Sermons

The Vanity of Life Drives Us To God

March 5, 2023 Speaker: Reid Strahan Series: Ecclesiastes - Life Under the Sun

Topic: Wisdom Passage: Ecclesiastes 1:1–9, Romans 8:19–23

Ecclesiastes is the greatest book of philosophy ever written.  It’s older than Aristotle, Socrates, and Plato. And it’s greater, because it’s from God. It’s relevant because it expresses the futility we experience in a fallen world, which God Himself subjected to futility. And it gives us wisdom for living, and for coping with this present futility.  You can disagree with this book, but you WILL for sure experience this book! 

It describes life here on earth, this side of the grave. It’s about life “under the sun”!    

It is NOT the viewpoint of an unbeliever or an agnostic. It was written by Solomon, at the end of his life, after he  repented and turned back to God. The last chapter says, the teacher was wise, what he wrote was upright and true. And they are given by one Shepherd, the Lord himself.  This is the word of God. 

A young lady once said to me, “I don’t read Ecclesiastes because it makes me feel depressed.” I said “I don’t think you can really go live for Jesus with abandon unless you have an Ecclesiastes perspective on life.” 

Jim Elliott had that perspective. He said “he is no fool who gives up what he cannot keep, to gain what he cannot lose.”

Jesus preached the futility of life when he said “what will it profit a man if he gain the whole world but lose his soul.” 

Paul evaluated his life before he met Jesus and said it was garbage, trash, dung.  He gave up all his religious achievements, his prestige, his power, and went all in for Jesus.  You MUST see the vanity of life, in order to let go of the world, and follow Christ. 

Many live half-heartedly for Jesus because they don’t believe the message of this book. They still really think something other than God, out there, in this life “under the sun” is the answer.  But Ecclesiastes bursts that bubble. It rips off our rose colored glasses.  It shatters our false hopes in pleasure and achievement, and forces us to look at the simple terrifying truth that life is fleeting, empty, a vapor, unsatisfying and we all die. 

It blows up our shallow philosophies, and sayings, and quotes that pretend nothing is really wrong here.  “Don’t worry be happy. I’m okay – you’re okay. Life is a journey not a destination.  Or just life is good.” Walk up to the Pastor in Mozambique whose wife just died and left 2 young children, and flippantly say, “Hey, life is good brother!”.  That doesn’t work!  We need a philosophy of life that can bear the weight of reality.  Only the Bible gives us that!

Only the Bible tells us WHY life has misery, and frustration and death, and shows us the way out! The world we experience is under the tragic reality of the fall.  Romans 8 “the creation has been subjected to futility and is groaning in the pains of childbirth.” We don’t live in a storybook world. We got kicked out of the garden. It’s painful, disappointing. 

Solomon said, “What a heavy burden God has laid upon the sons of men to occupy them!” vs 13 Psychologist Jordan Peterson called this the burden of Being. He said ‘We’re pack animals, beasts of burden, we must bear a load to justify our miserable existence.”  That’s a secular psychologist saying that.  But it might have come right out of the book of Ecclesiastes.

This is a painful book and it was meant to be. And you have to go into the pain of this book to get the point of this book. 12:11 “The words of the wise are like cattle prods – painful but helpful.  Their collected sayings are like a nail studded stick with which a shepherd drives the sheep”. NLT  (if this message isn’t painful on some level I haven’t done my job)

So the first message that the author drives home with tremendous force, is that life is fleeting and frustrating. You won’t figure things out, it won’t all be fair. You will do lots of things over and over that do not really matter. And no matter what you do, or accomplish it won’t satisfy you. 

Roy Zuck said, finding pleasure, meaning and satisfaction in this life is like trying to play soccer with a watermelon.  It won’t stand up to the game. Nothing in life will stand up to your demands, or measure up to your expectations, not marriage, sex, food, career, your friends, or even children.

