Man, Ecclesiastes chapter number four, we continue here with King Solomon.
And remember, when we're studying the book of Ecclesiastes, this is a very difficult book.
This is one of the harder books in the Bible.
And so we want to make sure that we interpret this by comparing scripture with scripture.
And there are lots of portions of scripture in the Bible that are easy to understand.
And, you know, one of the best tips I could give you for Bible study is that when you have
scriptures that are clear and simple and easy to understand, you know, make those the
foundation of your faith and what you believe.
It's sort of like algebra.
You know, you start with what you know and then you solve for the unknown.
Well, think about the Bible that way.
Parts of the Bible are easy.
They're simple. They're clear.
It's obvious what the Bible is saying.
You know, anchor yourself on those constants.
And then, you know, scriptures like this are a little bit more obscure and difficult, and
you need to interpret them in light of other clear scripture, especially because
Ecclesiastes represents Solomon's thought process.
Eventually, he comes to all the right conclusions, but sometimes he has some strange
thoughts along the way.
And the Bible is just taking us through the entire process as he's fleshing these things
out. So it starts out in chapter four, verse one.
So I returned and considered all the oppressions that are done under the sun.
And behold, the tears of such as were oppressed and they had no comforter.
And on the side of their oppressors, there was power, but they had no comforter.
And this is a theme that has already come up in the Book of Ecclesiastes, where Solomon
just doesn't like the way the world is.
And he doesn't think that things are fair and he doesn't like the fact that he's going
to work and achieve a bunch of things and store up a bunch of wealth, and then he's
going to leave it to someone else.
There's just a lot about this world that bothers him.
And so here, one of the things that bothers him is the fact that this world is not a fair
place. There are lots of people in this world that are oppressed and abused and they're
kept down, but yet they have no comforter.
Nobody helps them out.
Nobody strengthens them.
Nobody goes to bat for them.
And then on the side of their oppressors, there's power.
You know, so you see a lot of wicked people prospering in this world and then you see a
lot of other just helpless, innocent people that are just victims.
And this is very similar to what Job is teaching us, where Job talks about over and over
again, you know, wicked people prospering and succeeding and doing well and then good
people going through bad times.
And what we need to understand is simply that the world is not fair.
The world is a sinful place.
It's a mankind is in a fallen condition.
And so you're not going to find fairness in this world.
You're going to find all kinds of good people suffering and bad people being blessed,
quote unquote, at least that's how it seems.
But of course, we know by faith that God is going to settle the score in the end.
It's all going to be fair and just and balanced in the end, according to God's
judgment.
But don't look at this world expecting it to be fair.
Now, a lot of people, because life isn't fair, because the world isn't fair, because
there are winners and losers and because sometimes, you know, the best people are not
being blessed the most and the worst people seem to be getting ahead and doing well.
They get disillusioned with God or the Bible.
But in reality, you know, the Bible teaches us that that's how it's going to be.
So therefore, when we see the world being an unfair place, that's just confirmed to us
what scripture is saying, because nowhere did scripture ever say, ever say, hey,
everything's fair, good people are always going to be living good and bad people are
always going to be suffering.
All that.
Now, if the Bible said that and then I looked at reality and didn't see that, then
that would make me question the Bible, like what's going on with the Bible here, you
know, acting like everything's going to be fair when it's not.
No, the Bible tells you it's not fair.
People are oppressed.
There are crying tears and it's horrible.
And guess what?
On the side of the oppressors is power and they have no comforter.
Is that what we see in this world?
Yes, it is.
So the Bible never paints this rosy picture that people are looking for because we're
living in a sinful, fallen world.
All kinds of bad things happen.
The dark places of this earth are full of the habitations of cruelty.
The Bible says, and you know, those of us who live in the United States, we're
sheltered in many ways from just how wicked this world is because we live in one of
the nicest places in the world.
I mean, we go to bed every night and we feel completely safe.
Even if you're in kind of a rough neighborhood, you still feel pretty safe
going to bed at night in the United States.
And, you know, God has blessed us to be born here or to have moved here because of
the fact that we have peace and prosperity that's unparalleled virtually anywhere else
in the world.
I mean, if we were in India, I see you nodding your head.
If we were in India right now, you know, we wouldn't be living as good of a life as
we're living here right now.
Okay.
There are all kinds of places and Asia and Africa and South America where people are
struggling and they're living in much worse conditions.
And so I'm afraid that our young people who grow up here in the United States and
especially growing up in church with godly parents, I'm afraid that they could just
grow up thinking that everything in this world is just kind of sunshine and rainbows
and unicorns and get a little bit spoiled.
And, you know, their biggest problem is that, you know, they didn't get to eat their
very favorite thing for dinner tonight and other people, you know, don't have anything
for dinner tonight in other parts of the world.
So it's important that we understand that we're truly blessed to live in America and
that people are suffering and going through pain and misery all over this world.
Now, part of the reason why we are so blessed in America is because historically our
country has been Christian.
Now, not necessarily the leadership, but in general, as a people, Americans have been
a Christian nation and actually a fairly moral and godly nation as a whole historically.
But the problem is that's not what we're doing now.
You know, now we're getting away from the morals of the Bible.
We're being de-Christianized, yet we're still prospering because it's always a
delayed reaction.
When you reap what you sow, it takes a long time.
So the seeds that we're sowing right now are not good seeds, but right now we're still
reaping the benefits of our Christian heritage in the past.
The fact that our nation has been godly in the past.
And again, I'm not necessarily talking about the leadership, but just as a nation, culturally,
we've been Christian.
Nowadays, though, the more we knock doors in 2021 and beyond, you're going to see more
and more hostility toward the things of God.
You know, you're going to get more and more people that are just angry that you're even
bringing up Jesus or even mentioning the Bible.
Okay.
And as a result, you know, things are going to go downhill in this country as a result
of that.
And so we need to understand that there are oppressions and horrible things that are going
on in other parts of the world.
