Man, the book of Ecclesiastes, I want to start out by just talking about the title of the
book.
I don't know about how your Bible is, but mine says Ecclesiastes or the preacher.
Whose Bible says it that way?
Virtually all of them.
Sometimes it just says Ecclesiastes.
So that's what the word Ecclesiastes means.
It literally means the preacher, but specifically it means the kind of preacher that is mentioned
in chapter 12.
Flip over if you would to chapter 12 of Ecclesiastes.
It says in verse number 11 of chapter 12 of Ecclesiastes, it says, the words of the wise
are as goads and as nails fastened by the masters of assemblies, which are given from
one shepherd.
So it has that term, it uses the term preacher in verse eight, preacher in verse nine, preacher
in verse 10, and then verse 11, it uses that term masters of assemblies.
So it's talking about someone who's leading an assembly or preaching before an assembly.
You probably are familiar with the word Iglesia in Spanish, even if you know very little Spanish,
and that is basically from the same root word as Ecclesiastes.
Iglesia, ecclesia, ecclesiastes.
So basically that's what it's referring to.
A preacher, specifically a preacher who preaches to an assembly or preaches to a crowd is what
that literally means.
As we saw over in chapter 12, masters of assemblies preaching to a group of people.
So it says in verse number one of chapter one, the words of the preacher, the son of
David, king in Jerusalem, vanity of vanities, saith the preacher, vanity of vanities, all
is vanity.
Of course, this is the great theme of the book of Ecclesiastes.
In chapter 12, he ends up the book saying everything's vanity.
Throughout the book, this comes up over and over again.
What does this mean?
What does it mean to be vanity?
It basically means something that is empty, something that has no value, something that's
a waste of time.
If you did something in vain, it means you wasted your time.
There was no point.
You didn't accomplish anything.
So the preacher is looking at all of life and he's saying everything in life is vanity.
Everything is empty.
Everything is meaningless.
Now, you have to take this within the context of the book that it's meaningless without
the Lord, without God.
You know, he's looking at things from a human perspective and saying without God, everything
in life ends up being meaningless.
And that's what he's going to be explaining to us chapter after chapter after chapter.
People will often like to take verses from the book of Ecclesiastes out of context to
teach false doctrine.
You know, like when the Bible says, hey, once you're dead, you know, everything's over and
there's going to be no love or anything in the grave where you go.
There's no work.
There's no thoughts.
Just everything's over.
And the Seventh-day Adventists will grab on to some verse from Ecclesiastes to try to
say that when you die, it's just over.
You know, no one is conscious after death.
But of course, we have the whole rest of the Bible, don't we, teaching us about people
being conscious after death.
You know, Jesus said, Abraham rejoiced to see my day and was glad.
And the Bible says the work compests about with a great cloud of witnesses.
And in the context, it's people who've died and gone on to be with the Lord.
Those who've gone on before us are the cloud of witnesses.
Of course, we see the rich man and Lazarus in Luke chapter 16, and Lazarus is comforted
and the rich man is tormented in hell.
So there's heaven and hell after we die.
And people who die are still consciously experiencing something, either heaven or hell.
So you don't want to take things in the book of Ecclesiastes out of context.
It'd be ridiculous to ignore clear teachings of the New Testament and the Old Testament
and just grab something from Ecclesiastes and say, well, when you die, there's nothing.
It's over. That's it.
But I've seen Jehovah's Witness gospel tracts and Seventh-day Adventist gospel tracts quoting
Ecclesiastes to make that point.
But here's the thing.
By their logic, then, you could grab hold of this verse and just say, everything's meaningless.
Everything's vanity.
Let's eat, drink, and be married because tomorrow we die.
But wouldn't that be out of context?
The Bible has this important book of Ecclesiastes not to teach us that nothing matters or that
there's nothing after death or something, but rather to teach us that God is the only
thing that really matters.
Serving God is the only thing that really matters.
Everything in this world was created by him and for his pleasure, and without the Lord,
life becomes meaningless.
That's the message here.
Not that life actually is meaningless.
You have to take things in context.
So he starts out by saying, vanity, vanity, saith the preacher, all is vanity.
What profit hath the man of all his labor which he taketh unto the sun?
One generation passeth away and another generation cometh, but the earth abideth forever.
He's saying, look, no matter how hard you work, no matter how much you accomplish, eventually
you're going to die.
And you say, well, I'm going to leave behind a legacy.
Your legacy is only going to last so long.
I mean, if you think about some of the most famous people from the ancient world, you
could think about some of the most powerful people in Europe or the Middle East or India
from 700 B.C., 500 B.C., 400 B.C., and you know what?
Most people couldn't name them.
And some of them are so forgotten to history that no one could name them.
They don't even have a single inscription.
Nobody even knows who they are.
And they could have been the most powerful man in that region, the most important person
in that region, and no one could tell you who they are.
Their name is forgotten.
And even the ones who are remembered are probably only remembered by some academic historian
somewhere who's an expert or something, knows their name.
But eventually, even that will cease.
Everything will eventually be gone.
So no matter how famous you are, how important you are, no matter what works you accomplish,
no matter what you build, eventually it will decay and be gone.
So he's saying, you know, what prophet has a man of all his labor which he takes out
of the sun?
What's the point of making a whole bunch of money if eventually everything that you made
is going to be burned up someday?