Certainly Christ finally and completely solves all despair and death! He is the way out of futility, the only way out!  But Christians do experience the futility, frustration, weariness, or vanity of life! That will all be gone when creation is redeemed. When Christ appears. But for now, as Paul said, “Even though we have the Spirit, we still groan.”  Meaning that we are still undergoing things that are difficult, that are hard, not satisfying.  There’s a longing for things to be made right. There is a longing to be released from this present futility.  

Once you see the terrible problem of life under the sun, there are only two roads to travel. One is to hate life.  One is to seek God. The despair in Ecclesiastes drives us to God.  Solomon starts with a heavy dose of despair but ends up at God. 12: “When all has been heard, the conclusion of the matter is this: Fear God and keep His commandments, because this is the whole duty of man.” Vanity forces a conclusion!  It is to fear God then surprisingly to enjoy God and his gifts!  Right here and now in this life! What a shocking book this is! It takes us way down to lift us up.  This book commands us to enjoy life and it tells us HOW to enjoy life! ….NOW under the sun even in this broken world. 

So there are answers, there is joy, now! But we can’t skip the painful truth we need, to drive us fully to God and to rejoice in His gifts, even in this fleeting life.  So the book begins:

Verse 2 “Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, vanity of vanities! All is vanity.” The word here is vapor or breath. It means life is futile, fleeting, like a breath.  In some verses it means futility, emptiness, or meaningless. 

So let’s dive in!  Remember he said it would be painful! 

Verse 3 “What does man gain by all the toil at which he toils under the sun?”  Toil here is not just your job, it’s everything you must do to get through life.  It’s getting up in the morning, taking care of yourself, your kids, your home, taking care of all the business of life. Life is labor!  You have to push your way through life, it’s not easy, there’s stress. It’s a fight. And what do you really have? You still die and you will take nothing with you! 

Verse 4 “Generations come and generations go.” Before you know it you’ll be gone.  Billions have lived before you and billions may live after you.  There is just this repeated cycle of life over and over.  It’s like you are on a train riding toward the end of life and you just can’t get off.  John Mayer song: 

“Stop this train I want to get off...I can't take the speed it's moving in. I know I can't.  But honestly, won't someone stop this train? (I) don't want to see my parents go. I'm one generation away from fighting life out on my own. Oh, come on, stop this train..I want to get off..I can't take the speed it's moving in...won't someone stop this train?  I'm so scared of getting older… Had a talk with my old man
(I)Said, "Help me understand" (He said) I tried my hand
John, honestly we'll never stop this train".  

Verse 4 adds, almost to increase the pain. “But the earth remains forever.”  That rock in your back yard will still be there, but you will be gone. He’s emphasizing the brevity of life. 

Verse 5 “The sun rises the sun sets. And it hurries around to rise again.”  Your life is like that.  You do things over and over and over, day after day. We sleep, and we have to sleep again, we get up in the morning and we have to get up the next morning. We eat and we have to eat again. You cook one meal for your family before you get the dishes done somebody is hungry again. Whatever we do we have to keep doing and do more of over and over and over. 

Verse 6 “The wind blows south then north, round and round it swirls, ever returning to it’s course.  All the rivers flow into the sea, yet the sea is never full. The water returns to the rivers and then flows out again to the sea. Everything is weariness beyond description.”  He’s expressing what we all feel! Life is Repetitive, much is the same day after day, there is a certain emptiness, a kind of boredom, frustration, monotony and sorrow.

And whatever we can do it is never enough! Verse 8 “No matter how much we see we are never satisfied.  No matter how much we hear we are not content.”  NLT And that applies to everything!  5:10 “He who loves money is never satisfied by money.”  Getting things is fun, having things is not fun!  So soon the pleasure of getting something is gone and then there is the burden of keeping in. 

Verse 9 “What has been done will be done again and there is nothing new under the sun.”  History repeats itself. Kings rise and fall, people make money and lose money.  Babies are born, old people die. Smart phones are made up of just 30 elements that have been in the earth since creation! 

Verse 11  “We do not remember those who came before , and those yet to come will not be remembered by those who follow after.”   You may possibly know who your great grandfather’s name.  But you don’t know his hopes and dreams, his inner thoughts, how he felt when he was getting up each morning, or his thoughts when he was dying?   We all live this intensely personal drama, very important to us, but Solomon says we are soon forgotten.  You may build a great business, or become a great person but after a generation or two no one really remembers, or really cares. 

