. So, that's that. The book is relatively short compared to a lot of the other Old Testament books that we've been through so far.

So, it has a stanza in chapter one that is the Song of the Bride, a stanza It is also part of chapter one that is a response from Solomon. And then all of chapter two is an admiration of the bride. And then there's a bad dream sequence, which I think is kind of strange. But in the bad dream sequence, the bride can't find Solomon and she's really upset. And so that's in there. But then there is... Everything's okay. It's just a bad dream.

Then there's the wedding day and Solomon's proclamation of love for the bride. Then in chapter 5 there's this absence makes the heart grow fonder concept that oh, there's separation and oh how I long for the arms of my spouse. And then more admiration by the bride. because there's a lot of that in here. There's a delight in one another and then an admiration by the groom and then it closes with the unity of love between the two of them.

I decided to just go for two stanzas that I think are reflective of the kind of poetry that are in the book as our highlights because that kind of seemed a good way to kind of introduce some of the language that was used. It's also kind of funny. There's good comedy sometimes in cultural differences and there's no shortage of that in these two passages. But it's going to cover health and attractiveness and youth, which I think are good indicators of the cultural understanding of relationship at the time. So we'll do that. I'm going to go ahead and read these out loud so they're nice and strong on the recording. But we'll go over them just kind of briefly. And if you have questions, you can ask. But I'll be honest with you.

I'm glad I never wrote to my wife this way so anyways chapter 4 verses 1 through 7 this is the bride I'm sorry Solomon speaking to the bride how beautiful you are my darling how beautiful you are your eyes are like doves behind your veil your hair is like a flock of goats that have descended from Mount Gilead your teeth are like a flock of newly shorn ewes which have come up from their washing, all of which bear twins, and not one among them has lost her young.

Your lips are like a scarlet thread, and your mouth is lovely. Your temples are like a slice of a pomegranate behind your veil. Your neck is like the Tower of David, built with rows of stones, on which are hung a thousand shields, all the round shields of the mighty men. Your two breasts are like two fawns, twins of a gazelle, which feed among the lilies. Until the cool of the day, when the shadows flee away, I will go my way to the mountain of myrrh and the hill of frankincense.

You are altogether beautiful, my darling, and there is no blemish in you." So he starts off with this idea of beauty and ends with the idea of beauty in the stanzas that are there. Now when you say your eyes are like doves, doves are cute delicate birds, right? So everybody feels okay about that.

It doesn't sound too absurd. But your hair is like a flock of goats. That one is maybe less... We think of goats as kind of filthy animals, right? But they were prized possessions, if you think about this at the time. That's not an altogether pleasing picture, but at least if you understand culturally that there's some value there, then okay. Again, I would never use that with my wife, right?

Your teeth are like a flock of newly shorn ewes. Now, what does a newly shorn ewe look like? clean and white. I don't have any goats or sheep in our house, but we have a white miniature poodle named Hercules, and when we shave him, he's clean and white for the two hours before we let him outside.

The freshness of there is pretty significant. How many of you know when the toothbrush was introduced into modern use as we know it? was developed by an inmate about 150 years ago. At least that's the most recent record we have of that. So we take for granted that we brush our teeth and we go to the dentist, but historically this would have been pretty significant that your teeth are white.

You haven't gotten old enough for them to get gray or brown or crusty or falling out or whatever it is that's going on there. All of which bear twins. You've got both sides. You're not missing a few teeth. We laugh at that, but if you think about that culturally, that's actually pretty significant. You actually have a mouth that isn't... We don't spend the whole time doing this so that we don't see from the nose up, right?

Then, your lips are like a scarlet thread and your mouth is lovely. Your temples are like a slice of pomegranate behind your veil. So, obviously she's made up and she's beautiful. Your neck is like the Tower of David built with rows of stones on which are hung a thousand shields. So, nice, long, delicate neck.

Still, stone towers sound like harsh and hearty and different ideas. Apparently that's a good thing. I'm not going to use that. And we have ours today. They're just very different. Here's one that's gotten even lost. Something we've repeated and repeated. We used to say it was like a broken record. A lot of kids these days, what's a record? Well, they're coming back. They're making a comeback. CD sales are dying down, record sales are going up, and MP3 sales are the majority of the sales. Al?