You know, the Bible says everything in this world will eventually be burned up.
The things that are seen are temporary.
The Bible tells the things that are seen are temporal and the things that are not seen
are eternal.
So everything that you build, anything that you accomplish, any works that you do, you
will die and eventually all those works will all be gone and they will all die as well.
You know, the Bible says the grass withereth and the flower fadeth, but the word of our
God shall stand forever.
And it says he that doeth the will of God shall abide forever.
But you say, well, that's just grass, but you know what the Bible says?
All flesh is as grass, your grass, your whatever is grass.
Okay.
That's what the Bible tells you.
Okay.
And God's the lawnmower.
So the point is, you know, the Bible teaches that all flesh is as grass.
And I mean, think about how short-lived grass is.
You know, the grass grows up, it dries out, it's gone.
He's saying that's you.
And that's not just you because you're Joe Plummer.
No, that's the President of the United States.
He's grass.
Everybody's grass.
So nothing matters if you think about it then.
You know, so this is the problem that atheists have today is that they have to try to figure
out meaning in their life.
They have to find meaning where there is no meaning.
They're looking for meaning and it isn't there.
So they say, oh, it's all about love.
You know, just all you need is love, right?
You know what?
Try that.
Follow that.
And eventually, you know what?
You're going to find a dead end because guess what?
That's vanity too.
You know, Solomon was in love.
I mean, he wrote a whole book about it, Song of Solomon.
But that was so satisfying to him.
Being in love was so satisfying that he went out and found a few hundred more.
And I mean, you want to talk about true love.
I mean, Song of Solomon, that's pretty intense.
Wasn't enough for him.
He had to have another one and another one and another one and none of it satisfied.
And so it doesn't matter what you pursue in life, you will eventually find an empty feeling
at the end of that pursuit.
Whether you say, oh, life is just all about relationships, it's just all about love, it's
all about family, it's all about that romantic relationship, eventually that's going to be
a dead end in your life as far as finding true fulfillment and lasting joy.
That is not going to ultimately satisfy you.
You know, when you're a teenager and you've heard all the songs and you've watched all
the movies and you feel like that's going to satisfy you, it doesn't.
Eventually you realize there's more that you want out of life.
But you know, the one thing that truly satisfies is the Lord.
That is the true meaning.
That is where you find actual satisfaction.
And I'm not downplaying love and relationships, I'm not downplaying education or hard work
or career.
Those are all great things.
But in the perspective of eternity, those things are vain in comparison with the things
of God.
I'm not saying they don't matter, but they don't matter though, you know, when it comes
down to eternity.
And from a human perspective, they don't matter.
And so those who are atheistic have to try to find meaning in life, but according to
them, they believe that this is all just a big cosmic accident.
If we're just supposedly just clumps of cells and we're just evolved animals and everything
that we feel is just a chemical reaction that we're feeling and there's no soul.
And by the way, I just heard some idiot preacher say that, by the way, the other day, Todd
Friel, the wretched radio Bob Saget looking guy.
He made this video where he said, oh, you don't ever feel the Holy Spirit.
You can't feel the presence of God.
That's just a chemical reaction, he said.
He said, oh, God's not present in a service.
God's omnipresent, he said.
Oh, really?
Because last time I checked, Jesus said, where two or three are gathered together in my name,
there am I in the midst of them.
Because I'm omnipresent.
No, not because he's omnipresent.
He's there specially.
And you know what?
You could be in a service where God is in that service.
You think God's down at the United Methodist Church where the pastor is a drag queen?
No, they just, that was in the news this week.
They just ordained a drag queen.
Wouldn't it be accurate to say God is not in that church?
God is not in that service.
God is not in that place.
But yet we would say God is here with us tonight.
Wow, just because he's everywhere.
No, he's not just everywhere.
He's also specifically present with us in the house of God tonight.
And I did a whole sermon on that a few weeks ago called The Presence of the Lord.
But you know, Todd Frill sounds like an atheist sitting there saying, oh, you just got excited
about stuff you read in the Bible and it released a chemical reaction in your brain.
Folks, let me tell you something.
There is something to life that transcends the physical.
Life is not just physical.
It's not just atoms and molecules and the laws of physics.
There is a spiritual component to us as human beings.
And there's a spiritual component to our lives.
And if you take away that spiritual component, you are left with nothingness, emptiness.
And that's what Solomon's saying here.
You know, vanity of vanity, all is vanity.
Everything is vain.
And so if you're an atheist, your life has no meaning even according to you because you're
the one saying you're this glorified animal.
You're this basically just glorified primate and the whole universe is eventually just
going to slow down and stop because of heat death.
You know, I mean, what's the point?
Everything will be gone.
Well, we just have to experience life to the full.
So what?
Let's say one guy, you know, I'm laying the foundation for this whole book so that we
understand it.
So I'm giving you the basic teachings.
Let's say one guy just lives life to the full and just experiences everything and just has
the most fulfilling marriage and he has the most fulfilling career and everybody loves
him and everybody comes to his funeral and he's just the greatest guy ever.
And then you have another guy who's just a complete loser, messes up every part of
his life.
Nobody comes to the funeral.
Nobody cares.
You know what?
According to Ecclesiastes, hey, they both go to the same place.
