Today's passage: Ecclesiastes 12:9-14

Helpful thoughts:

• The Word of God is the one collection of writings that we can wholly trust.  Everything else we read must be run through the grid of Scripture.
• The number of books we read is not the measure of our spiritual growth.  Fear God and keep His commandments.
• God is our judge.  No person on the face of this earth…no friend, no enemy, no group of kids from school, no coworkers will ever be our judge.

Questions to consider:

1. In the previous passage, we were told to remember our Creator in our youth.  These verses tell how to remember our Creator.  How do we remember and learn about our Creator?
2. Why does the Word of God sometimes feel painful (Like an ox's goad or a board of nails)?  When does this pain keep us away from God's Word and when does this pain “Hurt so good”?
3. Why should we love and read the Word of God with more gravity and attention than we read other books, news sources, or social media?  How do our actions in these areas work to reveal our loves and our fear/worship?

Today's passage: Ecclesiastes 12:1-8

Helpful thoughts:

• God does not exist for our good pleasure, we exist for His.
• Thinking of the future helps us to live better in the present.
• The imagery in verses 2-7 convey the aging, growing old of a person.
  • The eyes dim
  • Our bodies weaken
  • We may grow fearful and recluse/lonely
  • Our hair whitens (Almond tree blossoms)
  • Our bodies break and give way and our life pours out
    • The sweetness of these years is the fruit and memories of a life well lived for the Lord, and the eagerness of going home and seeing Jesus face to face.
    • The “vanity” is the vapor that is life.  It's here and its gone.  Don't wait to start living the way your old self will have wished you lived.

Questions to consider:

1. If God is my creator than who has the best idea how I could best live this vapor of a life?  How should that change my thinking, my values, my interests, my planning, my actions…everything?
2. How does thinking about the future beyond retirement help us to plan accordingly for retirement?  How might it change some of our plans?
3. How does our salvation in Christ totally liberate us from a life that just pours out onto the ground and dissipates when we die?  How amazing is it to be a child of God!?!

Today's passage: Ecclesiastes 11:1-10

Helpful thoughts:

• If you cast out your goods, you may or may not have access to it later.  But when you give a portion of your goods, you can be sure it was put to good use.
• The world is full of cause and effect.  If we wait around for the perfect scenario to do anything, the effect will be that we have done nothing.
• Rejoice in the good days and look at the big picture of life so that we can even rejoice during the dark days.
  • Part of Solomon's reminder of God's judgement is our command to rejoice.  God commands us to have joy in the life He has given us.
  • We do not have to be told to follow our hearts…we always do what we do because we want what we want.  When we are rejoicing in the Lord, our hearts and eyes will delight in the right path.

Questions to consider:

1. How could we apply verses 5 & 6 to our work?  What would be wiser than thinking we have a sure solution to any work-related problem?
2. Given the context of this passage, how could we successfully put away vexation (Think grumpiness) and evil?
3. Knowing that everyone has “light” days and “dark” days, why are some people grumpy and some joyful?  What makes the difference? (See Philippians 4:10-13)

Today's passage: Ecclesiastes 10:1-20

Helpful thoughts:

• Verse 1 sums up verse 17-18 of chapter 9
• Verses 2-7 teach that even though wisdom and foolishness are easy to behold/differentiate, fools will often still be elevated and the wise will often still be forgotten.
• Verses 8-11 are a unit.  They teach the likelihood of being endangered whether you are working mischievously or honorably…but emphasize the greater prospects of working honorably and planning ahead.
• Verses 12-15 convey the uselessness of the fool's counsel.  They won't stop talking and can't even successfully give you directions into town.
• Verses 16-20 speak of the value of hard work and diligence both in governmental leadership and in personal practice.
  • Verse 19 could be taken out of context in a bad way…money is not the answer to everything.  But, you need money to pay for everything you buy.

Questions to consider:

1. There is much to consider from this proverbial chapter…what thoughts stick out the most to you?
2. How does this chapter summarize and apply much of the content from the book of Ecclesiastes?
3. How would you apply these principles to your work, home, family, etc.?

Today's passage: Ecclesiastes 9:11-18

Helpful thoughts:

• “Man does not know his time.”  We can try to plan, and we can benefit from planning.  But planning is not guaranteeing…it's just planning.
• The wise man in the city was not heard until he was desperately needed.  Then, he was forgotten as soon as the threat was gone.  His wisdom now despised and his words unheard.
  • This doesn't mean wisdom is inferior, it just isn't desired because of sin.