Pascal said, “the ending is dreary, however fine the rest of the play.  They put a little dirt over your head, and that is the end forever.  That is the end awaiting the world’s most illustrious life.”  Of course we know in Christ there is more!  But that IS life under the sun, as we experience it.  

Verse 15 “What is crooked cannot be straightened, and what is lacking cannot be counted.”  There are problems that can’t be solved.  Needs that just are never met.  No matter what we do there’s still poverty, hunger, kids that are abandoned, marriages and dreams that fall apart. Things happen to you that we just can’t fix in this life.  Things you lose that you won’t get back.   

Solomon obviously thinks we need to hear this theme of vanity over and over. He says says it a lot! “What have I gained by being wise. The wise man will die just like the fool.  Everything is futile and chasing after the wind”. 2:15-17 “All that I have worked for must be left to one who comes after me.  This too is futile.” 2:19  “What does a man get for all the toil and striving with which he labors under the sun.  His days are filled with grief, his task is sorrowful, this too is futile. 2:23

“As a man came from his mother’s womb, so he will depart again, naked as he arrived. He takes nothing for this labor to carry in his hands.” 5:15,16  “There are righteous men who get what the actions of the wicked deserve, and there are wicked men who get what the actions of the righteous deserve.  This too is futile.” 8:14 Bad people often get promoted and godly people get overlooked.  Bad people often prosper and godly people often struggle to make ends meet. And Solomon sees that as a problem.

Then, in the last chapter, he describes the inevitable deterioration of our bodies falling apart in old age. It’s like a house that is falling apart. You lose your eyesight, your legs tremble, your back stoops, you loose your teeth, your lose your energy, and then you die. Your body returns to the ground from which it came.  “Futility of futilities, everything is futile.” 

Pascal said, “Anyone who does not see the vanity in life, must be very vain indeed.”  Of course vanity is NOT the only conclusion we have about life. Christ opens up the door to a life of hope. But before we find joy in Him, and full satisfaction in him, for most us, we have to first go through a season where we find that pleasure, possessions and achievement (in this life under the sun) is a dead end. And it’s important that we let this sink into our souls.

**Then Solomon goes on to say he personally tested all these pleasures and pursuits, all the ways of finding meaning in life and they all failed to satisfy!!  First he tries wisdom: 1:16 “I said in my heart, “I have acquired great wisdom, surpassing all who were over Jerusalem before me...I perceived that this also is but a striving after wind. For with much wisdom comes much sorrow and with increase in knowledge comes much grief.

The more you know about life and the human condition, it’s harder to be happy. There is spousal abuse, child abuse, sex trafficking, poverty, people suffering from accidents or disease.  So far 200,000 Russian troop killed or wounded in the present war. 120,000 Ukrainian troops.  The more you know about life the more you feel sad.  And so knowledge fails as a means of making you happy.

Then Solomon tested Pleasure – 2:1 I said in my heart, “Come now, I will test you with pleasure; enjoy yourself.” But behold, this also was vanity.” Then he tried comedy, and humor, Verse 2 “I said of laughter, “It is mad,” and of pleasure, “What use is it?” It’s a great thing to laugh. But Laughter doesn’t solve life!  It doesn’t give meaning. If that’s what you are relying on to make life feel good it’s a dead end street.  It just doesn’t work.  It won’t hold you up in the futility and sorrows of life. 

He tested achievement, projects, accomplishments. Verse 4 “I made great works. I built houses and planted vineyards for myself. I made myself gardens and parks, and planted in them all kinds of fruit trees. I made myself pools from which to water the forest of growing trees.”  But the thrill of building something didn’t last. So then Solomon says, “I tested power and riches.” 