And 100 years from now, 200 years from now, 500 years from now, if it all eventually stops,
then does it really even matter what they experienced while they were on this earth?
What does it matter what they experienced if it all just is erased?
And not only the, not even the memory of them will survive, not even the memory will
survive.
Eventually every person will be forgotten.
That's just the way things work.
Even the most important celebrities, I mean, who were the really hot musicians in the fourth
century BC?
Now here's what you have to understand.
There's nothing new under the sun.
So not only does your life not matter, oh, but I came up with something new.
No, you didn't.
Tons of other people have already done the same thing.
You're just repeating what other people have done.
What does the Bible say?
It says one generation passes away and another generation cometh, but the earth abideth forever.
The sun also arises and the sun goeth down and hasteth to his place where he arose.
The wind goeth toward the south and turneth about unto the north.
It whirleth about continually and the wind returneth again according to his circuits.
So it's like, oh El Nino, big El Nino storm.
But guess what?
Then there's going to be another El Nino and there's going to be another El Nino and there's
just over and over again just El Nino, which is Spanish for the Nino.
No, I'm just kidding.
That was a joke.
But it says, you know, all the rivers run into the sea, yet the sea is not full.
Under the place from whence the rivers come, thither they return again.
So everything's cyclical, right?
The water cycle, the air cycle, we understand these things.
All things are full of labor.
You know, everything's really busy.
Like the world's really busy, water's flowing, air's circulating, animals are living their
lives.
None cannot utter it.
The eye's not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing, and here's the key
in verse 9.
The thing that has been is that which shall be, and that which is done is that which shall
be done.
The same stuff you're doing right now, people are going to do it later.
They did it in the past.
The thing that hath been is that which shall be, that which is done is that which shall
be done, and there's no new thing under the sun.
Is there anything whereof it may be said, see, this is new?
No.
Already been done.
It hath been already of old time, which was before us.
There's no remembrance of former things.
He said, no, no, no, this is new.
No, it's just that we just forgot about the time that it happened in the past.
It's already happened.
Everything has already been done.
He says there's no remembrance of former things, and by the way, neither shall there be any
remembrance of things that are to come with those that shall come after.
So we see just the utter futility and meaninglessness of trying to find meaning in the material
world.
What is it that scientists study?
They study the water cycle.
They study the weather.
They study all those patterns.
They study the geological patterns, and they study the plate tectonics and all these different
processes that are happening on our earth, and that should teach them something that
basically everything's in a cycle.
Everything eventually gets swallowed up.
Even according to their own teachings, all of the earth and everything, all the crust
eventually gets swallowed up and recycled.
It's all headed into the mantle eventually, you know what I mean, to get recycled, and
it all gets churned up anew.
So they should look at those things and understand that the physical world really doesn't offer
any meaning or anything lasting.
And you know, it's funny, scientists, you know what their dream is?
It's to get recognition for something.
They want to have some unit of measurement named after them, you know, because units
of measurement in science are named like the Newton, the Tesla, and most of them are based
on people's names.
You think about the Volt, Alessandro Volta, right?
And all these different people, whether it's the Coulomb or the Joule or all these different
measurements that are based on people's names, because people really want to make their mark
in science.
They want to have that theory that's named after them, that rule that's named after them,
that process, that device that's named after them, but it's all vanity, isn't it?
What's the point?
What good is it?
And by the way, science advances one funeral at a time because all of these people's theories,
as wonderful as they are, eventually get replaced by something better.
You know what I mean?
Isaac Newton is considered like the most brilliant scientist of all time, but most of his stuff
has been replaced by stuff that has gotten us closer to the truth, whatever that means.
And so the point is, you know, it advances one funeral at a time and each previous scientist
is forgotten and eventually they will all be forgotten and all of their works are meaningless.
And so we need to understand that true meaning in life is found outside of the physical realm.
It's found outside of the natural world.
It is only found in the things of God.
That which is spiritual is the only place that real meaning is found.
Everything else is meaningless.
And it doesn't matter what you pursue in life.
Whether you pursue education, he talks about that.
Whether you pursue pleasure, I mean, he talks about that.
I mean, he partied hard.
He partied like Solomon and yet he hated life, yet it was all vanity.
He had the women, the money, he did the swimming, he had the swimming pools, he had the fruit
trees, he did the gardening, he built stuff, he ruled a great kingdom, he was super smart,
he studied science, he could talk all about plants and animals.
He knew all the animals and plants.
You know, he talked about every plant from a cedar tree to the hyssop that springeth
out of the wall.
He knew his plants.
He knew his animals.
He had all the wise sayings and spoke thousands of proverbs, but at the end of the day he
realized that only spiritual things truly matter because eternity is what matters.
So he says in verse 12, I the preacher was king over Israel and Jerusalem and I gave
my heart to seek and search out by wisdom concerning all things that are done under
heaven.
This sore travail hath God given to the sons of men to be exercised therewith.
What's a sore travail?
Travail is painful labor, very hard work.
It's often the word that's used about a woman when she's going to give birth, she's in travail,
she's in labor.
It's a painful, difficult work trying to understand life, you know, trying to seek out by wisdom
concerning the things that are done in heaven.
And you know, if we were to put the sore travail that Solomon talks about in this chapter and
the vexation of spirit into our modern vernacular, I think the best way to describe it is that
it's a drag, man.