The basic question, why did they feel that Song of Solomon, they meaning those who looked at all the various literature around and decided what was to be included in the canon, I can understand Esther because of the context. in the Jewish history. Perhaps you have been appointed to be at this time and this place to do this for your people.

I can understand it in context, as long as Solomon, to me, has no contextual place. It's just sort of stuck in there. And then they make all this prohibition about reading it and they're asking. It is distinct. It seems to me that it's not included in canon and I was just wondering if you run across any explanation and I was just curious whether you have.

It's well from what I because I read up about it a little bit what I what I did see was that because we have the writing of Solomon and we see a series of development of writing from a very specifically revered character in history who was given God's wisdom and So this fit into that I don't have it on this on this It's on the Ecclesiastes thing, but I'll steal from that part of it to say that the rabbinical tradition is that Solomon wrote the Song of Solomon when he was young, Proverbs when he was middle-aged, and Ecclesiastes when he was older.

And it shows a progression of his perspective on life. So at least historically you see here's this significant character who is developing in his priorities. At my stage of life, I should either be romantic or wise. I should be turned into a philosopher. Yeah, that's the way that it develops, and we're going to look at that next, so for sure, the philosophy.

The next stanza is the one I was most nervous about reading in front of young children, but we're going to do it anyways. Your two breasts are like two fawns, twins of a gazelle, which feed among the lilies. So these are apparently well-formed breasts that the fawns have not been starved. So we'll go with that and be euphemistic and move on.

Until the cool of the day, when the shadows flee away, I will go my way to the mountain of myrrh and to the hill of frankincense. Okay, here's an interesting thing. What are myrrh and frankincense? They're spices, perfumes, okay? So, given that hygiene was a little different at the time, This is basically talking about he's going to pursue her and the lovely perfumes and the spices that she's surrounding herself with. But that would help cover BO.

Let's just be honest. That's a thing. Solomon wasn't into being a hippie, I guess. So, there you have it. And then, you are altogether beautiful, my darling, and there's no blemish in you. Obviously, she was still a human being, so she might have had a few flaws, but he doesn't see it.

He's just enamored. Now, the opposite side, we look at this, and we'll see from chapter 5, verses 10 through 16, My beloved is dazzling and ruddy, outstanding among ten thousand His head is like gold, pure gold. His locks are like clusters of dates and black as a raven. His eyes are like doves beside streams of water, bathed in milk and reposed in their setting. His cheeks are like a bed of balsam, banks of sweet-scented herbs.

His lips are lilies dripping with liquid myrrh. His hands are rods of gold set with beryl. His abdomen is carved ivory inlaid with sapphires. His legs are pillars of alabaster set on pedestals of pure gold. His appearance is like Lebanon, choice as the cedars. His mouth is full of sweetness and he is wholly desirable.

This is my beloved and this is my friend, O daughters of Jerusalem." That was a lot more G-rated, so that was good, right? Here we have Solomon being described by the Shulamite woman who is the bride in this story. And Solomon is a stud, or he's a Hollywood actor kind of a guy based on the way this is describing.

He's definitely attractive in his physical form based on the way this is describing. His hair is like clusters of dates. I would take clusters of dates over goats any time. If you're going to describe hair, Clusters of Day is better in my book. His eyes are like doves.

Again, that was similar to before. And besides streams of water, bathed in milk and reposed in their settings. Apparently, he's got beautiful eyes that are also very well taken care of in their environmental concerns or there hasn't been any hazmat spills or anything. So, that's good.

His cheeks are like a bed of balsam, banks of sweet-scented herbs. His lips are lilies dripped with liquid myrrh." So even he's got, we're going to say he's got cologne on because we're optimistic, right? But he's got these scents and smells that are part of that. Of course, he's the king, right? So he's going to have more likely access to that sort of stuff than other people.

