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Ecclesiastes 2:4-8 · Providence Baptist Church - Sermons

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We've been studying now for a bit of time the book of Ecclesiastes and looking at the words of the preacher.
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I'm going to say this to you every week just because I think it matters.
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Most scholars believe that the book of Ecclesiastes was written by Solomon, and I tend to agree.
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I think it's most likely that that's who this writer is, but we don't know that for a fact because he just doesn't say in the book, to be sure.
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There's not enough detail to sort that all out.
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And so he calls himself the preacher, and therefore, that's what I'm going to call him.
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We have, as we've looked in Ecclesiastes and the first part of it, we have seen that he starts a sermon and he begins it,
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Vanity of vanities, vanity of vanities, all is vanity.
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What does man gain by all the toil at which he toils under the sun?
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And then in the rest of it, he gives us kind of the body of his sermon as his personal experience,
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his biography and his search to find gain.
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As a man, presumably Solomon, had all of the resources at his fingertips that he possibly needed to do this.
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And he starts out his story in chapter 2 with a number of self-indulgent pleasures.
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And he chases them out to their very end.
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And I think that's important for us to recognize that none of us really have the capacity,
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the resources to chase out every possible thing that we could potentially find joy in under the sun to its very end.
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But the preacher does. At least he sure seems to.
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And after all of this chasing, all of these experiments in gain,
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as he's looking for this ultimate value, he finds nothing of note.
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Remember the conclusion of the book of Ecclesiastes, chapter 12, verse 13.
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The end of the matter.
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All has been heard. I've searched it all out and recorded it for you.
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Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man.
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And so in the past weeks, we've looked at chapter 2, verses 1 through 11.
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We're going to continue to do so today and select out these particular potential gains and his search in them.
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So follow with me, if you will, as I read to you verses 1 through 11 of chapter 2.
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I said in my heart, come now, I will test you with pleasure.
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Enjoy yourself.
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But behold, this also was vanity.
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I said of laughter, it is mad, and of pleasure, what use is it?
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I searched my heart to know how to cheer my body with wine,
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my heart still guiding me with wisdom,
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and how to lay hold on folly till I might see what was good for the children of man to do
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under heaven during the few days of their life.
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I made great works.
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I built houses and planted vineyards for myself.
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I made myself gardens and parks and planted in them all kinds of fruit trees.
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I made myself pools from which to water the forest of growing trees.
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I bought male and female slaves and had slaves who were born in my house.
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I had also great possessions of herds and flocks,
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more than any who had been before me in Jerusalem.
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I also gathered for myself silver and gold and the treasure of kings and provinces.
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I got singers, both men and women, and many concubines, the delight of the sons of man.
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So I became great and surpassed all who were before me in Jerusalem.
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Also, my wisdom remained with me.
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And whatever my eyes desired, I did not keep from them.
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I kept my heart from no pleasure,
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for my heart found pleasure in all my toil,
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and this was my reward for all my toil.
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Then I considered all that my hands had done,
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and the toil I had expended in doing it,
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and behold, all was vanity and a striving after wind,
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and there was nothing to be gained under the sun.
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This is God's Word to us.
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It was written for His glory and our good.
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And we would all do well to listen to it in order to believe its promises and obey its commands.
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And this morning, I want to draw your attention in to verses 4 through the first half of 8
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and talk about the vanity of wealth.
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And this is not a thing that's talked about very often in churches these days.
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And we could muse at the reasons why.
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We could survey all of the pastors in America and ask that question,
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why do we not talk more about money in our churches?
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We could guess that we are afraid to offend those who give well.
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We could guess that many of us see it as a necessary evil,
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that we don't really like talking about it because we know it's a thing that can be so deceptive.
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But I would venture to say to you that the reason that it's not talked about more
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is because it's a great idol in our churches.
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And I'm not excluding ours from that.
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And you don't mess with people's idols because they'll get angry at you.
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And this morning, I just want you to know that I don't care because I love you.
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If you want to get really mad at me, I will simply say,
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you are offended by God's Word.
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And I'll step out of the way.
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I love you.
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And I want what's best for you.
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I echo with Paul.
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It's not you that I seek.
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It's not what you have that I seek.
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Excuse me.
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It's not what's yours, but you.
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I want what's best for you.
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And I know our audience, it's mixed, but it's primarily young people.
