HOPE
Ecclesiastes 9:7-10 NET.
7 Go, eat your food with joy, and drink your wine with a happy heart, because God has already approved your works. 8 Let your clothes always be white, and do not spare precious ointment on your head.
9 Enjoy life with your beloved wife during all the days of your fleeting life that God has given you on earth during all your fleeting days; for that is your reward in life and in your burdensome work on earth.
10 Whatever you find to do with your hands, do it with all your might, because there is neither work nor planning nor knowledge nor wisdom in the grave, the place where you will eventually go.
The message of Solomon in his book Ecclesiastes can sometimes be challenging to learn. Some have called him a pessimist because he does not appear to give the “pie in the sky” gospel that many modern religious people preach. If you look at verse 10, it seems that Solomon is telling us that the only thing we have to look forward to is the grave. But then one wonders why he tells us, in verses 7-9, to enjoy life. He is not telling us to deny the finer things in life. He is telling us to feast on the best food and drink. To wear the best of clothing, to anoint our heads with oil, and to enjoy our marriages. The reason we should do that is that life is short.
Solomon does not seem to be following the same religious playbook as others. He looks at the same data others do, but he reaches a different conclusion. Solomon is not teaching us that life is futile. He is telling us that it can be wonderful, but also warning us that it does not last. So, he does not advocate withdrawal from life in a self-imposed monastic hermitage. Instead, he challenges all of us to engage in life and, if we are fortunate enough to have work, a good marriage, or any of the other benefits of this life, to consider them all a reward. Do not ignore those rewards. Enjoy them. Just remember that none of these things is permanent. Enjoy life’s temporary rewards, and also seek a more permanent kingdom.
Our Advent theme of hope centers on that idea as well. If we look at life under the sun, we can experience many good things, but the longer we live, the more we realize that life is temporary. It does not last. If we are looking for hope, we will have to look beyond the limits of ordinary life. Hope has to come from beyond the boundaries of this world. The message of the coming Messiah did that for the Jews during the long wait for Jesus. Their focus on the future king added an extra dimension to their lives. No matter who they were or what their personal experiences were, the vision of God’s saving King empowered them and helped them to stay focused on him.
Solomon taught that Hope is not found in retreat, but in engagement.
He didn’t tell them to waste their lives. He taught them the opposite approach. They were to invest their lives in today, as he did fully. Solomon was not just a thinker. He was a doer. He built things. He collected things. He was a Renaissance man long before the Renaissance. He modeled enlightenment long before the Enlightenment era.
There would be many seasons and eras that would ignore Solomon’s advice. Even many who sought to obey the commands of Christ would seek to do so by shutting themselves off from the world. They were not wrong. Our Lord did teach us to deny ourselves, take up the cross, and follow him. But Solomon taught us that we can put our hope in God’s future world while still being active and relevant in this one.
The prophets told us to wait on the Lord. Isaiah said, “I will wait for the LORD, who is hiding his face from the house of Jacob, and I will hope in him” (8:14). He spoke of a day when the Lord would 0swallow up death forever; and wipe away tears from all faces, and the reproach of his people he will take away from all the earth. He wrote that it will be said on that day, “Behold, this is our God; we have waited for him, that he might save us. This is the LORD; we have waited for him; let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation” (25:8-9).
Isaiah’s point is that God would bring about the renewal and restoration of all things. He encouraged his readers to actively wait on God to do what only he could do.
Solomon taught us that we can wait on the Lord without retreating from life. The New Testament tells us about a couple of old-timers who had done that. They had long and fruitful lives, and then, when they were older, they met Jesus.
Solomon taught that Hope is not found in death, but in God.
The Israelites needed to be reminded of their history. We share that history. There are two of those reminders that Solomon mentioned in today’s text. In verse seven, he said that God had already approved of their works. This does not mean that God overlooked their sins. We have plenty of biblical proof of that. But what Solomon was talking about was the everyday life-work of people. He encouraged his readers to see God not as an enemy, but as a loving Father.
Solomon ended this book with these words: “Having heard everything, I have reached this conclusion: Fear God and keep his commandments, because this is the whole duty of man. For God will evaluate every deed, including every secret thing, whether good or evil” (12:13-14). Here’s the good and the bad news. The bad news is that we can fail. We can fail others and forget God. But the good news is that we can also obey God. King Solomon needed to remind his people that repentance is possible. No matter how many times they forgot their creator, they could always return to him. When they did, they would find their heavenly Father right there, where they left him, ready to forgive and reconcile with them.
We need to remember this, too. There’s a song that always reminds me of this when I hear it. The song is called “When God Ran.”
“Almighty God
The Great I Am
Immoveable Rock
Omnipotent, Powerful
Awesome Lord
Victorious Warrior
Commanding King of Kings
Mighty Conqueror
And the only time
The only time I ever saw Him run
Was when He ran to me
Took me in His arms, held my head to His chest
Said “My son’s come home again”
Lifted my face, wiped the tears from my eyes
With forgiveness in His voice
He said “Son, do you know I still love you?”
It caught me by surprise when God ran
The day I left home
I knew I’d broken His heart
I wondered then
If things could ever be the same
But one night
I remembered His love for me
And down that dusty road
Ahead I could see
It’s the only time
The only time I ever saw Him run
When He ran to me
Took me in His arms, held my head to His chest
Said “My son’s come home again”
Lifted my face, wiped the tears from my eyes
With forgiveness in His voice
He said “Son, do you know I still love you?”
It caught me by surprise
It brought me to my knees
When God ran.”
The second truth about God that Solomon reminds us of here is that he has given us lives to enjoy, and we should enjoy them. In verse 9, he says, “Enjoy life with your beloved wife during all the days of your fleeting life that God has given you on earth during all your fleeting days; for that is your reward in life and in your burdensome work on earth.” Here, again, we see the good and the bad. The bad news is that life is fleeting and can be burdensome. The good news is that we don’t have to live it alone. There are others whom god has given us to make life enjoyable. Praise God for that.
So, Solomon’s wisdom does not tell us to seek death, but to embrace life.
The ultimate message of hope is Christ.
Solomon does not mention the Messiah, but he surely knew about this promise from his own history. The prophecies spoke of another son of David whose coming would bring restoration to the universe. This season of Advent helps us remember that the hope of the ages began being fulfilled when our Lord came to us as a baby in Bethlehem. We join the angels and the shepherds and proclaim the good news of his first Advent. We also sing the second stanza of that song when we proclaim the promise of hs second coming. Both advents are fulfillments of God’s promise and humanity’s most profound hope. Just as the Israelites waited on the Lord to fulfill his promise, so we wait in anticipation of our Lord’s coming today. We hear him speak his final words in Scripture in the 20th verse of the 22nd chapter of Revelation. He says, “Yes, I am coming soon!” John replies, Amen! Come, Lord Jesus! It would not be a bad idea for us to hang on to those words. No matter what we face today, we can constantly be reminded of our hope by listening to our Savior say, “Yes, I am coming soon!” And when we hear it, we can reply, Amen! Come, Lord Jesus!
jeffersonvann 