His hands are rods of gold set with beryl. His abdomen is carved of ivory and laid with sapphires. I guess they didn't have the term six-pack then, right? So he's got this awesome abs. His legs are pillars of alabaster set on pedestals of pure gold. His appearance is like the choice cedars. Okay, so he's got really strong legs.

Now for us, okay, I guess maybe That's not how we tend to describe people in songs today, but that's probably good. But the choice cedars from Lebanon, anybody have any other biblical insight about the cedars from Lebanon? things we've read from other places.

That was good natural resources and they were very valuable and expensive. You're importing the wood, so that's a big deal. We recently bought some flooring and we looked at wood that was imported and it costs a lot of money. So our flooring will not be imported. Well, maybe it is, but it's probably imported from China rather than somewhere else.

His mouth is full of sweetness, and he is wholly desirable. This is my beloved, and this is my friend, O daughters of Jerusalem." So she doesn't mention his teeth, but he also doesn't have bad breath, so kudos on that one. I'm not sure if he's using Colgate or AIM or whatever his toothbrush, you know, toothpaste brand is, but he's doing alright. But this is my beloved, and this is my friend, O daughters of Jerusalem.

And throughout the book there are brief mentions of what from Greek poetry would be the choir. And so the O Daughters of Jerusalem is mentioned several times. So that's all I wanted to go over to keep things kind of G-rated for this morning. For Song of Solomon, Al asked a good question about why is it canonized. And the answer is, as best as we know, because the Holy Spirit decided He wanted to include it.

But it doesn't... there's zero references to God. It is genuinely just a love poem between a man and a woman and apparently an audience that gets called out to the daughters of Jerusalem several times. But that's it. So there's a very brief overview of Song of Solomon. It is interesting reading to see the way that that poetry is written, but it is definitely not like modern love poetry.

Alright, well, since no one has any questions, at least that they're willing to ask in front of a group about that content, let's keep going. So now let's take a look at... that was the youth of Solomon. Last week we actually looked at Proverbs. Now we're going to look at Ecclesiastes, the Old Testament philosophy book. I loved the book of Ecclesiastes when I was younger. It just really set with my 90s angst that I had listening to Nirvana and other pop rock bands that were never satisfied with life. So Ecclesiastes fit right in there. No one liked my Nirvana reference. No 90s rock for anybody? No? Just my brother? No? You didn't listen? I'm alone in this room with that reference.

Ecclesiastes is a very philosophical book. If the book of Proverbs was about wisdom, Ecclesiastes is about life without a heavenly focus being empty. Or that life with God as our focus having meaning. Both sides of that cone are explored. So he's going to talk about a number of things. Now, Ecclesiastes doesn't actually say that Solomon is the author. but all of the descriptions of the author point to Solomon, and rabbinical tradition is that it's from Solomon.

In verse 1, I'm sorry, chapter 112, and I'll read that out loud. In 112, this is where all the skeptics get all of their angst about where it came. So I turn to consider wisdom, whoops, that's 212. Nope, that is 112. Sorry, so I turn to consider wisdom, madness, and folly. For what will the man do who will come after the king except what has already been done? And so there's this idea of, that is 212, I'm sorry, 112.

I, the preacher, have been king over Israel and Jerusalem. And there's a past tense nuance to that, and so people say, well, past tense, it can't be Solomon, because Solomon was never deposed or unseated. but the past tense nature of it doesn't say he's not, he's just, I have been king, so it's okay. It's not like there's this really big gaping hole in the logic of the idea that Solomon was the king. Now, 112 does say, the preacher, and actually multiple times throughout the book, about eight times throughout the book, the preacher or the teacher gets used over and over again as being the position of the author.

We'll take a quick gander at the outline here. The book starts by talking about all is vanity. Solomon outlines the vanity of wisdom, the vanity of hedonism, and the vanity of intellectualism. Here's the guy that the Bible describes as having the most wisdom in all the world. And Solomon says it's vain. It's vanity. The vanity of hedonism. Solomon followed his passions. If you've got a thousand wives and concubines, it's a little hard to say that maybe he didn't. He definitely proved out when you hit the number a thousand. That's a milestone, right? So he pursued hedonism.