You should be very thankful for everything that you have and the blessings of God living
here in America, especially living with Christian parents who love you and take care of your
needs and don't expose you to a lot of the dark things that you'll probably be exposed
to later as an adult, understanding just how dark this world is.
But again, if the Bible told me it was all going to be sunshine and rainbows, then I
would question the Bible at that point.
But no, no, no.
The Bible told us that man is sinful.
The Bible told us that the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked.
Who can know it?
The Bible told us that there's none righteous, no, not one.
The Bible told us that the dark places of the earth are full of the habitations of cruelty.
So it shouldn't surprise us when that's the reality and it matches up with the word of
God.
So because of this, you know, Solomon just kind of leaps to this conclusion in verse
two, wherefore I praise the dead, which are already dead more than the living, which are
yet alive.
He said, man, I don't even want to be alive.
It'd be better just to be dead because the world's such a painful, sorrowful, dark,
horrible place, right?
This is obviously not a correct way to look at things, okay?
To think like, hey, we're all better off dead or something, right?
But this is the thought process that he's going through in the book of Ecclesiastes.
He says, yea, better is he than both they which have not yet been, who had not seen
the evil work that is done under the sun.
And this is very similar to what Job said, right?
Job said, why die, die not in the womb?
And he basically praises the untimely birth of a woman and says it would have been better
just to die in the womb to be a miscarriage and the soul goes straight to heaven and you
don't have to go through any of the pain and suffering and travail and misery that's
on this earth.
And so you can see how Solomon would think this way because this is how Job thought the
same way and he said the same thing.
And so they're just basically saying, the world's so messed up, who would even want
to live in it?
And you'll hear people even say things like this sometimes today where people will say,
well, I'm not going to have kids because I don't want to bring them into this world.
Who's ever had someone say that to you?
You have pretty much every hand in the building, which that is not a right conclusion to come
to to say like, oh, the world's too wicked.
We don't want to bring children into this world.
The Bible tells us that children are a blessing.
The Bible tells us to be fruitful and multiply and that the fruit of the womb is his reward
and happy is the man that hath this quiver full of them.
So having children is good.
It's a blessing.
And you can still raise a godly family in 2021 America and you can still live a good,
clean, decent Christian life.
You can live a peaceful, godly, honest life today in 2021.
And you know, frankly, I personally don't wish that I lived at any other time.
I don't wish I was living back in the 50s or the 20s or any other period.
Like I'm glad to be alive right now.
If I could pick any time to be alive, it'd be right now.
It would be this era, this period, you know, and God knew what he was doing when he put
us all here.
You know, here we are.
This is where we belong.
And so don't get this attitude of, uh, you know, oh, well, it's just, it's too wicked.
It's too evil.
Folks, the more darkness there is, the brighter our light can shine.
You know, my, my, my son, uh, Peter is a little toddler, you know, he came up to me, it was
either this morning or yesterday morning with a little flashlight and, and he said, oh,
it doesn't work in here because you know, it was so bright.
It was not effective.
And he, you know, he, we had to take it into the bathroom, shut the door so that we could
actually see the light because if it's too bright, you don't even see it.
So think of our world becoming darker or more wicked or going down an evil path.
The United States going down a dark path, you know, just think of it as an opportunity
to let your light shine because we're going to spend our entire eternity living in this
very sanitary, righteous, godly place where we're not going to have to worry about any
of the junk that's down here on this earth.
Right?
So this is our opportunity to live in the junk place, you know, to, to live in a dark
place where we can shine the light of the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ.
This is our opportunity to minister.
This is our opportunity to be a witness.
It's our opportunity to let our light shine.
And so don't lament the fact that we're here now.
God has put us here now because we have a job to do now.
We're here for such a time as this.
And so don't get a pessimistic attitude about the fact that our country is getting more
wicked or that, you know, there are so many people turning away from the faith.
Well, if so many people are turning away from the faith, all the more reason why we need
to be here right now, turning people toward the faith, right?
And, and winning people to Christ, since many people are turning away from Christ, we're
here to win them unto Christ.
And so, you know, think of it as an opportunity being put in the hottest part of the battle
or being put, you know, in a time when you're needed.
That's the way I would look at it is that, you know, God needs us right now because of
the fact that so few people are preaching the gospel, you know, he's ready and willing
to use us.
And so it's, it's actually a great opportunity, you know, and that's why I'm not trying
to just create a little slice of heaven on earth by, you know, isolating myself.
You know, some people today, because things are sinful and, and things are wicked, they
want to isolate themselves.
And so they want to just kind of go live out in the woods somewhere and just kind of just
cut themselves off from society.
I mean, this is pretty popular right now, just because things are getting weird.
And so people just, they don't want their family to be exposed to any of this stuff
that's going on.
And so they just want to isolate themselves out in the wilderness.
And to me, you know, if I just wanted to live in this cloister or monastery or, you know,
I want to just separate myself in some kind of a holy little commune, whether it's with
family or anybody else, you know, to me, it's like, what's the point of even being on this
earth?
You know, I can do that for all eternity.
I can be in a godly, clean, sanitary place, but, but rather the reason that I'm here on
this earth is to minister to the law.
So that means I have to be around the laws.
And Jesus told us that he didn't want us to be taken out of this world, but just to be
kept from the evil.
And so I'm not interested in withdrawing from society.
I'm not interested in moving to some other part of the country because it's more godly
there.
You know, I'm fine being right here in Phoenix, Arizona, for all of its sinfulness or ungodliness.
Now, look, I can understand not wanting to live in like a super ungodly place that's
like a Sodom and Gomorrah.
Yeah, get out of there and don't look back.
But, you know, we're not even close to that yet in Phoenix, Arizona.
And so we need to just understand that it's our job to be amongst sinners and not to just
not interact with anybody.
You know, we should interact with worldly people.
We should interact with our neighbors and people at our job and at school and just in
our community because we're reaching them with the gospel.
You know, we're knocking their doors and giving them the gospel.
We're running into them in other areas of life.
So that's why I don't want to just go move to someplace where everybody's godly.
If everybody's godly, then my work here is done.
Right?