You know what he's saying?
Life is a drag.
Trying to figure things out is a drag.
The works that we perform are a drag.
You know, it's a sore travail.
It's vexation of spirit, man.
It's a drag.
That's what he's basically saying, okay?
I'm bringing the Bible up to date for you to the 1960s, okay?
Not all the way up to 2021.
My modern slang is lacking.
But there's no new thing under the sun, so it doesn't really matter, right?
The slang of now is as good as the slang of, you know, 60 years ago or whatever.
So he says here, you know, this sore travail hath God given to the sons of men to be exercised
therewith.
You know, when I hear this verse, I picture basically like, it's like handing someone
a Rubik's Cube.
Here, have fun figuring this out.
Now eventually you can figure out the Rubik's Cube.
But in order to figure out a Rubik's Cube, most of us received training on how to solve
a Rubik's Cube.
I used to be able to solve, you could hand me a Rubik's Cube and in less than three minutes,
I could solve it no matter what.
My best time I ever got down to it was like 90 seconds I solved a Rubik's Cube in 90 seconds.
But the thing is, that's because I read an explanation of how to do it.
But you know, the first guy who solved it, you know, it took somebody a long time to
actually solve the thing because it was, you know, he was a pioneer.
He didn't have the formula.
He didn't have the tricks.
But here's the thing.
God has given us life and life is a puzzle that's far more complicated than a Rubik's
Cube.
You know, it's like those Rubik's Cubes that have four by four.
You know, I like the one that's like two by two, you know, that's a little more doable.
But I've seen the four by four.
I, you know, I guarantee it's probably out there.
Solomon probably knows.
Five by five.
I mean, yeah, he's like, oh yeah, it's out there.
Thank you my fellow geek.
No, I'm just kidding.
But anyway, you know, five by five.
I mean, think about it.
The world is like a Rubik's Cube that's like a hundred by a hundred.
It's like good luck trying to solve the puzzle of understanding who we are, why we're here,
you know, seeking out by wisdom concerning all the things that are done.
It's like this endless puzzle that's impossible to solve.
And so God has given this sore travail to the sons of men to be exercised therewith.
So basically, you have people spending their entire lives as philosophers, just, you know,
intelligent people just wrestling with the nature of things for decades.
And guess what?
At the end of their life, they haven't solved the mysteries of the universe.
And then the next philosopher comes along and he's going to solve it and he comes up
with a new theory and then his theory is popular for a little while.
Then the next generation of philosophers just rips that guy's theory apart and proves how
wrong it was and looks for other answers and so forth.
So God gave this sore travail to the sons of men to be exercised therewith.
Life, figuring out life, trying to understand life is a sore travail.
It's a painful, difficult exercise.
And it's really just that, it's an exercise because you can't reach the destination.
Verse 14, I have seen all the works that are done under the sun and behold, all is vanity
and vexation of spirit.
Again, it's vain and it's a drag.
What does it mean to be vexed?
Vex is to be bothered, to be irritated.
You know, it talks about how Lot, when Lot lived in Sodom and Gomorrah because Lot was
a righteous man, it bothered him in seeing and hearing their unlawful deeds.
It says he vexed his righteous soul daily, seeing and hearing their unlawful deeds.
We know what that means, right?
We understand what it means that he was bothered, he was irritated, it made him uncomfortable.
And God is saying here that all the works that are done under the sun, you know, Solomon
found them all to be vanity and he found them all to be irritating.
So even things that we love, if we keep doing them long enough, eventually they will irritate
us and we'll be sick of them.
You know, think about stuff that you've liked to do in the past and you just got burned
out on it.
Like, one thing I used to like, I used to like to travel.
I used to travel all the time for work and I actually enjoyed traveling for work.
And sometimes I'd be home for like a week and a half and I'd kind of be like, oh man,
you know, get out and take another trip because I was just traveling so much, I was just used
to it and I enjoyed it.
But now traveling to me is a vexation of spirit.
I hate traveling.
Every time I go on a trip, I'm just like, why am I doing this?
Why am I here?
And, you know, once I get there, I have a good time and I enjoy the fellowship, I enjoy
preaching and meeting people and I always have a good time.
But the trip itself, you know, being at the airport and stuff, and you know, you think
like, oh, it's fun to go to the airport.
It's fun like the first thousand times.
But I have literally flown over 1,000 times.
That's not exaggerating.
It's probably more like 1,200.
And so after doing it a thousand times, it gets to be vexation of spirit.
Something that's cool and fun and exciting can eventually become a drag.
You know, there are all kinds of people who spent years playing a certain sport or playing
a certain video game or whatever and eventually it just becomes a drag.
Eventually you're just sick of it and it just, everything gets old eventually.
So it becomes vexation of spirit, all is vanity and vexation of spirit.
And then he says in verse 15, that which is crooked cannot be made straight and that which
is wanting cannot be numbered.
And I think what he's saying there in verse 15 is that, you know, some people might seek
meaning in their life by fixing the world, fixing things.
You know, a lot of people, that's why they become a police officer because they think
I'm going to really clean up this town.
I mean, don't you think that a lot of people who go into policing probably feel that way?
Like I'm going to clean up this town.
I want to make a difference.
I want to make things better.
You know, I want to make the streets a little bit safer.
