Ecclesiastes 7:21-29To: Ecclesiastes Main MenuTo: Grace Notes Home Page Ecclesiastes 7:21,22Serves as a warning to us not to believe all of our critics nor all of our supporters. It is set in the negative, the critics, because that is perhaps a bit easier for us to understand. Also, do not take seriously all words which are spoken, lest you hear your servant cursing you. For you also have realized that you likewise have many times cursed others.No boss, employer, or master in the ancient world, ever believes all that is said about him by those he hires. This looks at destructive and not constructive criticism. We need to listen to and consider the rebuke of the wise (Eccl. 7:5). But the words that are spoken in anger or is disgust, we let them go. AND IN THE SAME WAY the words that endlessly praise, and pat us on the back too must be let go. YOU SEE, GOD SAYS we are sinners, we are have in us some righteousness but also wickedness, if we know ourselves we are not going to let others define who we are. That definition is in the hands of an objective, perfect, loving God. Not in the hands of critics or supporters. Consider the times you have cursed others, did you ever have to eat your words, take back what was said. Conclude that you were really wrong in what was said? It has happened to us all. And that should teach us not to listen to the numerated praises and the unwarranted criticisms. LET GOD THE JUDGE OF WHO YOU ARE AND WHAT YOU ARE. Ecclesiastes 7:23-26 tells us ab out looking for wisdom in all the wrong places. Now Solomon valued wisdom. He had wisdom in two categories. A wisdom that was built into him as he was growing up being taught by his father David and his mother Bathsheba. He learned and he observed and eventually surpassed them in wisdom. And he also had a gift of wisdom from God that made him the wisest man who ever lived a part from the Lord Jesus. And yet while he could apply this wisdom to others, he could not apply it to self. For the sake of the nation, God allowed Solomon's wisdom to remain even while he was in reversionism. Eccl. 2:9 Then I became great and increased more than all who preceded me in Jerusalem. My wisdom also stood by me. But he failed in applying wisdom to his relationship with God. The primary purpose for wisdom went wanting. Ecclesiastes 7:23I tested all this with wisdom, and I said, I will be wise, but it was far from me.A statement of inability...it was far from me. Our inability must teach of God's greater ability. Whenever we face our weakness we have an opportunity to seek and know God and His strength. NOTICE: The self resolve of the decision and statement the he would be wise, means very little. The words were empty, the ability was not there. Ecclesiastes 7:24What has been is remote and exceedingly mysterious. Who can discover it?Why does this wisdom and its use seem so far away? Because Solomon is far away from God. So even when he comes up with wisdom, even wisdom that is parallel to the wisdom of God, common sense, divine view point, laws of divine establishment, they fail him because he is not first drawing near to God. Let's consider some verses on drawing near to God. Psalm 73:28 But as for me, the nearness of God is my good; I have made the Lord God my refuge, That I may tell of all Thy works. Matthew 11:28 Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Hebrews 10:22 Let us draw near with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. James 4:8 Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded. John 7:37 Now on the last day, the great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, If any man is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink. To draw near to God is done in attitude not mere actions. Isaiah 29:13 Then the Lord said, Because this people draw near with their words And honor Me with their lip service, But they remove their hearts far from Me, And their reverence for Me consists of tradition learned by rote. NOTE: They learn by only by rote, facts with no relationship with God Jeremiah reveals this as a double problem. Jeremiah 2:13 For My people have committed two evils: They have forsaken Me, The fountain of living waters, To hew for themselves cisterns, Broken cisterns, That can hold no water. AND THAT IS WHERE SOLOMON IS, in the middle of two problems. And that is where many believers are today, in the middle of these two problems. They have forsaken a personal relationship with God. They have forgotten what God desires, they have set aside any thought of being able to know God, they know about God, but they do not know Him. They are religious, they may know doctrine, they may attend and be