What do they need me for?
If I moved somewhere where everybody's saved, how am I going to do any soul-winning?
I need to be around people that are not saved so I can win them to the Lord.
And so you can see the frustration here, you know, praising the dead and life isn't fair
and the world's messed up.
That's how a lot of people feel right now.
But we need to understand that God has us here for a reason and we need to see it as
an opportunity to let our light shine and do more and not try to escape from it.
He says in verse number four, again, I considered all travail and every right work that for
this a man is envied of his neighbor.
This is also vanity and vexation of spirit.
So he's just bringing up more stuff that bothers him about the world.
He's just complaining about how bad the world is.
And he brings up here, he says, you know, when you do what's right and when you succeed
and do well for yourself, all that does is make people resent you and envy you.
You know, the more successful you are, then you have people around you that just hate
you for being successful because they're jealous of you, right?
They're envious of your success.
And he says this is vanity and vexation of spirit.
Again, vexation of spirit means this is irritating unto me.
That's what it means to vex his spirit.
And then he says in verse five, the fool foldeth his hand together and eateth his own flesh.
Now let's put these two verses together, verses four and five.
So in verse four, we've got the guy who's doing the right work.
And what's the operative word here?
Work.
So you've got a guy who is doing the right work and he's succeeding and he's being envied
by other people.
And one of the people that's envying him is the fool.
And the fool folds his hands together and eats his own flesh.
Now, what you have to understand is that when you study Proverbs and Ecclesiastes,
typically the fool and the slothful man are the same person.
Often those are used interchangeably so that the fool is somebody who's lazy.
Okay, lazy people are fools.
Fools are lazy.
This is something that we see throughout Proverbs and Ecclesiastes.
And so the fool folding his hands together and eating his own flesh is basically a picture
of the fact that he's refusing to work.
He's folding his hands together because his hands aren't out doing stuff.
And so he's folding his hands together and eating his own flesh.
Basically, it's just referring to the fact that he's not willing to go out and work and
provide for himself and get his own food by actually doing profitable labor.
So we need to understand that today there are a lot of people who are envious of people
who have money or have a house or have a car or have possessions.
And a lot of times these people are just lazy people who don't want to work hard.
And then they look at someone who works hard and think, oh, it must be nice.
And look, there are a lot of people out there today that you would look at and see them
in their nice clothes and their fancy car and they're the bosses or the managers.
And you might think to yourself, oh, it must be nice.
But what you don't see behind the scenes is probably a lot of hard work that went into
that.
And so we want to be careful that we don't just look at anyone who has money and just
automatically just think, oh, it must be nice and it isn't fair and I didn't get a fair
shake and how come they get to have all this stuff.
You know, it's one of the Ten Commandments, thou shalt not covet, meaning don't look
at what other people have and wish that it was yours.
And again, we started out in verse one of this chapter saying that life isn't going
to be fair.
Life is not fair.
You know, people talk about, you know, growing up privileged or whatever.
But, you know, if you think about it, different people have different advantages in life.
Some people, yeah, they do start out with more of an advantage than others.
But at the end of the day, if you work hard as a Christian, God's going to bless you.
Now, we started out in verse one saying that life isn't fair and that there are all
kinds of good people suffering and all kinds of bad people succeeding.
But what you have to understand is that when you get saved and you become a child of God,
a different set of rules apply to you than apply to the rest of the world.
Okay, what do I mean by that?
What I mean is that if you're an unsaved person and you're out there in the world,
you might go out there and just work your tail off and just never get rewarded, never
get recognition, never get ahead and die in poverty even though you just worked your tail
off and you did your best and everybody just oppresses you and steals you from you and
beats you up and you just, your life's horrible and then you die and whatever.
That could happen if you're to an unsaved person and there are lots of unsaved people
in this world and there are people who go through life like that.
But what you have to understand is that if you're saved, the Bible promises you that
if we do our work as unto the Lord and as unto Christ, then every good thing which
any man doeth, the same shall he receive of the Lord, whether he be bond or free.
So he says, servants, be obedient to them that are your masters according to the flesh,
with singleness of heart, as unto Christ, not with eye service as men pleasers,
but as the servants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart, with good will,
doing service as the Lord and not unto men, knowing that whatsoever good thing any man doeth,
the same shall he receive of the Lord, whether he be bond or free.
You know, Jacob was working for his uncle Laban and he kept getting ripped off,
but then God came to him and said, look, I see what Laban's doing
and I'm going to take care of you. I'm going to protect you. I'm going to bless you.
And you know what? God will do the same thing for you.
If you work hard, you will be blessed as a Christian, period.
Now, are there people in this world who work hard and never get rewarded?
Yes, but they're not God's children.
God takes care of his children to where you'll be rewarded if you go out and work hard.
I'm not saying you're going to be rich.
Being rich is not necessarily a blessing, but having your daily bread is a blessing.
Having what you need, having a roof over your head,
having food and clothing and able to make it in this world is a blessing.
And God promises as a Christian that if you work hard, your labor is not in vain,
not just from an eternal perspective,
but that he'll even reward you even on this earth and take care of you on this earth.
So therefore, don't be the fool who just folds your hands together, eats your own flesh,
and then looks at the person who's worked hard and achieved something and said,
oh, it must be nice.
You know, while you were fooling around and wasting time and watching TV and sitting on
your rear end, some people were out gaining skills and working hard and achieving something,
and you could do the same thing,
especially because you're living in America in the land of opportunity.
And not only are you living in America in the land of opportunity,
but you've got the Lord on your side, and you've got these promises of God saying that
if you work hard, you're going to succeed.
And look, I had a job for a couple of years where I worked hard,
and the boss would just never give me a fair shake.
And they were always just going back on their word and lying.
And you think you're going to get a raise, and it never materializes.
And they just were always just pinching every penny with us.
And they just didn't treat their employees well.
And I worked there for a couple of years, and I remember just thinking, man,
I wish I'd never taken this job.
It was such a big mistake, because my last job was so much better,
and I just didn't like the job.
But you know what?
