The Futility of Earthly Enterprise

I. Explanation of Ecclesiastes 2:1–11
A. 1-2 I said in my heart, “Come now, I will test you with pleasure; enjoy yourself.” But behold, this also was vanity. 2 I said of laughter, “It is mad,” and of pleasure, “What use is it?”
1. He sets out to see if earthly pleasures and enjoyments satisfy his soul.
2. He tries laughter and many kinds of other kinds of pleasure.
3. This is like an introductory sentence which summarizes the section. Then he goes into detail about his experiment with pleasure...
B. 3 I searched with my heart how to cheer my body with wine—my heart still guiding me with wisdom—and how to lay hold on folly, till I might see what was good for the children of man to do under heaven during the few days of their life.
1. Alcohol (or drugs, or whatever makes your body feel better or takes away your pain)
C. 4-6 I made great works. I built houses and planted vineyards for myself. 5 I made myself gardens and parks, and planted in them all kinds of fruit trees. 6 I made myself pools from which to water the forest of growing trees.
1. Dream house, dream garden
2. He didn’t do the work himself, or course. That’s what the slaves in v.7 are all about.
3. Imagine having all the money you need, and all the help you need to have whatever kind of house/estate you want.
D. 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.
1. Lordship of an estate
E. 8a I also gathered for myself silver and gold and the treasure of kings and provinces.
1. Money and possessions
F. 8b I got singers, both men and women,
1. Music: it was unimaginably rare to have music in your home in those days, unless you were singing or playing it yourself.
G. 8c and many concubines, the delight of the sons of man.
1. Sexual pleasure: if this was written by Solomon, he had enough wives and concubines to have one a day for 3 years.
H. 9-10 So I became great and surpassed all who were before me in Jerusalem. Also my wisdom remained with me. 10 And whatever my eyes desired I did not keep from them. I kept my heart from no pleasure, for my heart found pleasure in all my toil, and this was my reward for all my toil.
1. The writer is not just an ordinary person.
2. First, the author is also extraordinary in the fact that he had his dreams come true.
a. He was able to have whatever his eyes desired. He didn’t have to hold back at all.
b. He didn’t just reach the top tier of human privilege and pleasure. He surpassed it: “I became great and surpassed all who were before me in Jerusalem.”
c. Most people live their whole lives yearning for things they think will make them happy, but never achieving them. But this man had the opportunities and resources to have it all.
(1) And so he tasted and saw that these things which most people can only dream of are just as empty as the stuff they already have. He had it all!
3. Second, his good sense is not drown out by the intoxicating effect of the pleasures he indulged in. He says, “My wisdom remained with me.”
a. In Eccl.1:13-16 he had said: “I applied my heart to seek and to search out by wisdom all that is done under heaven...I have acquired great wisdom, surpassing all who were over Jerusalem before me, and my heart has had great experience of wisdom and knowledge...”
b. Many people would just ride the pleasure of these earthly enjoyments all the way to the grave, thinking they’re happy. But this guy is someone who is really paying attention. He’s really striving to see life as it really is.
I. 11 Then I considered all that my hands had done and the toil I had expended in doing it, and behold, all was vanity and a striving after wind, and there was nothing to be gained under the sun.
1. Here is the conclusion from the whole experiment with pleasure.
2. Article quoted in Tim Keller’s book, King’s Cross, p.29. “Nobody has articulated the damage caused by that discontentment better than Cynthia Heimel, who used to write for the Village Voice. She wrote an article that I’ve never forgotten. Over the years she had known a number of people who were struggling actors and actresses, working in restaurants and punching tickets at theaters to pay their bills, and then they became famous. When they were struggling like all of us, they said, ‘If only I could make it in the business, if only I had this or that, I’d be happy.’ They were like so many other people: stressed, driven, easily upset. But when they actually got the fame they had been longing for, Heimel said, they became insufferable: unstable, angry and manic. Not just arrogant, as you might expect — worse than that. They were now unhappier than they used to be. She said, ‘I pity [celebrities]. No, I do. [Celebrities] were once perfectly pleasant human beings...but now...their wrath is awful....More than any of us, they wanted fame. They worked, they pushed....The morning after...each of them became famous, they wanted to take an overdose...because that giant thing they were striving for, that fame thing that was going to make everything okay, that was going to make their lives bearable, that was going to provide them with personal fulfillment and...happiness, had happened. And nothing changed. They were still them. The disullusionment turned them howling and insufferable.’ ”
II. Conclusion
A. Everything in this life is cursed!
1. We were made for paradise! But because of the introduction of sin and God’s curse on the world, this is not paradise.
2. God created the world and it was very good. But then in the curse, He tainted it.
3. The trouble is that we keep trying to make it paradise. We keep trying to find paradise here.
4. And it’s actually a blessing to us that everything’s cursed.
a. The curse is a blessing? That sounds contradictory. But it’s true.
b. The curse God put upon everything on this earth is a blessing because it helps us to see that the creation is far inferior to the Creator, and this life is far inferior to the life which is to come.