active in a local church, but the relationship is not there. Illustration: Can two people be married for even a long time, live under the same roof, sleep in the same bed, share the same toothpaste, and not have a relationship? Of course, we have heard of it happening many times. And if that can happen with someone who is visible, how much more so with God who is invisible. Second problem: They carve out cisterns for themselves and yet these cisterns break and cannot hold water. A cistern was a hollow carved out of a rock to capture rain water and run off. It was designed as a reservoir to hold water for the dry season. Took a lot of work to carve one out. Yet these are broken and hold no water, what a waste of time and effort. THE ANALOGY is to the believer who forsakes God and tries to find refreshing water someplace else, it won't work. That is what Solomon was doing and that so often is what we do. We work hard, chipping away at the rocks of life only to find that our effort is in vain. Solomon sought wisdom but he had forsaken God, so he ended up with a cistern that was empty, vain, of no value. Remember what Jesus said: John 7:37 If any man is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink. That is the only place to go for wisdom, to God and it begins with drawing near to Him. Ecclesiastes 7:25Solomon is stubborn, as are most of us, so he is going to try to figure these things out and come up with his own Wisdom Plan.I directed my mind to know, to investigate, and to seek wisdom and an explanation, and to know the evil of folly and the foolishness of madness. NOTICE THE PROBLEMS HERE. He is directing His own mind. We so often make decisions which seem good in our own eyes. Proverbs 21:2 Every man's way is right in his own eyes, But the Lord weighs the hearts. Solomon had been taught better than to put much stock into his own decisions a part from what God wanted. I Chronicles 28:9 David's challenge: As for you, my son Solomon, know the God of your father, and serve Him with a whole heart and a willing mind; for the Lord searches all hearts, and understands every intent of the thoughts. If you seek Him, He will let you find Him; but if you forsake Him, He will reject you forever. He directed his mind to know, to seek, to understand. Yet these are things that only God truly knows. Here is Solomon trying to figure out the meaning of life, figure out his own significance apart from God. It does not work. Isaiah 55:8-9 For My thoughts are not your thoughts, Neither are your ways My ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, So are My ways higher than your ways, And My thoughts than your thoughts. Ecclesiastes 7:26He skips over his investigation and goes right to the conclusion. And I discovered more bitter than death the woman whose heart is snares and nets, whose hands are chains. One who is pleasing to God will escape from her, but the sinner will be captured by her.He skips over his investigation and goes right to the conclusion. Talk about a letdown. He starts off to seek, explore, find the meaning of life with his great wisdom and ends up in snares, nets, and chains. Reminds me of the warning earlier in the chapter: The end of a matter is better than its beginning. He uses a personification that he also employs in Proverbs. Wisdom as a woman and Evil as a woman. [Illustrated in very graphic detail in Proverbs 7] BUT SOLOMON GIVES US A FURTHER CONCLUSION: One he could only come up with once he is back in fellowship. THERE IS A WAY OUT...Be one who is pleasing to God and you will escape this evil. HOW CAN WE PLEASE GOD? First, we have the job of learning what is pleasing to God. Ephesians 5:10 Paul speaks of: Trying to learn what is pleasing to the Lord. Our ways are not God's ways so we must go to God's book and find out how we can please Him. Pleasing God must never be attempted in our own strength. Zechariah 4:6 This is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel saying, Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit, says the Lord of hosts. II Corinthians 12:10 For when I am weak, then I am strong. Pleasing God begins with an attitude and not with actions. Jeremiah 6:20 For what purpose does frankincense come to Me from Sheba, And the sweet cane from a distant land? Your burnt offerings are not acceptable, And your sacrifices are not pleasing to Me. When we spend time in the Word thinking, musing upon the Word and what it reveals of God, He is pleased. Psalm 104:34 Let my meditation be pleasing to Him; As for me, I shall be glad in the Lord. When we ask God for that which blesses other and furthers His cause on earth He is pleased. I Kings 3:10 And it was