Vanity of intellectualism. And so he talks about pursuing more knowledge and more things and how that came up short. Now, what's vanity? Does everybody feel comfortable with the term vanity? I'm saying it, but I want to make sure these youth over here... Do you know what vanity means? It means it has no value. It comes up short. Or it makes you feel good about yourself, but it has no value. Everybody feel good about that? Understand what I'm saying now? Al?

It can often be associated with pride. Knowledge puffs up. If all you have is a bunch of information, you think you know more than anybody else, or you know everything, it's worthwhile. Yeah. Vanity has that kind of context to it. You are able to scoff at everybody else because you have a superior position, and you understand, and you know. But it makes for good television. But yeah, there's arrogance often associated with that.

So the next section, further explores not just those those three mentions but the vanity of physical labor and a point there and and we get enough there's a famous song that you may have heard there is a season turn turn turn that's right out of Song of Solomon I'm sorry Ecclesiastes so in a time point for everything chapter three verses one through ten and uh... Then the second half is in the appointed time-space continuum. There's only value in activity if God gives them value. And I think that's really important. We'll take a look at that in more detail later on.

The third section here, wickedness of oppression. So Solomon, despite having said that all of this other stuff is vanity or has no lasting value, he sees that the wickedness of oppression is a real serious problem. Now if you're the king, That's a pretty big deal. You're the king. Your job is to help kind of lead and guide the nation to hopefully a morally upright position as a people and to develop the values and the resources that the nation has. But when you see oppression, you've got to deal with that. You've got to get people with their morality who have become immoral taken care of. So Solomon deals with that.

Chapter 5 verses 1-9 he talks about the importance of relationship with God. It's the only thing that really has lasting value. 5.10-6.12 talks about the vanity of wealth. I know a handful of pretty wealthy people and as it turns out I've watched their lives with great interest because there are some people who are wealthy and they're just good stewards of it and it's fine and there are some people who spend it like money is water and their lives are hectic and chaotic and you kind of shake your head as you watch them and then he keeps going on there past the wealth, the wisdom and folly those two being compared.

Wisdom of obeying rulers. Then the wisdom or the idea that all are in God's hands. Work hard with wisdom. Not just work hard, but applying wisdom and things that you know. Warning to those who may be foolish. Now in Proverbs we saw a lot about fools, didn't we? And stupid people, right? The translators use the S word, the stupid word. And then he says to prepare for calamity because tough times may be coming down the road. That's not an entirely bad concept even today.

Remember God in the days of your youth is his closing statement and he closes with that and we're actually going to take a look at that this morning as well as one of the highlights. But let's step through some of the verses in sequence here. 114 I've seen all the works which have been done under the sun and behold all is vanity and striving after wind that is like on the surface one of the more depressing statements that you could make you know a lot of people if you if you come to church just so you can be built up and feel really good when you leave this is not the Sunday school class for you but all the work which has been done under the sun and he's seen it now That's a bit of an exaggeration because obviously we know that Solomon didn't get to be in all places at all times like God did, or like God is. But he says, all is vanity and striving after wind.

That's a pretty big deal. How do we deal with that? This is a pretty negative statement for the Bible, isn't it? How do we reconcile what he's talking about here? Stan? It's saying that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. Chapter 3 Romans, Psalm 14 talks about that everything that man has on this earth without God is basically vanity. Not different than this.

Yeah. So, in the world of philosophy, in our modern vernacular, there's a term called existentialism. And it's a really nice big word, and I don't expect everybody to be bandying that about all the time. But existentialism is this idea that existence is the meaning of life, and existence is the most important thing. And so, Solomon talks about trying to find value in existence through much of this book. And here we can see that this existentialism has not really given him much to hold on to. It's vain. So we can see at the time of this writing that at least humanistic existentialism, or the idea of looking at ourselves in light of ourselves, and we are fully the sum of all that is to evaluate what is good, we come up short. But Solomon doesn't stop there, so we're okay.