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And some of you may have already checked out because you said,
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I don't have money.
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But you do.
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As college students, you're among some of the wealthiest in the world.
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You have more than you really understand.
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And someday, and I hope someday soon, you're going to finish college.
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And you're going to go on to a career of some sort.
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And you'll begin to receive a paycheck.
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And you need to understand how it is that we're meant to handle the wealth that we have.
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A note beginning in verse 4.
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And we're going to talk in future weeks a bit about toil and work.
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But I just want to say these beginning things that he mentioned starting in verse 4.
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The great works, the houses, the vineyards, the gardens, the parks, the pools to water the trees.
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All of those things are a work that he did, but they took money.
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Those of us with yards know how expensive it is to keep up a yard.
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I just, it's beyond me.
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Why does mulch cost so much?
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He buys slaves, right?
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He has slaves in his home to do work for him.
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This was a matter of status, but it also took money.
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He had great possessions of herds and flocks, more than any who had been before him.
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He gathered silver and gold and the treasure of kings and provinces, which means he had massive, massive wealth.
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Verse 10 says,
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Whatever my eyes desired, I did not keep from them.
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And the preacher tells us in Ecclesiastes that wealth has no real value in this life.
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That it is not ultimate gain.
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That it is vanity.
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Chasing after the wind.
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Meaningless.
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Why do so many of us who profess faith in Christ,
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who say we have the greatest treasure,
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still spend so much of our time chasing wind.
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Elsewhere in Ecclesiastes, the preacher tells us that money cannot satisfy our hearts.
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Chapter 5, verse 10.
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He says,
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He who loves money will not be satisfied with money,
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nor he who loves wealth with his income.
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This also is vanity or meaningless.
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We need to pay very careful attention to the message of the preacher this morning.
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Because our culture is telling us that the very opposite is true.
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It whispers from all sides.
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In social media and in advertisements.
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In the posturing of our peers.
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On television and in movies and on the radio.
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If you only have this, you'll be happy.
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Look at the way she dresses.
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She is so put together.
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That would make you complete.
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People would think you're successful if you drove that car.
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Your house is who you are.
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Your capacity for leisure.
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How many vacations you get to go on this summer and post on Facebook.
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Facebook defines you.
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The sound of this constant whispering rises.
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From something really subtle.
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Into a cacophony of lies.
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And beloved, we buy them.
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We eat them up.
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And when we do, they steal our satisfaction.
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And our joy.
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We need to stop listening to the culture.
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And we need to start listening to the word of God.
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God loves us.
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And He wants what's best for us.
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And therefore, He instructs us in the ways we should walk.
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We've had some difficult discipline in our house over the last couple of days.
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Those heart-wrenching moments for me where I really would just rather not get involved.
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It would be really nice just to ignore altogether and pass over the disobedience that's happening in our house.
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But because I love my children.
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I bring them discipline.
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I bring them instruction.
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Because I want them to walk in the ways that are best for them.
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And our Heavenly Father does the same for us.
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We need to listen to the words of the preacher this morning.
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Vanity of vanities.
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Vanity of vanities.
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All is vanity.
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The amassing of stuff is of no gain under the sun.
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Beloved, our life is but a vapor.
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We are merely passing through and we ought not invest in the now.
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I'm not speaking against investment.
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I'm speaking about investing in joy and satisfaction in the now.
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But we should rather invest in eternity.
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You can't take anything with you.
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Can you?
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I mentioned to Wes what the sermon was about today.
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The preacher says in chapter 5, verse 15 of Ecclesiastes,
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As he came from his mother's womb, he shall go again, naked as he came,
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and shall take nothing for his toil that he may carry away in his hand.
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None of it will have any eternal value.
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Those things that you invest in here, those earthly things that you invest in here, have zero eternal value.
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So how do we handle our money?
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Money is intrinsically woven into our lives.
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Almost everything we do requires it.
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Few things that don't have some component of money involved.
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It takes gas money to go see family members.
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There's money tied up into almost everything that we do.
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I'm not going to suggest to you today that we should all cease to deal with it.
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That we should all become monastic or move to some kind of philanthropic bartering system.
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Money is necessary.
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But as Christian people, we need to learn how to handle it appropriately.
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Whether we have little or whether we have much.
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I suppose that money is woven into everything.
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And because there's such a danger in it is why Jesus spoke about it so much.