pleasing in the sight of the Lord that Solomon had asked this thing. We are to keep our way, our path in life set on God and His word, and this pleases Him. Proverbs 16:7 When a man's ways are pleasing to the Lord, He makes even his enemies to be at peace with him. This has an effect of protecting us from our enemies and putting us at peace with them. Our obedience to God is of primary importance in pleasing Him. The Lord Jesus pleased the Father by His obedience. John 8:29 And He who sent Me is with Me; He has not left Me alone, for I always do the things that are pleasing to Him. We are to keep God's commandments for this age and by these the result will be that we will please Him. I John 3:22 Whatever we ask we receive from Him, because we keep His commandments and do the things that are pleasing in His sight. But none of our pleasing of God is independent of God. He is the one who works in us by the Holy Spirit that we can please Him. Hebrews 13:20-21 Now the God of peace, who brought up from the dead the great Shepherd of the sheep through the blood of the eternal covenant, even Jesus our Lord, equip you in every good thing to do His will, working in us that which is pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Ecclesiastes 7:27Behold, I have discovered this, says the Preacher, adding one thing to another to find an explanation.Solomon now adds some things up. He adds his human wisdom and inability to figure out what God is doing to . . . The character and essence of God verses the character of man. These two things are amplified in the next two verses Ecclesiastes 7:28Which I am still seeking but have not found. I have found one man among a thousand, but I have not found a woman among all these.With all his wisdom, position, power, he is still seeking. But as he previously stated, he cannot find because he has not first return to spirituality and then drawn near to God. The next two phrases are idiomatic. TYPES OF POETRY: See the Handouts: Hebrew Poetry is built around Parallelism: Putting one line in a poem into balance with another line. The number of lines that are balanced together determine whether it is a distich (2 line), tristich (3 lines) or whatever -stitch. RHYME. English would rhyme hill and will Hebrew would rhyme hill and mountain TYPES OF PARALLELISM. I. Synonymous Parallel: Two lines that have almost the same meaning Emblematic: Uses an image or illustration Climactic: Repetition of a portion of a line. Alphabetical: Psalms Divided by the Hebrew Alphabet SO HERE WE HAVE A SYNTHETIC PARALLEL: The second line advances the same concept found in the first line. 1. One man among a thousand means, as we might say, one in a million. Impossible odds, not really finding anyone. It is inconceivable that Solomon would in any way denigrate women. All we have to do is read Proverbs to see that Solomon recognized that women often had more spiritual sense than many men. The account of the virtuous woman in Proverbs 31 may well have been a remembrance of his mother Bathsheba who is portrayed in I Kings as an extremely wise woman. THE CONCLUSION THEN IS THAT Solomon found no one. Ecclesiastes 7:29Behold, I have found only this, that God made men upright, but they have sought out many devices.But this he has found. God made unique among creation. He made him upright. The word MADE is a Qal perfect and the word UPRIGHT is the Hebrew YARSHAWR which can mean upright, but also proper, fit, pleasing, correct. God has made to be proper, fitting in his sight. To live unto Him and have His highest and best. But just like Solomon, man chooses to try to figure life out on his own. But they have sought out many devices . So instead of drawing near to God man seeks his own methods, his own devices. NOW DEVICES, is KISH-SHAW-BONE in the Hebrew. And if can also be translated INVENTIONS. AND JUST LIKE AN INVENTION, THIS IS something man comes up with on his own a part from God's wisdom. Man comes up with these, as did Solomon in verse 23, he tests life with his own wisdom, that is a device of man. SOUGHT OUT is a Piel Perfect and this means that this is an intensive seeking out, an intense search. The PERFECT TENSE indicates that man is more often than not completely satisfied with his own devices. There is no charge for Grace Notes Materials. You can help further this work by your prayer and by sending a contribution to: Grace Notes 1705 Aggie Lane Austin, Texas 78757 wdoud@bga.com Grace Notes Web site: http://www.realtime.net/~wdoud/ Anonymous FTP site: ftp://ftp.bga.com/vendors/wdoud/ Grace Notes is a ministry of Village Missions International. |
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