I'm going to pick this block or this neighborhood and take care of it.
And you know, this is just one of those things that eventually leads to disappointment, vanity,
vexation of spirit.
You know, I talked to so many police officers who said it's so frustrating that they just,
they can't fix things.
They can't fix that neighborhood.
They can't fix that town.
And it's just, they just keep arresting people and says people just keep getting let free
and the crime continues.
And it's like they feel like they're just kind of babysitting a bunch of people, but
they don't really feel like they're truly making a difference.
It's frustrating for them.
And this is just another example of all the ways that we could try to seek fulfillment
in our life other than serving God, education, building stuff, leaving a legacy, working
hard.
Okay, how about fixing things?
But he says, you know, at the end of the day, that which is crooked cannot be made straight.
That which is wanted cannot be numbered.
You know, you're trying to make up the deficit and fix something and change things.
But at the end of the day, things are always going to be sinful.
They're always going to be screwed up.
There's always going to be crime.
There's always going to be poverty.
You know, you might say, oh, we're going to end poverty, war on poverty.
Jesus of the poor you have with you always.
Always going to be poverty, disease, crime.
You're never going to fix these things.
If you were to cure, let's say you devote your life to medicine and cured the worst
illnesses, a new illness will show up that nobody's ever seen, right?
I mean, aren't new illnesses constantly cropping up?
You know, you'll solve one virus and then it'll just mutate into something else.
And as some totally different plague will come along throughout history, new plagues
have sprung up almost like clockwork.
You know, every hundred years there's a serious new virus that pops up.
And every several hundred years, there'll be one that's truly deadly.
And so even if you were to cure the illnesses of 2021, that's not going to take care of
the illnesses of the year 2179 because of the fact that it will be different illnesses.
And so, you know, you're going to fix the world's problems, make money, enjoy pleasure,
get education, work hard.
These are all good things, but at the end of the day, they're all vanity and vexation
of spirit according to the Bible here.
Verse 16 says, I communed with my own heart saying, lo, I am come to great estate and
have gotten more wisdom than all they that have been before me in Jerusalem.
Yea, my heart had great experience of wisdom and knowledge.
And I gave my heart to know wisdom and to know madness and folly.
I perceive that this also is vexation of spirit for in much wisdom is much grief.
And he that increases knowledge increases sorrow.
And so the happiest person is not the smartest person.
Have you ever heard the saying, ignorance is bliss?
What you don't know can't hurt you.
In much wisdom is much grief and he that increases knowledge increases sorrow.
Now, again, you have to take these things in context because the Bible is not saying
be dumb, you'll be happier that way, stay dumb, enjoy it.
Don't tell me anything.
I don't want to learn because it's just going to make me unhappy.
The lowest level education is the happiest.
You don't want to take this out of context and praise lack of learning or praise lack
of intelligence or glorify being dumb.
And there are people out there who do that even amongst independent Baptists where they'll
I'm just a country boy, I'm just a simple man and I don't know.
But that's not really something to brag about.
The Bible teaches us to seek wisdom, to seek knowledge, to seek understanding.
He says, look for it like you would look for buried treasure.
It's more precious than rubies.
Wisdom is the principal thing, therefore get wisdom.
But what he's saying here is if wisdom is the end in itself, if you're getting wisdom
for the sake of wisdom, it's not worth it.
It's just going to bring you grief and heartache and sorrow.
Wisdom learning for the sake of wisdom and learning has no real meaning.
Now if you're seeking knowledge and wisdom so that you can be a better servant of God,
so that you can apply your knowledge and wisdom to serve the Lord, now all of a sudden it
takes on meaning, doesn't it?
There are people out there though where education is their God, it is their religion.
Not so that they can use that to serve the Lord, but just education for the sake of education.
Just so that they can be super smart, but I guarantee you, I guarantee you that those
working hard for that college degree, when they walk across that platform, even if they're
happy and smiling and everybody's taking a picture, I promise you there's an empty feeling
there.
It's an empty feeling.
And they get the master's degree, empty feeling.
NHD, empty feeling, full professorship, empty feeling, I promise you, I guarantee it.
Because that isn't going to bring true fulfillment and meaning to your life.
You're going to keep on going, and look, I guarantee you there are many people out there
who've learned this the hard way and they realize that their life is lacking something.
They realize like is this all there is to life?
The Hollywood celebrities, they have so much money and fame and they live such a glamorous
life.
I guarantee you they have an empty feeling.
I guarantee you academics have an empty feeling, millionaire businessmen have an empty feeling
in their heart.
It's kind of the cliche, the God-shaped hole in their heart, but you know what?
At the same time, it's real that there is a lack of meaning in that life.
Now some people are going to be more successful at others at just kind of ignoring that hole
in their soul and basically just kind of just distracting themselves with enough other things
to where they just don't think about it.
And this is why sometimes people get really mad at you when you ask them the question.
If you were to die today, do you know for sure you go to heaven?
The reason why that question, or even just seeing a Bible, or even just seeing somebody
talk about these things, because they don't want to think about it.
I've talked to my wife about this a lot because I got saved as a six-year-old boy, so I don't
really have as much experience being unsaved.
I don't really know what it's like to be unsaved because I was unsaved as a six-year-old.
So I wasn't really like communing with my own heart at age six.