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15%.
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I didn't do the math on that.
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So check me if you'd like.
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15% of Jesus' recorded teaching was on this matter.
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I know for sure that it is the one topic he talked about more than anything else.
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Jesus talked about money more than heaven and hell.
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Interesting.
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Why?
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Because it's dangerous.
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And because we need to handle it rightly.
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So turn with me.
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Step away with me, if you will, from Ecclesiastes.
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To the Gospel of Matthew 6.
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Remember that the preacher has said, the end of the matter.
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All has been heard.
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Fear God and keep His commandments.
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For this is the whole duty of man.
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And there's a temptation on my part to run you all over the Old Testament.
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Run you all over the commandments of God to see how you can rightly handle your money.
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And I think that there's a place and there's a time for that.
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But this morning, I really want to talk to your heart.
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So Matthew 6, verse 19-21.
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Jesus says,
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Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal.
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For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
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Jesus gives to us in this text one exhortation with negative and positive statements.
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So He says it in two different ways.
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Firstly, we are commanded, and don't miss that, the imperative of the language,
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we are commanded not to invest in this life.
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Our loving Father says to His children,
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Do not lay up for yourselves treasure on earth.
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Why?
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Because stuff is temporal.
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It is not lasting.
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It goes on to say, verse 19,
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Where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal.
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The things that we can have and we can hold here are fleeting.
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They're passing by.
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It's pointless to invest in them.
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We are in the positive commanded to invest in eternity.
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A loving Father graciously says to His children,
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But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven.
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It's not optional.
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This is a command being given to the children of God.
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Lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven.
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I love you.
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I want what's good for you.
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I want what's best for you.
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Invest in this way.
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Why?
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Because eternal treasure is eternal.
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It will last forever.
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We get to enjoy the treasure stored in heaven forever.
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Verse 20,
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Where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal.
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It makes sense to invest eternally.
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Those of us who have been enlightened by God,
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who have been made aware of the created order,
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who He is and what comes after.
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It makes sense that we would invest in that.
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Now, I'm with you in not being able to fathom what forever looks like.
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But on and on and on.
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This morning's book's attempt was to say day after day after day after day after day.
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It makes sense to invest in that way.
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It has great benefit to us in eternity.
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Don't be like the man in the parable Jesus tells in Luke chapter 12.
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You'll appreciate going there.
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Luke 12 verse 13.
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Luke 12 verse 14.
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Someone in the crowd said to him,
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Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me.
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This man wanted his now.
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But he said to him,
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Man, who made me a judge or arbitrator over you?
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And he said to them,
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Take care and be on your guard against all covetousness,
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wanting for yourself.
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For one's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.
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So there's the negative statement.
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Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth.
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So then he tells him a parable to make the point.
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Verse 16.
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He told him a parable saying,
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The land of a rich man produced plentifully.
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And he thought to himself,
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What shall I do?
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For I have nowhere to store my crops.
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And he said,
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I will do this.
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I will tear down my barns and build larger ones.
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And there I will store all my grain and my goods.
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And I will say to my soul,
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Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years.
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Relax, eat, drink, be merry.
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But God said to him,
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Fool, this night your soul is required of you.
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And the things you have prepared,
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Whose will they be?
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So is the one who lays up treasure for himself in the now and is not rich toward God.
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The fool is the one who spends his money on himself rather than spending his money in a Godward direction.
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Spending his money on the kingdom and God's advance of it.
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A very famous quote from a very famous man,
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the late missionary Jim Elliott.
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He said,
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He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.
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And to state that differently,
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the person who hangs on to what he cannot keep,
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who white knuckles the stuff of this world in lieu of eternal reward,
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is a fool.
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We are too often foolish.
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Investing in eternity makes sense in eternity.
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But it also is of great benefit for today.
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Look at verse 21, Matthew chapter 6.
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I'm sorry I got you away from there to rip you back into it.
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For where your treasure is,
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there your heart will be also.
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I've had many, many, many people argue against what I believe the Scripture is clearly teaching on the way we should handle our money.
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It's okay that I can have my things just as long as I don't worship my things.
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It's okay that I have all of this for myself just as long as I don't worship those things.
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But I want you to catch what Jesus is saying here in verse 21.
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Jesus is saying, put your money where you want your heart to be.
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He is suggesting that the one will follow the other.
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Put your money out there.