Verse 7 “I bought male and female slaves, and had slaves who were born in my house. I had also great possessions of herds and flocks, more than any who had been before me in Jerusalem. I also gathered for myself silver and gold and the treasure of kings and provinces. I got singers, both men and women, and many concubines, the delight of the sons of man. So I became great and surpassed all who were before me in Jerusalem.”  BUT greatness didn’t satisfy him either. He is left utterly deflated, 

Verse 10And whatever my eyes desired I did not keep from them.” ... (But) “behold, all was vanity and a striving after wind, and there was nothing to be gained under the sun.” 

Essentially Solomon says, “I didn’t find meaning and satisfaction in anything that I tried under the sun, and you won’t either”.  We foolishly think that if we had all of Solomon’s resources we would try these things and they would make us happy!  Solomon says, “No! I had it all I had all the wealth, all the power.  I tested every possible well that you could drink from to find satisfaction. And I didn’t find it. You guys don’t have to go try these things.  I already did. And the wells were empty! 

So whether your dream is wine, food, movies, video games, sports, shopping, great achievements, houses, you will still feel flat, and empty and unsatisfied. 

Lee Iacocca, former CEO of Chrysler, said, “As I start the twilight years of my life, I try to look back and figure out what it was all about. I'm still not sure what is meant by good fortune and success. (BUT) I know fame and power are for the birds.”  

But then just when we think this book is only about hating life and how futile it is, Solomon takes a sharp U-turn in chapter 2:24, "There is nothing better for a man than to eat and drink and to enjoy his work. I have also seen that this is from the hand of God. "For apart from Him, who can eat and who can find enjoyment” In 3:13 he said—this joy “is the gift of God.” He commends it and commands it. 

After driving home the real problem of life again and again. He drives home the message that life is a gift from God and to be enjoyed. There are 7 passages that drive home this theme! 

Our Christian philosophy of life is not life is a bummer and we’re just waiting for Jesus to take us out of here.  No! This life is a gift of God and we are supposed to enjoy it. 

Next time, focus on how Ecclesiastes helps us to find joy, and to live with joy right here, right now, right in the futility of life! 

Conclusions *Let the vanity of life sink into your soul. Ecclesiastes will set you free from the bondage of false expectations of life under the sun. Medical News Today said, “Studies show that constantly chasing the specter of perfection may seriously harm your mental health and well-being.”  When you find yourself sinking under the burden of unrealistic expectations, pick up and read Ecclesiastes!  Cindy has a saying that really helps us that when things aren’t going so well.  “This isn’t heaven yet!” There’s something so freeing about that and realizing what God says about where we are presently. 

*Second: It’s Okay to feel the frustrations of life, the weakness of our bodies, the flatness of life.  In Christ we do have joy, but we do feel life “under the sun”.  I work hard at joy and worship!!  But I also give myself a break when life feels kind of flat or mundane or ordinary or frustrating. 

*Third: Accept the limitations of pleasures and pursuits in life under the sun. Don’t deceive yourself into thinking: When I get that promotion, that will satisfy me.  If I could get that new house that will make me happy.  If I could only get married and that would fix me.  Only a relationship with  Abba Father through Jesus can satisfy your soul!  Only he can fill your life and make you whole. 

*Fourth: The ultimate business of life is NOT to find meaning and purpose in this life. Solomon says you won’t!  It’s not to fulfill our dreams. Not to realize our full potential. The ultimate business of everyone of us is to Fear God, and obey God, and then gratefully enjoy all the good things he gives you. (in this fleeting life under the sun) You won’t understand life. It won’t all make sense. Don’t put your hopes and dreams in this life. But please do go enjoy life, and your work, and all the good gifts of God.  Roy Zuck “Fear God and enjoy life.” 

*Fifth: Fix your hope completely on Christ in this present distress under the sun. Peter said, “Set your hope fully on the grace to be given you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.” Paul himself used this future glory that is coming to us, to keep his present pain in perspective! “I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed to us”. 

Yes, life here has futility. But the glory to come is so great, that Paul said the present futility hardly seems worth mentioning.  Because we’re bound for glory! And no doubt rejoicing in our future glory enables us to triumph victoriously in our futile and fallen world. 

More in Ecclesiastes - Life Under the Sun

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