There's hope. It's coming. 224 through 225, there's nothing better for a man than to eat and drink and tell himself that his labor is good. This also I have seen, that is from the hand of God. For who can eat and who can have enjoyment without him? And that's really the answer to the first one. I don't think this is a reference to the Food Network and foodies and that whole movement that's prominent today. But there's nothing better for a man than to eat and drink and tell himself that his labor is good.

If you think about it, he doesn't say clothing and shelter, but the idea is you've got food, your needs are taken care of, and you enjoy your job. Which is good, because if you're working for, let's say, a third of your life, or whatever the hours are that you spend, eight hours or more a day, working, that's a pretty significant amount of time. It'd be nice if you enjoyed it, right? Having had jobs I didn't enjoy, I can appreciate the idea of enjoying the labor that I'm pouring into things. But really his concern is that we start to understand that God is the one that brings about the value in those things.

In my own life, I remember When at my prior job, my boss took us out to this fine dining establishment, and I'm pretty much a t-shirt and jeans guy, so like every day of the week, including even Sundays, I'm pushing it with just my polo shirt and t-shirt, or blue jeans, right? But I don't dress up for work unless it's an interview. So I'm at work, t-shirt and jeans, and my boss takes us to this fine dining restaurant, and I'm just panicking. I've been an employee for less than a month, and I'm at this really high-end restaurant, and the waitstaff loves us.

And I didn't understand why, and when the bill got brought, I understood why, because they were very expensive bottles of wine and all this other stuff that was there. But I'd never enjoyed food at that caliber before. This was a level of food, and it was amazing. It was really cool. I thought, wow, this is way better than the buffet at the Carson City Nugget. But it was good, and it was there, and I enjoyed my job, and it was a really wonderful time. But can we say that is going to be all of life? Do we like all of our jobs? Do we like all of the food that we have the opportunity to eat?

But Solomon brings it back around to God God is the one that brings the value into those things God is the one that provided those things and Created our senses that we could enjoy them So moving further down 7 16 through 17 do not be excessively righteous and do not be overly wise Why should you ruin yourself? Do not be excessively wicked, and do not be a fool. Why should you die before your time?"

Now, this one stuck out in my mind. It's just kind of an interesting Bible verse, because here we're in the Old Testament. They're under the law. We're in the nation of Israel, and this is the king with the most wisdom of any man on the earth at the time, according to Scripture.

And he says, do not be excessively righteous and do not be overly wise. Why should you ruin yourself? And that really, I just think, is an incredibly remarkable concept. What happens if you obsess over becoming more righteous? Maybe you have a life experience with this. Maybe you've watched it in others. What happens? Stan? Well, the Pharisees definitely tried to do that. But have you ever known anyone, or even in your own life, maybe this is in your own experience, where they try to become more and more righteous? What happens?

Yeah, they focus on themselves. That's definitely a key point. Yes, depressed or prideful. Very, very succinct. Al? Paul writes about it very well in Romans 7. The more he thought about not being covetous, the more his mind got occupied with covetousness. The more you chase after purity, the more you get frustrated by the lack of it, either in yourself or in others.

And it's also legalism. Oh yeah, it's definitely legalism. That's the whole essence of legalism, because you can never be good enough, so you have to keep focusing on all the things you have to improve on. And you never get there. Ultimately, the only way to pursue righteousness is to pursue the Lord. Yeah. God needs to be our righteousness.

Benjamin Franklin, definitely not a theologian in my book. Benjamin Franklin actually wrote an article, he found 17 virtues, I think 17 too, 13 or 17. I want to go with 17, but it's an illustration, so we'll ignore how wrong that is. But I read an article in high school, it's just been apparently too long for me to remember a number, where he wrote about this list of virtues that he wanted to pursue, and he figured if he could deal with getting one virtue down per month in a year and a half's time, he could be perfect. He thought, nobody's applied this great wisdom I have. pursue righteousness. But the whole length of the article, he goes into how crazy that was, and what a mistake it was, because he could never actually perfect each one of the virtues. So that's interesting.

So on one side we have legalism, basically, and on the other side we have liberalism, and do not be excessively wicked and do not be a fool. Why should you die before your time? And by liberalism, I'm not talking about politics. But if you have restraint on one hand, and just going headlong on the other hand, he says, one way you'll go nuts, and one way you'll die.