Questions to consider:

1. Should we quit planning altogether since we do not have control over our ultimate ability to execute it? (James 4:13-17)  What should we plan to do?
2. Why do we have to call reading our Bibles a discipline?  Why do we have to train ourselves to read it?
3. How can we prove that living with wisdom is better than living as a foolish ruler under the sun?  Why must our faith and delighting in Jesus be our motivation?

Today's passage: Ecclesiastes 9:7-10

Helpful thoughts:

• God takes pleasure in our pleasure, in our righteous enjoyment of His creation.
• The first word of this passage is “Go”.  We are to enjoy life, enjoy our spouses, relationships, and our work, on purpose.
• It's good with this passage to remember that in Ecclesiastes, we are taught that life is a gift, not gain.  It is to be enjoyed, not obtained.
• Sheol is the grave.  Our dead bodies will no longer enjoy this life…but for the Christian, death has lost its sting and the grave has no victory!

Questions to consider:

1. How would the first half of verse nine require righteous living to enjoy?  Remember, love is an action, not a feeling.
2. Why should we pursue excellence in our work?  How will that provide more enjoyment for us and for others?
3. What will our enjoyment of this life better prepare us for after this life?  What enjoyment lies ahead?

Today's passage: Ecclesiastes 9:1-6

Helpful thoughts:

• This passage is the beginning of the end for this book.  Solomon begins to write the conclusions and recaps the content to drive it all home.
• The first truth: Death comes to all and we do not have control of its arrival or its timing.
  • The righteous do not guarantee the postponement of death.
  • The wicked are not sure to die earlier than the righteous.
  • All will become distant memories and even forgotten eventually under the sun.  All that will be known is what was done, recorded and kept…and even then only the perception of others will be what remains.

Questions to consider:

1. Why do we all die?  What is the root cause?  Is it unfair that any of us die at any time at all?
2. When we call death unfair, what plain are we operating on, the horizontal or the vertical?  With whom are we comparing people?  Who is forgetting the past?  Where is our popularity fading?
3. Who doesn't forget anything?  Who is the One who takes away the sting of death for all those who believe?
4. How does living with the reality of death, eternal life with Christ, and God's sovereignty affect the way we would live today?

Today's passage: Ecclesiastes 8:10-17

Helpful thoughts:

• Doing good or doing evil does not automatically result in an easier or harder (Or longer or shorter) life under the sun.
• Joy is possible whether life is easy or hard.
• All that God does and why He does it is beyond our comprehension.  There will always be some mystery under the sun.  God is too big for us to completely grasp…and that's a good thing.
  • We can know all what He has revealed to us, and He will always operate within His character and His promises.
  • But, He is above our comprehension.  We know what we do because He has revealed it to us.  We cannot know God as thoroughly as He knows us.

Questions to consider:

1. In what ways is it “well” for those who fear God?  In what ways are things better for us under the sun, and after this life?
2. If a Christian can have joy in good times and bad because of God, what is the cause of the sinner's sorrow?  At the root level, what are they missing out on?  What do they need?
3. Does it bother you that God is bigger than we can handle?  If so, why?  What are some reasons we might feel uncomfortable not having total comprehension of all that He is?  What might that reveal from within our own hearts?

Today's passage: Ecclesiastes 8:1-9

Helpful thoughts:

• Solomon learned some of these lessons the hard way (“While applying my heart to all that is done under the sun”).
• You never have power over your sin's consequences.
• The wise see the bigger picture even under the authority of certain “kings”.  The fool gets caught up in the moment and in every detail.

Questions to consider:

1. In what way(s) would wisdom cause a person's “hardness of face” soften?
2. How does this passage help us to respond well and respect those who are in authority over us in government, even when we disagree with them?
3. How would you best apply a passage like this with our system of government?  What trends do you see in our culture related to our government that we should avoid?

Today’s passage: Ecclesiastes 7:15-29

Helpful thoughts:

• You can be overly righteous (pious) and pursue wisdom to a fault.
• Wicked people may live longer under the sun than a righteous person. But, there is wickedness that leads to an early death.
• No one is righteous but one… (The Messiah)
  • In verse 28, Solomon eludes to the one among a thousand he has found. Read Job 33:23 for another reference of the one out of a thousand.
  • Jesus is the only possible “one” that Solomon could have found. He even says so in verse 20.
• Cursing and traps are the work of men and women. God made man upright in the beginning.  Man destructively schemes in the present.

Questions to consider:

1. How can a person be overly righteous? What would have to be the motivation for that righteousness?  How does that contradict the message of the Gospel?
2. Will it always hold true that the righteous have it “better” than the wicked under the sun? Why should that not discourage us?
3. Where must all of your confidence lie concerning righteousness? How does the truth of the Gospel humble us in the best of ways?