I just kept doing the job, and I went, and I worked hard, and it bothered me.
And when I went to leave that job, I knew how these people are.
I'm like, man, if I put in my two weeks notice, they're going to start cutting my hours and
stuff, even though I need every penny until I leave,
because I'm living paycheck to paycheck here.
But I'm like, you know what?
I'm going to put in my two weeks notice anyway, because it's the right thing to do.
I remember just quoting the golden rule.
All things whatsoever you would that men should do to you, do you even so to them.
And I'm like, I would want an employee to put in their two weeks notice to me,
so that's what I'm going to do for them, even though I know they're going to.
And of course, that's what happened.
Of course, they treated me unfairly when I put in my notice.
But you know what, though?
Right after that, a few weeks later, I got a job that I really liked,
where I made more money than I'd ever made.
And it was all the skills I had gained on that job that I hated.
And during that time, I was working hard.
I wasn't really getting compensated the way I was supposed to get compensated.
But you know what?
God saw me going through that and not getting a fair shake.
And he made sure that I got it from the next job.
So God looks down, and he sees his children working hard.
He's going to take care of you.
He's going to provide your needs.
So don't be foolish.
And what does it mean to be foolish in this context?
The fool is the guy who, number one, he's lazy.
And number two, he envies other people who worked hard and thinks like,
oh, it must be nice, instead of realizing, hey, they worked hard.
They've earned that.
And I need to go out and do the same thing for myself and get ahead myself.
But then he follows this up with verse six,
because four, five, and six kind of all go together here.
But then he follows this up and says, better is a handful with quietness
than both the hands full with travail and vexation of spirit.
So on the one hand, he's looking at the rich man in verse four,
the guy who has worked hard and achieved something.
And he's the envy of everyone around him, right?
Because he's achieved, and he has possessions.
Then he looks in verse five at the guy who's lazy and blaming everyone else.
And he envies the rich man, but it's really just because he's too lazy to do anything.
And then in verse six, he talks about the fact that better is a handful with quietness
than both the hands full with travail and vexation of spirit.
And what the Bible is basically teaching here is that the middle station of life
is the best station here.
Because, you know, both hands full with travail and vexation of spirit,
that's what Solomon's experiencing being very rich, very prosperous.
He's got both hands full.
Basically, he's got excess.
He's got more than enough.
He's got too much, but it bothers him.
And he's irritated, and he has the stress of being rich.
And, you know, the Bible says the abundance of the rich will not suffer him to sleep.
Can't sleep at night because he's too worried about his portfolio
and too stressed out about all the possessions and wealth and everything.
So basically what he's saying, you know, it's better just to have the one handful with quietness.
You know, so the middle station of life.
This is what Proverbs chapter 30 teaches.
Give me neither poverty nor riches.
Feed me with food convenient for me.
We should not desire to be rich, according to the Bible.
But obviously, we don't want to be poor either, do we?
And who here just wants to be dirt poor?
Not me.
None of us wants to be poor.
But you know what?
I don't want to be rich either because that comes with all this other set of problems.
You know, what we should just desire is to just go to work every day and have what we need, right?
And just be able to pay the bills and take care of our families and not stress out about our
portfolio because we don't have a, the only portfolio I have is in a trapper keeper.
You know, that's my portfolio.
I don't even know if those things even exist anymore.
They probably stopped existing about 25 years ago.
But who remembers the trapper keepers?
Were those things cool or what?
It was like once a year, that was the ritual.
You know, you went down to the store and it's like you got your new trappers and trapper keepers.
Some people have no idea what I'm talking about.
That's the only portfolio I've ever had was a trapper, okay?
But you know what?
What do I need?
What do I need all these riches and wealth for, right?
I don't.
As long as I've got food on the table, as long as my family's provided for, you know,
I don't want to be rich.
I don't want to be poor.
The middle station of life is the best according to scripture.
And so it says in verse seven, then I returned.
So he's kind of changing the subject a few times here.
He says, then I returned and I saw vanity under the sun.
There's one alone and there's not a second.
Yea, he hath neither child nor brother, yet is there no end of all his labor?
Neither is his eye satisfied with riches, neither sayeth he for whom do I labor and
bereave my soul of good.
This is also vanity.
Yea, it is a sore travail.
Now, have you ever known people like this or been aware of people like this that literally
have no family?
They're just single and they just work so many hours and they work so hard and they
just have so much wealth.
And it's like, who are they working for?
Or like, how about an elderly person that's like 70, 80, 90 years old and they just have
millions of dollars in the bank and they have no children and they have no heirs.
And it's just like, what in the world are you going to do with all that money?
Where's that money going to go?
And you know, then they donate it to the SPCA or whatever.
You know, they donate it to something.
But he's saying, you know, there, here's a guy that's being described in verse eight.
He doesn't have a child and he doesn't have a brother.
And yet there's no end of all his labor and he's not satisfied with his riches.
And he never even asked himself, who am I doing this for?
Why am I working so hard?
And this is vanity and it's a sore travail.
So, you know, he's just, but again, you say, well, what's that verse about?
You know, what do I learn from that verse?
What do I take from that?
Solomon just basically explaining all the different ways that life is vain so that
we can understand what the true meaning of life is, which is to serve the Lord.
That's the end of the book.
Spoiler alert.
But anyway, that's why it says in verse nine, two are better than one.
You know, being alone is not good because they have a good reward for their labor.
For if they fall, the one will lift up his fellow, but woe to him that is alone when
he falls, for he hath not another to help him up.
Again, if two lie together, then they have heat, but how can one be warm alone?
And if one prevail against him, two shall withstand him and a threefold cord is not
quickly broken.
So again, if we put verse eight together with verses nine through 12, here's what we
understand is that the people and the relationships in our life are more important than money.
The guy in verse eight, he doesn't have people in his life.
He doesn't have relationships.
Verses nine through 12 is saying, Hey, the people, you know, you need to have someone
to share life with and go through life with.
Because this guy in verse eight, nobody wants to be him.
Yeah, but he's a millionaire.