It's too much. You're going to pursue wickedness and foolishness. So that's definitely, and he's not talking about moderation between those, so that we would have a balance. He's heard some of this garbagey karma stuff that you hear people with modern day philosophy, where you're like, whoa, you need to sow your wild oats, but then practice random acts of kindness. That kind of stuff, where it's just stupid. That's not what Solomon's talking about here.

But, as my dad pointed out, focus on the Lord. That's really the important thing. Stan? I was just going to say, I think it's also a comparison. He's looking back on his life. He's not real happy with what is there. And in comparison to Paul saying that he's finished the race, he's fought a good fight, and he's ready to go. I mean, he's done in his life what he was supposed to do, and he's run the race. I think Solomon's looking back and saying, well, God told me I was supposed to do all these things when I started off.

I kind of come up short. So now he's really kind of sad about the whole thing. And so he sums it up as all being vanity. Because he didn't do what God wanted him to do, I guess. At least he saw it that way. He lost the kingdom for future generations and rulership that came from there.

But reading through Ecclesiastes, I recommend it. It's not too long of a book, so it doesn't take a massive amount of reading. But as you go through it, it's sobering. But he ends with, and repeats throughout the book, this concept that God brings value into life. It's through relationship with God. So we have that there, and then 12, 13 through 14, the conclusion of of that there when all has been heard is fear God and keep his commandments because this applies to every person for God will bring every act of judgment I'm sorry act to judgment everything which is hidden whether it is good or evil and so Solomon wraps up this really intense book with some practical thoughts obviously fearing God is important When we fear God, we understand everything is in light of who He is as the righteous God, the loving God, the caring God. Yeah. for the students in the audience here this morning. Verse 12 is the student's verse. Although they read the books, there is no end. And much studying is working to bring them to the flesh. So cheer up. Even Solomon got tired of learning.

But having fear of God, understanding our place in the universe, as one of my seminary professors was very fond of saying, there's a God and you're not him. As funny as it is, it's also part of our world view. It's part of our understanding of how we look at life and how we look at one another. But it's really important that we understand who God is in that context.

And then he says, keep his commandments. Now for us as believers today, we would say that in Holly Hills, you're not under the law, but you are to abide and walk in fellowship with the Lord. And that's obviously a more important factor for us to walk away from this rather than somehow we're under the law again. That's not what we want to take away from that. So the New Testament principle overrides there.

But he says, because this applies to every person. So at the beginning of the book, Everything is vanity applies to every person. But at the end of the book, having a fear of the Lord and obeying Him applies to every person. If you were super wealthy like Solomon, you needed to take that into consideration. And if you were incredibly poor within Solomon's kingdom, you needed to take that into consideration. If you were a Gentile, you could still be grafted into Israel. and obey the commands, and love the Lord, and be fearful of God.

And so it applies to every person. For God will bring every act to judgment. Now for the Jew in the Old Testament, that is a weightier sentence in their mind. But we still understand how many of the Jews' sins were paid for by Christ? 50%? Are we taking bets? Votes? All of it. All of it was paid for.

So even the sins that he talks about, every act of judgment, it's in God's eyes. He still sees them in that context, but they're paid for by Christ, the sins are. Everything which is hidden, whether it is good or evil, whatever you're doing in the privacy of your life, still is before God. Now, I didn't do Christ in the Song of Solomon.

I hope that's for obvious reasons. But there was one really strong principle in Ecclesiastes. Christ brings meaning. He brings meaning to life. Without Christ we will find it easy to wander looking for meaning in life. I know a guy who's recently walked away from Christianity and that is his new default position is that everything is meaningless and It breaks my heart, and I'm hoping to have an opportunity to engage him, and hopefully maybe he'll come back to the Lord, or come back to walking with the Lord. But meaningless is a bad place to live every day. That's depressing. I mean, quite literally. That is a major piece of depression.

So, Christ brings purpose. And that's definitely something that comes out in Ecclesiastes, although he doesn't mention Christ, he mentions God. But we definitely see that Christ does that as we look at the New Testament. Christ sustains the universe.

