“Rich in Things or Rich in Soul?”
Sermon by Rev. Michael Zehnder on The Book of Ecclesiastes
Ascension Lutheran Church, Littleton, CO (08-03-25)
Grace, mercy and peace, from God our Father and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ! The Book of Ecclesiastes, written by the Holy Spirit through the words of King Solomon has a very provocative beginning. Here’s how it starts, in the NIV version. “Meaningless! Meaningless!” says the Preacher. “Utterly meaningless!” Boy aren’t you glad you came to church today!? (Ha)
This word “meaningless” is repeated 38 times in the 12 chapters of Ecclesiastes. It shows up almost like a musical refrain. The Hebrew word “Hevel,” translated as “meaningless” has no precise English equivalent because its literal meaning is “vapor,” “breath” or “mist”. It’s like he’s saying, “Life is fleeting and hard to make sense of; it’s like smoke and mirrors”! In the scheme of things, life is just very short and people’s memories of whatever you might have accomplished are also very short.
If you grew up with the King James Version like I did, you’ve probably also heard this translated as “Vanity of Vanities. All is vanity.” But the word “vain” or “vanity” has taken on another connotation through the years, because language evolves over time. Vain used to mostly mean “useless” as in “a vain attempt.” But over time it’s begun more to mean “having an excessively high opinion of yourself, your looks, abilities, or worth” as in the song, “You’re so vain, you probably think this song is about you.”
So translators today have tried to render the Hebrew “Hevel” with more precise words for modern ears. I looked through my various Bible editions and the KJV and ESV alone still keep the old “Vanity of Vanities.” Now, the most common translation is the one I’m quoting, the NIV: “Meaningless.”
However you end up rendering it, you can hear Solomon’s utter disappointment and frustration before he gets to his excellent spiritual conclusion which we’ll get to later on. I think he’s asking the question we all have at some point in life which is, “There must be more to life than what I am currently experiencing.” Or as the old song said, “What’s it all about, Alfie?” He’s asking, “Is that is all there is?” “Has real life passed me by?” In 1974, a band called America came out with a song that had these lyrics, “This is for all the lonely people, Thinking that life has passed them by.” If we’re honest we can probably all remember a time, maybe some of you are even asking this question right now, “What’s the use?” But hang in there, because the author of Ecclesiastes has something encouraging to say to you and me.
Our first impression of Solomon might be that he was most likely a pessimist, like “keep all sharp objects away from Solomon.” (Ha.) One of Ronald Reagan’s favorite jokes was about twin boys, one an incurable pessimist and the other an unrelenting optimist. Trying to determine the cause of their different outlooks on life, a psychologist put the pessimistic boy into a room full of toys and the optimistic boy into a room filled with horse manure. True to form, the pessimistic boy began to whine because his favorite toy was not among the toys in the toy-filled room. The optimistic boy, on the other hand, climbed on top of the manure pile and began to burrow furiously into the messy mound. “With all this poop,” he exclaimed, “there’s got to be a pony in here somewhere!” (Ha.)
Before you go concluding that King Solomon is just some kind of “Negative Nancy” who can’t find his favorite toy I want to remind you WHO King Solomon was and what section of the Bible the book of Ecclesiastes is found in. Ecclesiastes is one of the five books of the Bible that we have come to know as the WISDOM literature of the Bible. If you want to be wise, you’ll want to encounter these five books: Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes and Song of Songs. King Solomon wrote three of these (Proverbs, Ecclesiastes and Song of Songs). Solomon was King David’s son – remember that? The phrase “a man after God’s own heart” is how the Bible refers to King David, a man known for his deep faith and devotion to God, despite his flaws. He wrote about half of the Psalms. Solomon was his son and the only one of 21 sons born to David to become King. Under Solomon, the temple was built. Under Solomon, the territory and borders of Israel reached its farthest boundaries. He was the richest king who ever lived. Solomon was also the smartest King who ever lived and rulers from other countries traveled to Israel just to marvel at his wisdom and his wealthy surroundings.
Do you remember how he got his start as King? He rose to power when he was very young. He prayed to God, “Now, LORD my God, you have made your servant king in place of my father David. But I am only a little child and do not know how to carry out my duties.” The Bible doesn’t state his exact age, but he calls himself a “little child.” Most scholars think he was as young as 15, 16 – 17 tops. So he is just a teenager and he’s just been handed daddy’s kingdom, the most powerful kingdom on earth at that time, 900 B.C. Fortunately, for Israel, he already knew what he didn’t know. As recorded in 1 Kings 3:5-9, God appears to Solomon in a dream and offers to give him whatever he asks.