Yeah, but he's all alone.
You know, you'd rather have family and friends and church and loved ones around you.
And so people are more important than things.
People are more important than money.
Now let's go through these verses quickly.
Verse nine, he says two are better than one for they have a good reward for their labor.
For if they fall, the one will lift up his fellow, but woe to him that is alone when
he falleth for he hath not another to help him up.
You know, we teach our children this all the time, right?
Don't go swimming alone.
You know, never swim alone.
Don't go hiking alone, right?
We always want to use the buddy system and stay together as a group.
Safety in numbers, right?
We're all taught this as children.
It's true because if you fall, woe unto you if you fall and you're alone.
Nobody's there to help you.
Nobody's there to call for help.
You could end very poorly there.
And so he says two are better than one.
Woe to him that's alone when he falleth for he hath not another to help him up.
But spiritually, we could apply this by saying, you know, you don't want to be out there alone
in your Christian life.
You need the local church.
The church provides support for you.
And look, I don't care how spiritual you think you are.
You need the local church.
Look, I need the local church.
You know, without church, you will grow spiritually cold.
And the thing about it is that there are many days if I think back over the last 16 years
of pastoring or if I think back even just over the decades of being saved, even before
I was a pastor, if I think about that, you know, I can think of times when I was growing
spiritually cold or just don't feel like reading the Bible, don't feel like going soul.
Yeah, you go through phases where you love soul, when you love reading the Bible, you
love praying.
Other times you're just kind of like, nah, you're not into it.
Now, I know that some of you are far more spiritual than me and you have no idea what
I'm talking about.
But I think most of us can relate with going through spiritual highs and lows and going
through periods where the honeymoon's over of church and you're just kind of dragging
through.
But, you know, there are so many times when I'm down spiritually and just going to church
just instantly refreshes my spirit.
And times when I'm just not feeling up to going soul-winning, but then when you got
the soul-winning partner, now it's like, let's go.
You know, you're encouraged because you've got somebody to go with.
Man, going soul-winning by yourself is hard.
Going soul-winning by yourself is really hard because it's just discouraging.
It's lonely.
Not only that, but as the Bible says, you know, things can go wrong and you don't have
anyone there to help you.
So it's always better to go soul-winning with someone.
Now, some people have gone so far as to say it's wrong to go soul-winning by yourself.
The Bible doesn't teach that anywhere.
You know, there's only one verse that even talks about how Jesus sent them out two by
two.
And I'm all for going out two by two because of scriptures like this, too.
I think we should go out two by two.
But it's definitely not wrong to go by yourself, but it's definitely a drag to go by yourself.
I mean, look, if I had no one to go with, I'd go by myself.
When I started Faith Forward Baptist Church, many times I had no one to go with.
I did many scores of hours of soul-winning by myself.
Actually, hundreds of hours of soul-winning by myself the first year or so of this church's
existence because I didn't have a partner.
But man, it was great to start having a soul-winning partner.
Thank God for Dave Burzins, you know, showing up.
And you know, I had other soul-winning partners come and go during that time.
But Dave Burzins was my first steady soul-winning partner.
It was every week there, soul-winning with me.
And man, that made all the difference.
Look, getting yourself out soul-winning is very difficult, almost impossible.
But when you got a church that's rallying you, and there's a time in the bulletin, and
you show up, and you got a buddy that you're partnered up with, man, it's 100 times easier.
And so we need church.
We need Christian friends.
We need people to encourage us when we're down because there are going to be times when
we're weak spiritually, and we need other people to prop us up.
And then other times, we can prop them up spiritually.
And we need to be having that camaraderie.
You know, and he says, if two lie together, then they have heat.
But how can one be warm alone?
And you know, you get spiritually cold when you're out there by yourself.
And if you're looking to the internet for companionship, that's a rough companion.
You know what I mean?
Like, it's so much better to have actual companionship with flesh and blood human beings
in real life that you can actually look at them in the eye and walk and talk with them.
It's, you know, if you're only companionships on the internet, you're missing out on the
real thing, okay?
And so there's no substitute for actually physically showing up at the actual brick
and mortar building where the church is meeting and actually being in company with God's
people.
There's no substitute for it.
Physically being around other people.
And you know, coronavirus, you know, caused a lot of people to really hunker down.
You know, and I mean, you know, most of us, you know, when everything got the most sketchy
and they're saying, hey, 15 days to stop the spread and hey, just, you know, just the
month of March or whatever it was, April, March, I think it was March, you know, hey,
let's slow down.
You know, it was okay to hunker down for a couple weeks or a month of just kind of, you
know, spending more time at home.
It kind of felt like a little bit of a rest or a Sabbath.
But then it's like, man, some people took it to extremes.
Like, I talked to this one guy, he's like, I haven't left my house in one year.
And he was, this was like a badge of honor for him.
Like, I haven't left the house in a year.
It's like, dude, you got a problem.
You're a hikikomori now.
And the thing is, you know, even if you, even if you were that worried about the virus,
you should, I mean, why don't you just go out in the middle of the night or something
and just, and just walk 10 miles or something, you know, it's like, you haven't left your
house in a year that it's like, you're on house arrest.
You're like a prisoner.
That's crazy at that point.
But what I'm saying is, you know, that kind of gave a lot of people a taste of what it's
like to be alone.
And man, I remember just even after a few weeks of that, it was like everybody was just
hungry for fellowship, hungry, you know, people would come to church and man, they wanted
to talk and stay after and hang out and let's go to the restaurant and let's just keep
this thing going because it gets lonely.
You know, human beings are not designed to be alone.
If two lie together, then they have heat, but how can one be warm alone?
You get cold spiritually when you get away from church.
Church keeps you in the fire spiritually, keeps you warm.
And you know, whenever I read this verse, I think of an experience that I had when I
was a kid, my dad and I were camping in Nevada on a dirt bike riding trip and we were sleeping
in the back of a truck with a camper shell and it just got so incredibly cold, like below
zero cold.