Any other thoughts or questions? I'm actually done early. Brian's going to go ring the buzzer. I think this is a record for me. I think one of the things about Ecclesiastes, sometimes people will take a look at it, and they'll see these depressing kinds of statements.

But if you look at the book as a process, in other words, I've been here and here and here and seen this and tried that and here's a guy who can afford all kinds of different things and he says, I've tried them all. In the end, here's what you need to pay attention to. And so it's a book of process, here's where I've tried all this stuff. Here's where you really need to head. You need to see it as that. And that's the perspective that it's bringing. It's not just kind of zooming in on certain chapters or something like that. Trying to make that have huge significance.

The end of Ecclesiastes he talks about He uses some poetic language to describe the decay of his body. And I think that's one of those interesting things where I remember when I was a teenager, my dad said to me, oh, you think you're young and invincible? And I thought, no, I know I could die. I knew mortality was really a thing, but I didn't realize. exactly what he meant by that, just because he had built football injuries from when he was in high school and your first day of college football, which was also your last day of college football. And the way that the body decays now, it's much more real.

Now, oh, oh, that's how that works. But he talks about how you reach the end of things. One of the other things he mentions is when he talks about material possessions, he goes, I've worked for this kingdom, and I'm going to leave it behind to someone else. So if I build it all the way up to some pinnacle, I'll still die, and it'll be left behind. to someone else.

So, Ecclesiastes is a very intense book, a very philosophical book, but The key point to walk away from is that in the process of what Solomon saw, he saw that God brought the value to it and brought meaning into things. Just like Solomon is a back and forth dialogue between the several participants, so Solomon is almost a dialogue within himself. The difference between the world view and the secular view. what will become a Christian view, one that takes God into account and recognizes He's sovereign, He's in control, He has purpose in the plan. It's not just a chaotic... You're a victim of the universe. Yeah. The book of Ecclesiastes is also a book on parenting.

Because there's knowledge and there's activity and there's this and there's that. And those are all the things that the world offers. The world offers all those different things. Solomon says, I've explored it all again. This is what matters. And for parents to get that message across to their kids is huge.

Because In the end the focus is on the Lord and that's what's going to matter when it's all said and done. All the different things that this world offers to kids growing up, all the things it offers to young adults, He says here's the lesson in this.

I think also what Paul said that life is but a paper and it's so short and if you really look at the people who don't have faith of any kind and they put all of their energies and all their focus into this life I mean, it is meaningless. And when they come to the final days, if they have time to actually look back, a lot of people, you know, you die in a car accident or something, so you don't have the time to reflect.

Those people who reflect, I mean, it's only here and now. What a short period in all of eternity. I don't even know how to put that into words. I think Paul did his best by saying that his life is but a vapor. It's so short. Why worry to be concerned about this very short period of time in all of eternity?

In ninth grade I had a history teacher who was not a believer and that was really a wrestling for me because he was sometimes a little antagonistic towards Christianity. But he had a double wide chalkboard set up in the classroom and he took his chalk and he ran it all the way across. the two boards and then took his thumbnail and he scratched out a little line and he said that's your lifespan and this line goes all the way that way forever and all the way that way forever and it was like well I feel small now But yeah, the brevity of life is definitely one of those things that is important in our understanding.

The thing that he said after that, though, that I've always kind of thought was important is that you can actually impact what happens after you. So make sure that whatever you're doing, as a believer in particular, that, okay, if I'm a believer, that I'm leaving behind a legacy of God's Word being understood and grown and God's truth being being held, because that could have an impact moving forward, if the rapture doesn't happen and the Lord takes us home, which will have its own other impacts.

Alright, now as the second bell, we should close in prayer. Heavenly Father, thank you so much for the truth of your word. Thank you that while existentialism can be depressing, we know that we have an eternal perspective that has value and meaning. Lord, we thank you for the relationships we are in. For those of us who are married, we pray that those would be godly, biblical love type of marriages. And Lord, we pray for those who may yet get married, that their marriages would be ones that are focused on you and have godly love. We thank you and we praise you in Jesus' name. Amen.