You know, I'm just at age six, you know, I've come to great estate and have gotten more
wisdom than all that had been before me on this playground.
I made me great works, I built me houses, I planted me vineyards, and I looked upon
everything and it was all vanity.
I wasn't really thinking that deeply at that age.
And I was brought up in church the whole time.
So God was always in my thoughts, Jesus was always in my thoughts, and I received Christ
as Savior when I was six.
So I always like to talk to people that got saved later in life and ask them, like, what's
it like being unsaved?
You know, and I've asked tons of people that question.
Like I ask them, like, what did you think about death or what, you know, what do you
think about, you know, and I've just asked them questions about just what their mentality
was.
Because it's just, it's kind of fascinating to me, like, how you go through life unsaved.
Because I just kind of just take for granted, like, having meaning and purpose and understanding
who I am and where I'm from and where I'm going, I just, it all makes sense to me.
Because I have the Holy Spirit living inside of me, I've been saved since I was six, I've
been trained in the Word of God from a babe.
And so I've, you know, I've had a lot of conversations with my wife about this because she got saved
when she was 20 years old.
So you know, she had experienced and lived a lot more unsaved.
And she told me, she said, you know, when it comes to things like dying or what happens
after we die, she said, you just push those things out of your mind and you just think
about it as little as possible, you don't want to think about it, you'd rather just
ignore it, forget about it, push it out of your mind because it's a scary thing to think
about and so you don't want to think about it.
And I've had a lot of other people tell me something similar to that and they have that
same experience.
And so yeah, some people are going to be successful at distracting themselves with other pursuits
and other things and kind of outwardly seem happy and maybe even truly be happy, you know,
for a season, for a time.
But I think that there are a lot of people out there, though, that have already gotten
to the point in their life where they've realized that all is vanity.
I think eventually everybody's going to get there.
But a lot of people are already there, my friend.
They're already there.
Like they've tried the pleasure route and found it to be vanity, they've tried the
academic route, they've tried the business route.
Whatever route they've tried, they've tried, you know, making the world a better place
and it all ended up being vanity and now they're ready to hear the gospel.
And that's kind of, that's, you know, one type of person that we're looking for when
we go out soul winning.
We're looking for that person that realizes, man, there's something I'm missing, I need
something.
You know, in the words of the rich young ruler, what lack I yet?
What lack I yet?
There are people out there that are asking themselves right now and when you knock on
their door, a lot of those people are going to be the ones that are ready to hear the
gospel.
Now those aren't the only kind of people that we're looking for.
There are lots of other people who get saved, but that's one type of person that we're looking
for when we're out soul winning.
I guarantee you there are millions of people out there that feel that way because, because
it's the truth.
That's how life is.
Life is vanity and so it's just, have they realized that yet?
Young people don't realize this because of the fact that their whole life's ahead of
them.
So they think like, Oh, when I'm an adult, you know, yeah, my life's a little bit of
a drag right now cause I'm a teenager at home, you know, living with my parents or whatever.
And you think like life's a little bit of a drag, but here's the thing.
You can be the king of Israel and life's a drag.
You could have, you know, 300 wives and 700 concubines.
I think I always get that backwards.
700 wives and 300 concubines and life's still a drag.
Now you young people, you're like, huh, how's that a drag?
Well it is Solomon did it and it was a drag.
It was a vexation of spirit.
It was meaningless.
So when you're a teenager, you think like, Oh, when I'm an adult, then I can have my
own crib and I can have my own job and I'm going to have my wife and my career and I
can do, I can eat whatever I want.
I can, you know, eat cereal in the middle of the night and nobody's going to tell me
the cereals for breakfast.
Like my parents told me when I was growing up all the time.
But like once you get there though, you're going to, you're going to be, you're going
to, it's going to be cool for a while, but then you're gonna be like, okay, what's next?
Is this it?
What's next?
Everything you achieve in life, you're going to ask yourself, what's next?
What's next?
Okay.
The masters, what's next?
The masters.
What's next?
PhD.
Oh, Oh, Oh.
You went to the super bowl.
What's next?
Oh, now I got to do another super bowl.
I got, now I got to break the record.
Now I got to get in the hall of fame.
You know, Oh, now I got to switch sports and be Bo Jackson and do both.
You know, I'm telling you, there's always going to be like, what's next?
What's next?
Because, because none of it's going to be that I said, but I, I, I can tell you right
now though, Christ truly satisfies.
Serving God truly satisfies.
And not only does serving God just provide a feeling of satisfaction, it actually provides
real meaning.
You know, I, I, you know, I attempted to give the gospel, I was out hiking on a few days
ago and I attempted to give the gospel to this guy that I was hiking with.
And um, you know, he basically just said, Hey, you know, that's fine for you.
He said, I don't, you know, I don't want to hear about it.
I don't want to hear about, uh, you know, Christ or being saved or anything.
But he said, Hey, if that, if that makes you happy and gets you through life and keeps
you motivated, then that's great for you.
But just leave me out of it.
Is what the guy said.
He wasn't, you know, it wasn't being rude or anything.
I was just, he was just telling me like, you know, I'm not interested.
I'm like, okay, fine.
Because plenty of people are interested.
Amen.
I would rather just deal with people that are interested, but you know, I made the attempt
to give the, just like we do every day, you know, when we knock on doors and we make that
attempt to present the gospel, right.