And we had this little propane heater, but even with the little propane heater, the water
in our water bottles froze solid in the place where we were sleeping.
Like in the camper shell where we slept, it froze.
And you know, we had our sleeping bags, but we were so cold that, and here's the thing
about my family, we're not really a very affectionate family.
You know what I mean?
Like some families are really affectionate.
My family growing up was not affectionate at all.
But man, did we get affectionate that night because, you know, you know, we're not, we're
not like a family that hugs each other.
You know, we go to family gatherings, it's kind of a handshake, you know, and all right,
you know, see you later.
You know, we're not super lovey-dovey in my family growing up, but man, me and my dad
that night, it was me and my dad and we were just like hugged together, literally just
trying to survive.
I mean, it was cold and that was like how we survived through the night.
And you know, never hugged my dad like that before or since, but man, we were cold and
we were just like, we were both just like, just shivering and just trying to, cause it
was like we underestimated, I guess how cold it was going to be that night around.
We, you know, we made it through, but man, it was cold.
And that's why I think about this verse.
Like, you know, when you get super cold, that's what you have to do.
Like you have to huddle with other people just to survive and to conserve heat.
And it says in verse 12, and if one prevail against him, two shall withstand him.
And a threefold cord is not quickly broken.
So, you know, not only do we stay warm spiritually by having that companionship and camaraderie,
but also he says, if one prevail against him, two shall withstand him.
You know, another thing that we teach our kids is not just don't go swimming alone.
Don't go hiking alone.
Cause you know, you might get hurt, you could drown or whatever, but, but also just, if
you're out walking around by yourself, you're far more likely to be abducted as a child.
And I've told my children so many times I'll say to them, Hey, you know, you need to bring
someone with you.
Or I've said to my wife before, I've said, Hey, you know, if you're going to go there,
if you're going to go there at that time, bring one of the kids with you.
And my wife said to me like, Oh, are they going to protect me?
You know, is this five year old that I'm bringing with me going to protect me?
Is a six year old going to protect me?
But the answer is yes, they will.
Because think about it.
It's not that the five year old is just going to do Kung Fu on your assailant.
But here's the thing.
A predator is looking for someone who's by themselves.
I mean, think about it.
If you were some violent criminal looking to kidnap someone, are you going to kidnap
the person that's by themselves?
Or are you going to kidnap the person that's with a five year old?
Now it's not the five year old is going to defeat you, but it's just another variable.
It's another wild card.
When you're by yourself, you're a target.
When I was a kid, I got attacked by dogs in a neighbor of these big Rottweilers attack
me and bit me.
I counted 21 bite marks on my body after they were done with me.
So I got bit up bad by these Rottweilers.
And it was funny because I was jogging.
It was part of PE.
We were jogging over to this park to play baseball.
But I had left early and a couple other guys had left early.
So there were two guys jogging on one side of the street and I was jogging on the other
side of the street.
And there were these two big mean Rottweilers over on the side of the street where the two
guys were jogging.
And those two Rottweilers just ran right by those guys and just ignored them and just
came right over to me.
And they just started circling me and growling.
And I remember just thinking like, why did they single me out?
At the time, I didn't understand it.
I was like, man, they just jog by these two other potential victims and they just jog
straight over to me and they just singled me out.
And then later I understood the fact, oh, duh, it's because I was by myself.
And, you know, dogs, they have instinct and part of their instinct is to go after the
one that's by themselves.
And, you know, the Bible says the devil walketh about as a roaring lion seeking whom he may
devour.
And you know who he's going to be able to devour is the guy who's by himself.
And that's why it's dangerous to be by yourself.
And that's why, like, sometimes we'll be out solvening on the rez.
You don't really worry about this much in Phoenix, but when you're out on the Indian
reservations, there are a lot of loose dogs, the rez dogs, and the vast majority of them
are benign.
But there are some pit bulls out there that are vicious and dangerous.
And I always tell my kids, like, whatever you do, you've got to stay right next to me
because if we're both together, it's a lot less likely to bite us and attack us.
And we have tasers and stuff.
But anyway, you know, I always tell them, like, don't even get, I tell them, don't even
get six feet from me.
Don't even get, don't even socially distance.
You know, I tell them, like, be right next to me because if they see two of us, you know,
they're not human.
Their brains aren't that complex.
They're not quoting poetry, you know, as they look at you.
And in their brains, they're just saying, like, two people, you know, one person.
You know, they're animals.
And they are programmed to go after the person that's by themselves.
Here's two together.
Here's one gazelle by itself.
Go after it.
Go after the wildebeest that's by itself.
You know, go after the one that's alone.
And you know what?
The devil is going to be far more likely to go after you and succeed at taking you down
when you're by yourself.
If you're alone, you're a target.
You're a victim.
Just like a kid who goes to the store by themselves is a target, right?
That could be abducted.
Whereas if some car is going to pull up and grab a kid and throw them in, they're not
going to go after two.
Because while they're grabbing the one, the other runs away.
If one prevail against him, two shall withstand him.
And a threefold cord's not quickly broken.
He's saying if you have three, it's even better.
But woe unto him that's alone when he falleth, right?
When you're by yourself, you're a target.
You're a victim.
And you know what?
That tells me when you're out of church, when you're the Lone Ranger Christian, commando
Christian out there by yourself, you're very likely to be defeated spiritually.
Because you don't have the heat that comes from numbers.
You don't have the safety that comes from numbers.
And you don't have this protection of, hey, I'm not alone.
I have people around me.
You know, the devil wants you to feel isolated and to feel like you're the only person who
believes the way that you believe and nobody else agrees with you.
And the church is a place where you go and see, no, there are actually lots of people
who believe the same way.
And there are lots of, you know, I'm not crazy.
Because the world is out there gaslighting you, making you feel like you're the one who's
crazy.
When in reality, the world has gone crazy.
And these are the words of sanity right here.
And when you get around a couple hundred other people who believe the same stuff, you know,
it's like a sanity check.
Like, hey, all right, I actually am not out of my mind.
Like the world wants me to think because I remember, you know, again, just a quick personal
story.