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Invest in the kingdom because that's where we want our hearts to be.
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We know that that's what's best for us.
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Don't wait until you feel like investing into the eternal things.
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Invest in the eternal things and your heart will go to that place.
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1 Timothy 6, verse 17.
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Oh, I hate Scripture taken out of context.
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And this one is so destroyed in this way.
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1 Timothy 6, verse 17.
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As for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be haughty.
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Nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God who richly provides us with everything to enjoy.
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Have you heard that phrase before from somebody?
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As long as I don't worship these things, I don't set my hope in riches.
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They stop.
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They stop at the end of verse 17.
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How dare they?
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Verse 18.
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What are they to do?
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Instead of setting their hope on the uncertainty of riches, but rather setting it on God,
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then there's some evidencing of that hope.
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They are to do good.
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Paul's brilliant play with words.
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They're to be rich in good works.
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They're to be generous and ready to share.
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Which has the implication of both sharing and being ready to share.
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You catch that?
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So it's not just being ready to share.
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It's sharing and being ready to share.
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Verse 19.
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Thus, storing up treasure for themselves as a good foundation for the future.
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So there's the one implication, the eternal investment of this.
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So that they may take hold of that which is truly life.
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So that they might enjoy the very reason that God gave them the riches.
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And that is that they may gain more of Him.
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They may take hold of that which is truly life.
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Living as a child of God in the kingdom of God.
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That they may gain Him.
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And it's tragic to me that so many of us have so much.
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And we hold on to these little paltry things that mean nothing when we could have more of Christ.
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Would you freely give it away to have Him?
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Beloved, we have been saved by grace.
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We have God's riches at Christ's expense.
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Christ bore the curse in our stead.
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And He secured for us an eternal reward.
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Which is far grander than anything this world can afford us.
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If you have not experienced the goodness of God to you in Christ.
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Then none of this is going to make any sense to you.
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Eat, drink and be merry.
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Repent and believe that you may gain Christ.
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If you have experienced the goodness of God to you in Christ.
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Maybe you just need to be reminded of that goodness.
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Maybe it's grown cold in your heart.
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Maybe you have forgotten how precious a treasure Christ truly is.
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Psalm 34, 8-10 says,
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Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good.
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Blessed is the man who takes refuge in Him.
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Oh, fear the Lord, you His saints.
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For those who fear Him have no lack.
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The young lions suffer want and hunger.
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But those who seek the Lord lack no good thing.
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Get the imagery here.
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The young lions are the ones that have to take their turn to eat.
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It's the older lions that dominate the pack.
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And they get to eat their fill when there's a kill.
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The young lions have to wait on the periphery.
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And they get the leftovers and the scraps.
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The young lions are never fully satisfied.
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But those who seek the Lord lack no good thing.
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One of my very favorite psalms,
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which I want to invite you to turn to with me.
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And I promise not to put you back into Matthew.
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Psalm 73.
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This is a psalm of Asaph,
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who was one of David's singers.
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Pinned quite a few of the psalms.
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And this is a sort of confession for him.
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And I relate to this so often.
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Even in my day to day.
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As I look out and I observe the world.
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And I just want you to read through.
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We're going to read the entire psalm together.
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And I want to stop and make some comments to you.
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About his testimony concerning the goodness of God.
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He says,
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Truly, God is good to Israel.
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To those who are pure in heart.
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He starts with that very emphatic statement.
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An echo of Psalm 34.10.
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Those who think the Lord lack no good thing.
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Truly, God is good.
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Verse 2.
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But as for me,
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my feet had almost stumbled.
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My steps had nearly slipped.
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He stopped believing that great truth.
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That God is good to His.
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For I was envious of the arrogant
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when I saw the prosperity of the wicked.
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For they have no pangs until death.
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Their bodies are fat and sleek.
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In this day,
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to be fat meant you had time for leisure.
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You had time for laying around and eating
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rather than working hard.
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Right?
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So replace for that tan and fit.
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In that place.
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Verse 5.
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They are not in trouble as others are.
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They are not stricken like the rest of mankind.
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Therefore, pride is their necklace.
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Violence covers them as a garment.
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Their eyes swell out through fatness.
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Their hearts overflow with follies.
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They scoff and speak with malice.
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Loftily they threaten oppression.
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They set their mouths against the heavens
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and their tongue struts through the earth.