If God came to you in a dream and said “Here’s a blank check. Tell me anything you want and it’s yours” what would you ask for? Think about that for just a moment. What would you ask for? Anything you want! Wow! What’s that one thing you would ask for? Now I know we’re in church so don’t just over-spiritualize: “World peace and everybody to come to Jesus.” (ha) That sounds great and we all want that, but in the pressurized moment of God offering you anything you asked for, most people would say “give me riches, give me fame, good looks, give me popularity.” Or “give me practical things like my own lane on I-25…nobody else’s lane, just mine.” I shudder to think of what I might have asked for at the age of 15 much less at the age I am now – you know, somewhere in my early 30’s. (Ha.) I guarantee you this: I’m sure I’d have a lot less wrinkles and a lot more hair than this if God had ever offered me a blank check. (Ha.)
There’s a story about a man and wife who were strolling down the beach together and they found a bottle and a genie came out of the bottle when they uncorked it (just go with me on this; it’s a true story-ha) The genie came out of the bottle and said, “I’ll give you each one wish. Ask for anything you want and it’s yours…ladies first.” The wife said, “Well, now that we’re both in our 60’s and we still love each other so much I wish we could just live out the rest of our lives together alone, just the two of us, on a beautiful, tropical, deserted island.” And poof – there they were on the beach of a beautiful island with palm trees and crystal clear waters. So the genie asked the man, “And what do you want?” He answered, “Well if it’s just going to be the two of us in our 60’s, I wish that my wife were 30 years younger than me.” And poof, just like that, the man turned 90 years old. (ha). Be careful what you ask for, my friends.
Fortunately, Solomon was a lot smarter and humbler than me or the couple who found the bottle with the genie. So instead of asking for riches, for a long life, the defeat of his enemies or a great head of hair, he perceived the weight of his responsibility as a teenaged king asks for “an understanding mind to govern your people, able to discern between good and evil.”
God was so impressed by his “ask” that He granted Solomon’s prayer for wisdom and then gave him far more besides. He also bestowed on him great wealth, honor, and a long life, just like that famous Bible passage (from Matthew 6, which is quoted in the song we [will later] sing), “Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things will be added unto you as well” (Matthew 6:33).
That was the beginning of Solomon’s story. But the book of Ecclesiastes was written at the end of his story – It’s about his life in the rear view mirror. The wisdom found in the Book of Proverbs, on the other hand, was written at the beginning of his life. Unfortunately, along the way he took a lot of wrong turns, looking for pleasure in all the wrong places. The guy who wrote the Book of Proverbs – didn’t even heed his own advice. By the time he wrote Ecclesiastes he had a lot of regrets and had seen the error of his ways. This book is a warning from someone in the know, who has been there, done that, got the T-shirt! He is saying, here are the dumb mistakes that I made in the pursuit of pleasure which turned out to not be satisfying at all! Don’t you make these same dumb mistakes!
Solomon lists his mistakes one by one and there are too many to mention in just one sermon so I’m going to just give you the top THREE rabbit holes he went down.
#1 – He starts with WISDOM and KNOWLEDGE and I’m going to use the NIV text. It all started with the supernatural gift of wisdom God gave him as a teenager. Then, (2:12-16) he says in chapter 2, “I applied my mind to study and to explore by wisdom all that is done under the heavens… I said to myself, “Look, I have increased in wisdom more than anyone who has ruled over Jerusalem before me…But I learned that this, too, is a chasing after the wind….For with much wisdom comes much sorrow; the more knowledge, the more grief.” (2:16-17) “For the wise, like the fool, will not be long remembered; the days have already come when both have been forgotten. Like the fool, the wise too must die! … All of it is meaningless, a chasing after the wind.” So being smart and accumulating great knowledge and even a string of PhD’s can actually be a meaningless burden, according to Solomon.
#2 – Next he tried self-pleasuring himself with ALCOHOL AND LAUGHTER (and this is before the invention of late-night television or Comedy Central) (2:1-3) “I said to myself, “Come now, I will test you with pleasure to find out what is good.” But that also proved to be meaningless. “Laughter,” I said, “is madness. And what does pleasure accomplish?… I tried cheering myself with wine, and embracing folly… I wanted to see what was good for people to do under the heavens during the few days of their lives.” BUT, Strike #2, Boozing it up and laughing it all off didn’t make him happy or satisfy his soul.