But when I was growing up, you know, our church started going liberal and my parents were
frustrated and they were trying to find a good church and they couldn't find one.
And I remember my dad kept saying over and over again, maybe we're crazy.
You know, it's like nobody's a fundamental Baptist anymore.
Everybody's getting away from the old paths.
Everybody's going liberal.
Everybody's getting off the King James.
You know, maybe it's us.
Maybe we're crazy.
You know, maybe we just need.
And so, you know, we ended up actually going to some liberal NIV churches for a while just
because it was like we thought like, you know, are we the only ones left?
But, you know, that's how the devil wants you to feel like you're the only one.
Nobody agrees with you.
The science is settled.
You know, every, you know, everybody already agrees and everybody knows that, you know,
but, but, but hold on a second.
When you go to a church of like-minded believers, you can get a sanity check.
No, there still are 7,000 men who haven't bowed the knee to bail, you know, and the
Holy Spirit that's in you is the Holy Spirit that's in them.
We've got the same Bible.
We end up with a lot of the same beliefs and the same ideas.
It's refreshing to get around people that actually are our brothers and sisters in Christ
and they feel like we feel.
And then the last point that's brought up in this chapter that I'm going to touch on
quickly here is in verse 13, it says, better is a poor and a wise child than an old and
foolish king who will no more be admonished.
And again, sometimes when we're reading the book of Ecclesiastes, I don't know about your
Bible, but my Bible has these little paragraph markers in verse 4, 7, 9, and 13.
Whose Bible has that paragraph marking in 4, 7, 9, and 13?
So it's tempting to almost look at this as just a totally new thought, like it's just
random thought, just switching the subject.
But each thought actually is connected to the one before it.
Isn't that what we've seen so far?
Because, you know, for example, you know, hey, it's better to be dead and whatever.
And then he brings up like, oh, you know, you work hard, you do everything right, and
then you're envied.
And then, you know, these lazy people, you know, they're not working and whatever.
But then that leads him to think about people who are by themselves and they work.
Who are they working for?
And then he goes on to say two are better than one.
You know, you don't want to be by yourself.
So each thought kind of rolls into the next, right?
Well, how does verse 13 come from verses 9 through 12?
Better is a poor and a wise child than an old and a foolish king who will no more be
admonished.
To be admonished is to be told that you're wrong or to take correction or to be told
something different, you know, because the old foolish king who will no more be admonished
and saying, you can't tell this guy anything, you can't teach him anything.
He's done learning.
What does that have to do with two are better than one?
What does that do with the threefold cord is that part of the reason why you need fellowship,
part of the reason why you need church, part of the reason why you need Christian friends
part of the reason why you don't want to be by yourself and alone is because when you're
alone, you can tend to get crazy ideas or radical ideas or foolish ideas and no one's
there to correct you.
You know, I've noticed that people who get out of church and just the internet is their
only outlet, they can sometimes get radicalized because when you come to church and you have
a radical idea or some crazy idea or you kind of take a doctrine a little too far or
take an idea too far, you've got your friends around you saying like, whoa there, tiger,
and they kind of reign you in, you know, so family reigns you in, church reigns you in,
and sometimes I express it like this, church makes you normal, right?
Church makes you normal because if people are a little weird, but if they come to church
and get around a bunch of other people, they can kind of make them more normal, you know,
but when you get off by yourself, secluded somewhere, I mean, imagine a person who just
lived out in a cabin somewhere by themselves for like 20 years, don't you think they'd
probably get like pretty weird after 20 years by themselves?
Imagine a country that just completely cuts itself off from the rest of the world for
centuries, Japan, they're going to get weird, that's why some of the weirdest stuff comes
out of Japan, I'm not down on Japan, okay, but they're weird, why did they get so weird,
like crazy stuff comes out of Japan, because of the fact that they're isolated, they're
by themselves, the rest of the world wasn't there to kind of keep them normal, like okay
Japan, you're getting a little weird, you know, tone that down, so basically church
has this normalizing effect on you and so does family, have you ever known people that
were kind of weird and awkward, but then they got married and then they became really
cool normal people, you know, I've known some guys that were just total dweebs, but
then after like two years of being married, they were totally cool and easy to hang out
with and really socially able to get around, who's ever kind of seen a situation like
that before, you know, why, because being married makes you more normal and just being
around people makes you more normal, and so why, because they tell you when you're
being weird or being stupid or doing something crazy, they talk you down, when you're all
by yourself, nobody's there to stop you from just getting weirder and weirder and weirder,
okay, and so that's the connection between verse 13 and what comes before, but now let's
get to what's actually being said, it says better as a poor and a wise child than an
old and foolish king who will no more be admonished.
He's saying, you know, the worst thing is when you get to a point in life where you
can't learn anything anymore, and even if you're really smart, even if you've achieved
a lot, I mean, a king is a successful guy who's obviously he has some intelligence to
have gotten as far as he did, but if he gets to the point where you can't admonish him
anymore, it's better, a child is better, a child has more wisdom because when you can't
be corrected, you know, you're in a bad place.
It's better a poor and a wise child than an old and foolish king who will no more be admonished.
You'd rather listen to an eight-year-old who's learning and growing and smart and wise than
the guy who just kind of knows everything and he's done learning.
You know, we want to make sure that all of us are lifelong learners and that we don't
get to a point where we stop learning.
We should always be learning.
And look, in your job, you should always be learning.
In your career, always be learning.
The Bible, oh, I've read the Bible so many times, you know, good night, I've read the
Bible 40 times, I don't need to keep reading the Bible, I've already learned everything.
That's a very stupid thought, it's a foolish thought.
You got to keep learning the Bible, keep learning the Bible, keep learning your job, just keep
learning in life in general.
I've known people that were 80, 90 years old and they're still learning.
And you know what?
Those are the people where you can talk to them and they're as sharp as a tack.
And then there are the other people you run into literally in their late 60s or early
70s and it's like talking to one of those dolls that you pull a string and it just tells
you like prerecorded messages.