B. Vanity might seem like strong language, but Paul makes the same point using even stronger language: in Phil.3:8 “I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ and be found in Him.”
1. The Greek word translated rubbish here is SKUBALON. It occurs very rarely in Greek literature, and only here in the NT, presumably because it was a vulgar word no one wanted to use. It referred primarily to dung/excrement, but also was used at times to refer to rotten food - or garbage swept up after a meal and thrown out of the house - which the wild dogs would eat.
a. In every case it carries a sense of strongest undesirability and suitability to be discarded.
b. In translating the word as "rubbish" the translators chose the most polite word possible but not necessarily the most accurate. The KJV translates it "dung."
2. Ecclesiastes looks at the things of this world and calls them empty, Paul calls them dung. They’re both making the same point.
3. How did Paul come to this conclusion? Things which once he loved and cherished he came to see as dung. How did that happen?
4. It happened the way the great Puritan Thomas Chalmers described it in his famous sermon “The Expulsive Power of a New Affection.” Paul’s former desires were expelled by a new affection when he met Jesus.
5. Paul could only see the true nature of all his earthly treasures when he finally looked the True Treasure in the eye and beheld His beauty and glory. Then everything he had loved up to that point, everything he’d lived for up to that point, began to look and smell pretty dungy.
6. The only way the glamour and glitter of this world will grow dim in our eyes, the only way we will ever be willing to let go of our idols, is if the eyes of our hearts are opened to "the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus [our] Lord."
7. When He is left out of the picture, we grab hold of earthly securities and pleasures, because it seems like that’s all we’ve got. But when we see Christ for who He is, next to Him everything else looks mighty shabby and worthless. It is "in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus" that Paul can "count all things to be loss."
8. The way to have an undivided heart which is satisfied in Christ alone and which doesn’t lust after other lovers is by seeking to behold the glory of Christ.
a. Seek it in the Scriptures. Seek it in prayer. Seek it in corporate worship. Seek it through the example of brothers and sisters in Christ who have a heart for God. Seek it in the morning. Seek it all day long. Seek it during your busiest days. Seek it while you’re on vacation.
b. “Ask, & it will be given to you; seek, & you will find; knock, & it will be opened to you.” (Mt7:7)
C. What really matters is not whether earthly things have the capacity to make a person feel happy. The important thing is whether earthly things have the ability to satisfy the deepest human longings.
1. For instance, food satisfies our hunger. Sleep satisfies our tiredness. But neither food nor sleep satisfy our human desire for acceptance, for significance, for meaning. Some people suppress those deeper human longings by keeping themselves intoxicated with bodily pleasures, with success and popularity.
2. For some, it’s enough to have the bodily needs met.
3. Some people have to try everything themselves in order to come to the conclusion that it is all vanity. But God gave us the testimony of others, like in Eccl.2 so that we can come to same conclusion without wasting all the time and effort.
D. Maybe Eccl.2 seems like a downer: to look out at good things in this world like accomplishments and pleasure and music and enjoyment and wisdom and houses and gardens and to hear it’s empty.
1. This doesn’t ruin the earthly pleasures of life, it just puts them in perspective.
2. Ecclesiastes also exhorts us to enjoy our work and make the most of the things God gives us in this life. E.g. Ecclesiastes 3:12-13 “I perceived that there is nothing better for them than to be joyful and to do good as long as they live, also that everyone should eat and drink and take pleasure in all his toil—this is God’s gift to man.”
3. But blessed is the man who is given eyes to see the vanity of life.
4. Of course, you must also be given eyes to see the surpassing fullness of the Lord of life.
5. Maybe friends & children & food & health & beauty & stability & security are enough for you.
6. One thing I can guarantee you: They will not be enough on the day of your death!
7. Enjoy beauty? That’s great, as long as you most enjoy the One who is ultimate beauty.
8. Enjoy good food? Great, as long as you most enjoy the true food, the bread of life, Jesus Christ.
9. Enjoy good friends? That’s wonderful, as long as you recognize that, in the words of John Newton (Trinity Hymnal #186) “One there is, above all others, well deserves the name of Friend. His is love beyond a brother’s: costly, free, and knows no end.”
10. If you don’t, then you’re not only wrong about the nature of things in this life, but you’re missing out on the best Thing of all, the Thing which is ultimate beauty & truth & justice & pleasure & ultimate love.