#3 Third, he tried ACHIEVEMENT, making and completing some great PROJECTS, and ACCUMULATING WEALTH (2:4-11) He says, “I undertook great projects: I built houses for myself and planted vineyards. I made gardens and parks and planted all kinds of fruit trees in them. I made reservoirs to water groves of flourishing trees. I bought male and female slaves…I also owned more herds and flocks than anyone in Jerusalem before me. I amassed silver and gold for myself, and the treasure of kings and provinces. I acquired male and female singers, and a harem as well—the delights of a man’s heart… I denied myself nothing my eyes desired; I refused my heart no pleasure…Yet when I surveyed all that my hands had done and what I had toiled to achieve, everything was meaningless, a chasing after the wind; nothing was gained under the sun. Solomon sounds a bit like the “prophet” Mick Jagger (lol) of the Rolling Stones singing, “I can’t get no, satisfaction….well, I tried, and I tried and I tried and I tried…I can’t get no – da, da, da.”
Solomon tried “everything under the sun” (“under the sun” means every EARTHLY possibility)…but he tried according to human wisdom, not godly wisdom. He was the original pursuer of the phrase, “Wine, Women and Song.” Did you know how many women he could choose from each night? 1,000! According to the Bible, King Solomon had a total of 1000 women in his harem: 700 wives and 300 concubines. I don’t have time to go into all the details of how that happened, but in those days, a lot of treaties with other countries were based on keeping one nation from invading another through intermarriage. So, the king of the lesser nation would give his daughter to the king of the greater nation as a present to be his wife or a concubine. That’s how a lot of Solomon’s women were not from Israel, and many came from making treaties with pagan nations such as Moab, Ammon, Edom, Sidon, and the Hittites (exactly what God had warned His people not to do). Quick question, how many wives does one man need? If the men in this room were honest, most guys don’t meet the emotional needs of even one woman. You don’t need to say “Amen” to that, ladies, (ha) but I’m just saying. So why does he think he can do that with 700 wives plus 300 girlfriends on the side? Some of you single guys might be thinking, “This guy was pretty cool. Badda bing, Badda boom.” But you married guys know this was a stupid move. Can you imagine the conversations happening in that palace? (In a woman’s voice) “I don’t think you pay enough attention to me; you’re always looking at her. When was the last time we even had quality time? You know, quality time? I don’t think your mother really likes me! Does this tunic make me look fat?” Can you imagine?! All this times 700! Not a very smart guy.
Well, his wives love for pagan gods and Solomon’s love for multiple women brought idolatry into his life and into the nation of Israel. Solomon turned his back on the Lord. The Bible indicates that Solomon’s wives from foreign nations who worshipped pagan gods greatly influenced him and he started worshipping the gods of his pagan wives and even built temples to them! He even allowed children to be sacrificed in front of the very temple he had built for the Lord. These pagan wives eventually turned his heart away from the one true God for a while – not so very wise for the wisest man ever.
Bottom line of these three examples of how Solomon says he blew it: striving after wisdom and knowledge, seeking pleasure in drinking and laughter, and trying to make a name for himself by accumulating wealth, women and undertaking great building projects did nothing to satisfy his restless heart.
OK, so what does satisfy? What does Solomon conclude? It’s very simple and it’s the same thing Jesus says today in our Gospel readying from Luke 12. If all you do is lay up treasure and pleasure for yourself here on earth you are a fool; it will soon all be gone – poof – and you go with it. Instead of being rich in things, be rich toward God as summarized in today’s Epistle from Colossians 3:1-4, “Set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.” The only thing that matters is Jesus Christ and knowing that He gave His life for you and shed His blood for your sins and that He’s coming back for you! Live only for Him!
At least six times in this book Solomon summarizes true happiness kind of like this (I’m paraphrasing): “Set your minds and hearts on God and do your work as if you’re doing it for to the Lord, not to impress anyone else or to be remembered by having a building with your name on it. Only in God does life have meaning and true pleasure. Without him nothing satisfies. Everything else is mist, absolutely meaningless. Through Christ alone we find satisfaction and enjoyment. True pleasure comes only when we acknowledge and revere God as Lord and Center of our life and activities.”
I’ll let Solomon have the last word, and these are his exact words (2:24-26) “A person can do nothing better than to eat and drink and find satisfaction in their own toil. This too, I see, is from the hand of God, for without him, who can eat or find enjoyment? To the person who pleases him, God gives wisdom, knowledge and happiness, but to the sinner he gives the task of gathering and storing up wealth to hand it over to the one who pleases God”!
So, to enjoy your life, fix your eyes on Jesus who died for your sins, be content with what you have which is why Jesus taught us to pray, “Give us this day our daily bread” not “Give us this day our daily riches, fame, wine, women and song.” You want to be happy? According to the wisest, richest, most powerful and smartest man who ever lived on earth, who learned a lot from his own mistakes and more by inspiration of God’s Holy Spirit in the book of Ecclesiastes, true meaning and fulfillment are found in – (Here it is!) – A LOVE RELATIONSHIP WITH GOD. That’s why the hymn writer said, “My Hope is Built on Nothing Less Than Jesus’ Blood and Righteousness.” Amen.