But here's the thing about that when he's, Oh, whatever gets you through, it's like,
you know what?
Yeah, it's true.
Christianity does motivate me.
It does get me through and it does make me happy.
But guess what?
It does a lot more than that.
It actually is real and actually provides a real meaning.
So it's not just, you know, and I can't, I can't even count how many times people told
me that.
I remember my, my reprobate uncle told me that, you know, I didn't realize at the time
he was a reprobate, but my reprobate uncle told me and my brother, he said, you know,
Christianity is your coping mechanism.
He said, everybody's got a coping mechanism and religion is just your coping mechanism.
How you cope with life.
And here's the thing.
You know what?
Yeah.
The word of God is a great coping mechanism.
It does help you cope with life, but it's also real.
It's also true.
It's not just like some kind of a song and dance we go through to make ourselves feel
like our life has meaning.
No, no, no.
It actually has meaning because of the fact that a thousand years from now, everything
we're doing right now, Matt will matter.
The soul ending that we did today will matter.
A thousand years from now, 10,000 years from now, a hundred thousand years from now, our
deeds will never be forgotten.
They're all being written down.
You know, God has written them all in his book.
He's going to reward us according to our works and everything that we do matters in eternity.
But not only that, it does provide the ultimate coping mechanism, the ultimate motivation,
the ultimate joy and peace right now.
So right now in the nasty here and now, it provides peace because the fruit of the spirit
is love, joy, peace.
And there are six more that I'm not even going to get into because you already had me at
love, joy, peace because you know, you got the law.
I know what the rest are.
Okay.
I'm a preacher.
Law, you know, love, joy, peace, long suffering, gentleness, goodness, meekness, temperance,
faith.
I got it.
But the point is those three right there.
You had me at those three before we even get to the other six.
Okay.
Because if I have love, joy, and peace in my life, I mean, I feel like I've pretty much
arrived as far as humanly speaking.
Isn't that what the world longs for?
Isn't the world out there seeking love?
They're on a quest for true love.
And they're looking for happiness, joy.
And you know what they want?
Peace.
Inner peace.
Am I right?
More than money or anything else, people want love, joy, and peace.
And you know what?
The Holy Spirit's got it on a silver platter for you.
It's called the fruit of the Spirit, love, joy, and peace.
So even in this life, even in this life, Christianity provides the meaning that Solomon's life lacked
when he was living for self.
When he was selfishly going after knowledge, selfishly going after pleasure, selfishly
going after power and money and everything else.
Christianity provides the meaning and fulfillment he was looking for even now today.
But then it also provides the eternal reward and the eternal meaning and the eternal legacy.
It really offers everything.
And so in much wisdom is much grief.
And he that increases knowledge increases sorrow because, you know, let's take the atheist
scientist.
And the more he studies about science, it's just going to depress him if he just thinks
that that's all there is because he's going to realize the cyclical nature of everything,
how everything is on a cycle, and how basically according to that logic, everything is meaningless
because everything will repeat.
Everything is the same as it's always been and will always be the same and repeat.
And it's just going to be keep repeating because nature does that.
Nature repeats.
Well, guess what?
We're no different.
It's just we're just on repeat, my friend.
History repeats itself, right?
Those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it.
So goes the saying.
But man, that's like a whole other sermon.
How about the fact that our history is being changed right now?
Like somebody just told me there's this part on Little House on the Prairie.
What was that part on Little House on the Prairie that they got canceled?
What was it, honey?
What was the statement in Little House on the Prairie that got canceled?
Tell me what it was.
Yeah.
So here's what it said in Little House on the Prairie.
There were no people for hundreds of miles, only Indians.
So it's basically implying that Indians aren't people.
Like, no people for hundreds of miles, just Indians.
So here's the thing.
Now obviously, that's a foolish statement.
That's a wrong statement to think that Indians are not people or to not consider them people
or human or made in the image of God is stupid and wrong.
And could that hurt somebody's feelings?
Absolutely.
But here's the thing.
So then they're going to publish now Little House on the Prairie with that part redacted.
But then it's not Little House on the Prairie anymore.
That's not what Laura Ingalls Wilder wrote.
And the problem with redacting that is that you might save somebody's feelings.
But here's the thing.
It's important to understand that people used to think that way in a certain region at a
certain time.
You've got to remember that and realize, like, hey, this is how some people think.
This is some people's attitude.
Or this is an attitude that people have had in the past.
That's our history.
It's understanding where we came from in our thought processes in America.
But if you go back and whitewash all that and clean all that up and take out everything
that's offensive, then those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it.
So even if you think that something is wrong or sinful or reprehensible, you don't want
to pretend that it never happened.
Now, it would be one thing to say, I'm not going to read that book because I don't like
her attitude toward Indians.
Like that makes sense.
If somebody says, like, I don't want to read that book.
I don't like that book.
I'm going to boycott that book because I don't like the way it acts toward Indians.
That's fine.
But the problem with changing the book, when that's not what she wrote, you're basically
altering history.
And where does that end?
Then you're going to alter other things about history.
And then pretty soon you're going to just keep changing the past, changing the past.
And by changing the past, you're actually, you know, dooming people to repeat the past.