I'm serious, like you can get around people that are in their late 60s into their 70s
and 80s and they just keep coming at you with these prerecorded messages.
You cannot explain anything to them, you can't teach them anything.
The part of their brain that learns new things, it stopped working so long ago that now they
just can't learn anything new.
Now obviously that's an extreme example where people literally get to a place where they
literally can learn nothing new.
They can't even form a new sentence that they've never formed before, they can only repeat
the old sentences.
And I'm not exaggerating, I'm being 100% literal right now.
Who's ever talked to people like that where they just prerecorded and you can't explain
anything new to them?
And how did they get that way?
They stopped learning.
Or how about this?
How about the guy who works in a factory for 17 years and then the factory shuts down and
now he just literally just doesn't know what to do and he can never have another job again
because that was just the only job he knew how to do and now he's just 40 years old and
has no career and it's just like he can't start anything new and then he's just unemployed
for the rest of his life.
Have there been stories like that or situations like that?
But here's the thing, look, if you work in that factory, great, work in that factory
doing the same job every day, but you know what?
You better be doing your work.
You better be learning something.
You better be doing something because when that gig goes away, you want to be the type
of person that can always find a new gig.
You can always learn a new skill, learn a new trade, learn a new job because you're
just a lifelong learner.
What does that mean?
That means when you get home from work, you don't just veg out in front of the TV, rotting
your brain on the TV.
You're going to be that chatty Kathy guy when you become a senior citizen.
You want to be the person who actually does something with your brain, uses your brain,
not just rotting on TV.
At least read, but even beyond reading, actually do something that takes even more intelligence
than reading.
Use your brain or lose your brain.
You don't want to get to the point where you can't learn anymore.
That's the carnal example.
How about the spiritual example?
Don't get to the point where you can't be corrected spiritually.
Don't get to the point where you think you know everything and you won't listen to anyone
and you can't learn any new doctrine.
You wonder why does our church have so many young people in it?
Our church is predominantly young people because here's the thing, a lot of old people are
too set in their ways.
I say something that they don't like or that they don't agree with and instead of listening
to the Bible that I'm using to back it up and learning, a lot of them are just to that
point where they're just like, well, I've been pre-trib my whole life and I'm just not
open to that.
I don't even want to listen.
Even though the pre-trib rapture is just grossly unbiblical, it's not even close to being biblical.
Proving it wrong from the Bible is like taking candy from a baby, but yet people get to a
point where they're just not willing to change any of their beliefs.
We should be willing to change our beliefs on things when the evidence shows that we're
wrong.
Right?
I mean, isn't that when we're out sowing?
We show people the Bible, we expect them to repent and believe the gospel.
Okay, so if we're going to expect other people to change their beliefs when they are shown
clear scripture, we need to be open to being corrected on our beliefs and our doctrines
and realizing that we don't know everything and we're not right about everything.
Usually really smart people, they realize how much they don't know and the people who
walk around as the biggest know-it-alls are usually the biggest idiots.
Usually the people who tell you the science is settled, everyone agrees, there's not even
a shred of evidence against it, those are usually the people who are the poorest scientists.
They know the least about science because a good scientist doesn't feel like they know
everything.
They're questioning and they're skeptical of things, that's the whole point of science.
Right?
Well, it's the same thing.
The guy who just walks around just bragging about how well he knows the Bible probably
doesn't know much.
He's probably a fool, okay?
None of us knows the Bible to the point where we can't learn something new.
You know, I've changed beliefs on things over the years.
Now obviously, you know, you don't want to be changing your belief on salvation and on
the deity of Christ, on the Trinity.
Those things are clear, they're locked in, those are non-negotiables.
But you know, there are a lot of other small doctrines in the Bible and things that we
could be wrong about and things that we could learn more.
So you know, always be willing to think to yourself, you know, when the pastor gets up
and preaches something that you don't agree with, you should always at least ask yourself,
maybe I'm the one who's wrong here and maybe I should revisit this and examine this.
And you know, when I disagree with my preacher friends, you know, I'm constantly asking myself
that.
And over the past few years, my preacher friends have convinced me to change my mind on things
here and there in the Bible because they've, you know, put forth compelling evidence.
But you don't want to be that guy who just can't be corrected because you know everything.
You know, you'd be better off, you'd rather have the mentality of a child than to be the
old foolish king who can no longer be admonished.
And that's another reason why we need to be in church because we need to be corrected.
We all need to be.
I need to be corrected.
And being in church has that sort of moderating influence, that normalizing influence where
when you get too far off on one way or the other, other people rein you in and you have
to allow other people to rein you in when you get a little crazy.
And look, all of us can get a little radical, a little crazy and take things too far.
And that's why we need the church to be there to help rein us in.
If we're by ourselves, we're a target unto the devil, you know, and we're going to get
cold spiritually.
We need companionship and camaraderie and we don't want to just go to any church.
Iron sharpens iron.
So we want to go to a church of like-minded believers that are actually going to edify
us and build us up, not go to a church where everybody believes something different and
everybody's a different type of metal.
No, we need iron to sharpen iron.
You know, we don't want to be around this, this dole crowd of people who don't believe
like us.
You don't want to be around a red hot soul-winning kind of a church, a fundamentalist Baptist
church where people are challenging us spiritually, not where everybody's, you know, as spiritually
dead as we are.
So that's probably enough word of prayer.
Father, we thank you so much for this chapter, Lord, and help us to apply its truths to our
lives and understand the importance of companionship, camaraderie, and the local church.
Thank you for giving us the local church, Lord.
It's such a blessing of an institution and the Christian life would be very difficult
without it, Lord.
And I pray for those that are in maybe other countries where they don't have a church to
attend, Lord, I pray that they would find some godly fellowship because it's so hard
being a Christian alone and it's so hard soul-winning or doing anything alone.
And so, Lord, thank you for blessing us with a big church full of fellow brothers and sisters
that we could team up with, Lord, and bless those who don't have that and help them to
find it ASAP.
And in Jesus' name we pray, amen.