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Therefore, His people turn back to them
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and find no fault in them.
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And they say,
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How can God know?
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Is there knowledge in the Most High?
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Behold, these are the wicked.
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Always at ease, they increase in riches.
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So catch what he's doing.
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He's observing the way that these people live.
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But he's saying,
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But wait a minute.
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They clearly oppose God.
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And yet,
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they're so wealthy here.
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They seem to have so little trouble.
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And so much joy.
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Right?
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So much so that the people of God
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find no fault in what they're doing.
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The people of God are being deceived by them.
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Right?
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How can God know?
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The people of God have ceased to listen to the Word of God
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and rather are listening to the culture around them.
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He goes on to say,
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verse 13,
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All in vain have I kept my heart clean
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and washed my hands in innocence.
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For all the day long,
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I have been stricken and rebuked every morning.
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If I had said,
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I will speak thus,
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I would have betrayed the generation of your children.
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Right?
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So here's this emotion going on in him.
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He's actually beginning to think,
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maybe I shouldn't follow the ways of God.
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Maybe it'd be better for me
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if I would follow the ways of the world.
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But then he says in verse 15,
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if I were to say that out loud,
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right?
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This thing that I'm feeling,
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if I were to actually vocalize that,
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I would have betrayed your children.
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Verse 16,
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But when I thought how to understand this,
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it seemed to me a wearisome task
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until,
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catch this,
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I kind of hear in verse 16,
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the preacher in Ecclesiastes,
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the labor,
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the toil of trying to figure out
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what is good under the sun
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until,
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verse 17,
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I went into the sanctuary of God.
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Then I discerned their end.
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Truly you set them in slippery places.
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You make them fall to ruin.
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How they are destroyed in a moment,
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swept away utterly by terrors.
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Like a dream in one awakes,
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O Lord,
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when you rouse yourself,
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you despise them as phantoms.
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So he sees that the end of things,
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right?
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They've got what they want now,
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but the end of things,
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at the end of their life,
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they will be destroyed.
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Verse 21,
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When my soul was embittered,
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when I was pricked in heart,
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I was brutish and ignorant.
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I was like a beast toward you.
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How dare I think in this way?
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Nevertheless,
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I am continually with you.
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You hold my right hand.
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You guide me with your counsel.
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And afterward,
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you will receive me to glory.
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Praise God.
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Whom have I in heaven but you?
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And there is nothing on earth
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that I desire besides you.
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My flesh and my heart may fail,
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but God is the strength of my heart
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and my portion forever.
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My full satisfaction forever.
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For behold,
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those who are far from you shall perish.
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You put an end to everyone
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who is unfaithful to you,
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but for me it is good to be near God.
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I have made the Lord God my refuge
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that I may tell of all your works.
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So this great satisfaction
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that he finds in the Lord
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is turned out to the telling
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of his great satisfaction in the Lord
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and all that he has done for Him.
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Beloved, this should be the testimony
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of our lives as well.
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Recognizing the goodness of God.
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We should be like the man
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that Jesus talks about in Matthew 13, 44
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who goes and finds a treasure
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hidden in a field.
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Jesus says this is what
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the kingdom of heaven is like.
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A treasure hidden in a field
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which a man found and he covered up.
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So he's cutting across a field
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which was customary in this day
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and he trips over a treasure.
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He finds something of massive value
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and so he hides it.
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And then he goes in joy.
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It says then in this joy
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he goes and sells all that he has
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and he buys that field
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for this greater thing
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that he finds in this field.
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He's willing to give up everything else
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in his joy for the treasure
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that's in that field
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that he may possess it as his own.
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Beloved, this is Christ.
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The one who brings the kingdom of heaven
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to earth.
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The one who will one day return
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and fully bring it to pass.
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Where your treasure is,
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there your heart will be also.
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Give to the work of God.
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Give abundantly.
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Give sacrificially.
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Give in a way that loosens your grip
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on the things of this world.
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Give in a way that has you
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gripped tightly to Christ.
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in a way that leaves no room
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for anything else in that grasp.
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And we'll speak more of giving
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next Lord's Day.
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Give to the work of God
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here and beyond.
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Listen to the words of the preacher.
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Vanity of vanities.
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Vanity of vanities.
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All is vanity.
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The end of the matter.
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All has been heard.
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Fear God.
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And keep his commandments.
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Let's pray together.