And you're also fulfilling prophecy because the Bible teaches that everything's going
to be forgotten.
In Ecclesiastes chapter one, what does it say?
Everything's eventually going to be forgotten.
So those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it.
Well, guess what?
The past will all be forgotten.
And we are doomed to repeat all of it.
Every last bit of it because it all gets forgotten.
Does everybody see what I'm saying?
You know, you don't want to just erase or, and really it's a lie to say this is what
Laura Ingalls Wilder said and then change it.
Just like the new King James version is a lie because King James had been dead for several
hundred years before it came out.
That's a lie.
That's not the King James version.
Did King James reach up with his dead hand and sign off on it?
Then it's not the King James version, is it?
It's a lie is what it is.
Can't be a new King James version.
There's only the one that King James approved, the one that he authorized.
And so we see that erasing the past is vain.
And I'm not sure how I got off on that, but I'm glad I did.
You know, I wanted to say that.
That which is crooked cannot be made straight.
All is vanity.
Folks, thank God for our home in heaven, but thank God that the decades that we spend on
this earth actually have meaning.
And you know what?
The Christian life's a great life.
You know, it's, it's a wonderful life.
It's much more fulfilling than anything that the world has out there.
So you know, they're out there living life to the full.
Yeah, I mean, that's what Richard Dawkins, because people ask Richard Dawkins like, why
are you so against Christianity?
Why do you want to promote atheism so much?
And he's like, well, people think there's something else beyond the grave, so then they
don't end up living life to the full.
But what, but I mean, do we like, do you, would you ever just wish you were Richard
Dawkins?
You know what I mean?
Like, I don't.
The true living of life to the full is following Christ.
You know, the apostle Paul whipped and beaten and in jail with Silas.
Was he living life to the full?
I mean, I don't know.
Was he?
Hey, I say that he had more love, joy, and peace in his heart in that jail cell than
Richard Dawkins has ever experienced, than Bill Gates has ever experienced in his life.
Paul had more love, joy, and peace, the three things that really matter, in that jail cell.
And that was on his worst day, humanly speaking.
Other days when he was wining and dining, you know, being put up by rich people and,
you know, when he's on the island there in Melita and he gets, you know, he's staying
with the, he's staying in the biggest mansion on the island.
He experienced both, you know, but he had more fulfillment in life, but also instead
of burning in hell with the unsaved, he's up there right now rejoicing with, with Christ.
He's in that heavenly cloud of witnesses.
The apostle Paul right now is living the afterlife to the full.
He's up and his joy will never end and no, you know what, thousands of years from now
when we don't know or care who Richard Dawkins or Bill Gates are, 2000 years from now, 5000
years from now, we'll never forget the apostle Paul.
You say, well, how do you know?
Because the word of God abides forever and his name's all over it.
So if there's one person we're not going to forget, it's Paul.
So who lived life to the full?
So any way you slice it, the Christian life is the life.
And if you don't believe me, if you're listening to me right now and you're skeptical, well,
you know what?
Just give it a few years, go chasing whatever it is that you're chasing, go chase education,
go chase money, go chase career, go chase all the skirts, but guess what?
You're going to come back and eventually say that I'm right, that it was all vanity and
vexation of spirit.
Solomon found out the hard way.
Don't live your life finding this out the hard way.
Why don't you just trust the word of God and start serving God right now and say, you know,
I'm going to put God first now.
I'm going to seek the Lord.
I'm going to read the Bible.
I'm going to pray.
I'm going to go to church.
I'm going to do something with my life that matters.
Trust in the Lord and trust me what I'm telling you because I'm preaching here.
You know, Solomon's not the only preacher.
I'm a preacher too and I'm telling you the same thing Solomon's telling you.
It's vanity.
There's nothing in that strip club.
There's nothing in that casino.
And you know what?
I don't have to go there to tell you that.
I can tell you that because I've read the word of God and I know that there's nothing
there.
Seek the Lord.
It's the only thing that has meaning in life.
Now we're going to get into a lot.
Don't worry.
The next 11 weeks are not just going to be me just saying over and over again, life doesn't
matter.
Life sucks and then you die.
Life has no meaning.
You know, that's just chapter one.
That's the foundation.
There's a lot of other great things that this book is about.
There's a lot more to this book.
There's all kinds of wisdom.
It's sort of like a miniature book of Proverbs.
So we're going to be, it's almost like preaching through the book of Proverbs in a lot of ways.
We're going to get a lot of Proverbs and a lot of other insights.
I'm not going to be repetitive throughout this series, but come on.
Chapter one, you got to lay this down and then now that we have this sort of prerequisite,
now that we understand chapter one, we're ready to go into chapters two through 12 without
coming away with some kind of a Seventh Day Adventist or Jehovah's Witness kind of interpretation.
Now we get the book.
We can get into the nitty gritty of each chapter and each chapter is going to have a lot of
great things for us.
It's very great.
It's one of my favorite books.
I think it's a lot of people's one of their favorites, I think.
So let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer.
Father, we thank you so much for this book, Lord, and Lord, thank you for the Holy Spirit
to teach it to us and explain it to us.
Lord, give us understanding over the next 11 weeks as we study this, Lord, give us understanding,
open our minds and our hearts to the truth and just show us wondrous things from your
word, Lord.
And in Jesus' name, we pray.
Amen.