Make the Most of Your Mist

Tonight's sermon comes from Ecclesiastes chapters 10 through 12. It says, "Dead flies make the perfumers ointment give off a stench, so a little folly outweighs wisdom and honor a wise man's heart inclines him to the right, but a fool's heart to the left. Cast your bread upon the waters, for you will find it after many days. Give a portion to seven, or even to eight, for you know not what disaster may happen on earth. He who observes the wind will not sow, and he who regards the clouds will not reap. As you do not know the way the spirit comes to the bones and the womb of a woman with child, so you do not know the work of God who makes everything. In the morning sow your seed in an evening withhold not your hand, for you do not know which will prosper, this or that, or whether both alike will be good. So if a person lives many years let him rejoice in them, but let him remember that the days of darkness will be many. All that comes is vanity, rejoice a young man in your youth, and let your heart cheer you in the days of your youth. Walk in the ways of your heart in the sight of your eyes, but know that for all these things God will bring you into judgment. The end of the matter all has been heard, fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man, for God will bring every deed into judgment with every secret thing, whether good or evil. This is the word of God for the people of God, you may be seated. Well some of church at all of our campuses, if you would, how about raise your hand if you have enjoyed the book of Ecclesiastes, raise your hand. I know I have for sure, but Solomon says every good thing under the sun must come to an end, and sadly we have come to the end of our time in the book of Ecclesiastes. Remember, in Ecclesiastes the author pursues one central thesis, a thesis that he sets out for us in the very opening verses of the book, Ecclesiastes chapter 1 verse 1, the words of the preacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem, Solomon, vanity of vanities, says the preacher, vanity of vanities, all is vanity.

What does man gain by all the toil at which he toils under the sun? There are two key concepts that we have identified in there, and come back to again and again. The first is vanity. You see how often it's repeated in those first verses. In Hebrew, in Hebrew, vanity is the word, what is it, class? Hevel, hevel, that's right. And remember that "hevel" literally means a vapor, like a cloud, something that looks so appealing and beautiful from the outside, but is actually substanceless. If you try to grasp a cloud, it will slip through your fingers. If you try to rest on it, you will fall right through it. This, the preacher says, is life under the sun, life that has been subjected to the curse of futility, a curse that has come about because of our sin. And because of that, because of that, Solomon says it is useless, here's the second concept, to seek gain in life here, gain in life under the sun. Now remember, gain in Ecclesiastes means that you try to hold on to something, to make it permanent, to have it fulfill your deepest longings, to base your life on it. Solomon says, if you try to find meaning and permanence and satisfaction in life under the sun, if you try to gain life here, it is going to disappoint you betterly. There is a way to be happy. He wants you to know that. There is a way to enjoy life, the preacher says. But it starts with recognizing that life under the sun can't make you happy. Happiness and permanence are found only in God. And when you embrace that, the most wonderful thing happens, he explains, you begin to appreciate life under the sun for what it is, a gift. A temporary gift, yes, a fleeting gift, but a gift that you can really enjoy. Chapters 10 to 12 of Ecclesiastes bring us to the end of the matter, which means the author is going to draw some conclusions. I'm going to highlight five conclusions from these chapters that basically encapsulate the whole book.

How are we supposed to live in a world of heaven? The author gives us five truths to live by. Here is the first one. Life is designed by God, he says, so we should live by wisdom. We should look at chapter 10, verse 2, if you have your Bible. He says, "A wise person's heart goes to the right, but a fool's heart to the left." This, by the way, is not a political statement, though I'll let you deduce whether there's any wisdom in that or not. right in the ancient world. be offensive to you, South Paul's out there, but that is just how they saw it in the ancient world. We know better, of course, but that's how they saw it. His point is that, yes, because we live in a world under the curse of heaven, life is not foolproof. Sometimes you do the right thing, the wise thing, and it still turns out badly. But even so, he says, the world is still designed by God, and that means wisdom will more often lead you to success and blessing than foolishness will. The first week I told you that Ecclesiastes comes right after the book of Proverbs in our Bibles, which is intentional because Proverbs and Ecclesiastes present opposite sides of a divine tension. Both Proverbs and Ecclesiastes are a part of what we call the wisdom literature of the Bible. The wisdom literature is that set of about five books right in the middle of our Old Testament that contains reflections about life and how it works. On one side of that tension, Proverb lays out principles for us and says, "Hey, if you live this way, here's how your life is probably going to go and it's probably going to be good." But then there's books like Ecclesiastes and Job in the wisdom literature that show you that because we live in a world of heaven, sometimes life goes wrong even when you do everything right. In fact, let me share with you a little seminary humor. Normally, I try to shield you from this kind of stuff, but I feel like after this series, you are ready for it, okay? One of my professor friends sent me this, okay? In the wisdom literature, in the Bible, if they were a family, this is what it would look like. Ecclesiastes, Job, and lamentations are these golf-looking people telling us about the tragedy of life. I did everything right and everything still imploded, right? Meanwhile, Proverbs is this kid down here. Live this way. He'll be blessed,

you know? And Ecclesiastes doesn't deny this. I mean, right here in chapter 10, verse 2, one of many places that Solomon says, "Yes, verse 2, a wise person's heart goes to the right but a fool's heart to the left." Why does he say that even though we're in a world of heaven? Well, first he says, because wisdom still works. The Proverbs are generally true. Proverbs 22, 6, "Train up a child the way that he should go and when he is old, he will not depart from it." Proverbs 3, verse 9, "Honor God with the first fruits of all your wealth and your barns will overflow with plenty and your vats will burst with new wine." Those are biblical principles that are generally true. And if you live by them, generally speaking, your life will turn out well more often than not. But more importantly, Solomon says, the other reason they used to pursue wisdom is because wise living is its own reward. Even when things don't work out exactly like you think they should, living in a way that pleases God has its own rewards. Wise living may not always lead you to an easy life, you see, but foolish living will always lead you to a tragic one. Solomon is pretty dogmatic about this. In that look at what he says in the first verse of this chapter, "Deadflies make a perfumer's oil stink." So a little folly outweighs wisdom and honor. Here you've got this beautiful, awesome smelling perfume, but it's got some dead bugs floating in it, which by the way, would have made all of it firm-met, which would have made the whole thing smell putrid. Or think of making a nice, delicious cake batter, but unknown to you. A mouse crawls in the bowl and drowns, and the batter sits there for like three weeks. When you bake that cake, you're just not going to be able to eat around that mouse carcass. Arcade to cake and carcass is going to make the whole cake stink. In the same way, a few ignored areas of foolishness, Solomon says, "Yeah, it can ruin an otherwise amazing life, so you need to pay attention to anywhere in your life that you are living foolishly and not wisely." There's a question that some of my accountability partners and I ask each other from time to time. We'll say to each other, we'll say, "Okay, if we could look five years into the future and we could see five years into the future that you'd been disqualified from ministry." What would have been the cause? In other words, what in your life is Satan most likely to use to bring you down? It's a very sobering question because it forces me to think, "Not where am I in trouble now, but where might I have some floating dead flies in my perfume?" Now, obviously, I know most of you aren't in full-time ministry,

so let me just ask you, if we could know that in five years, Satan will have wrecked your life. Here's the question, what would he most likely have used? Maybe for some of you, it'd be sexual temptation. You've got some overly friendly relationships at work or out in the neighborhood that you've just let develop. Nothing has happened yet, but you I can't say you hadn't thought about it. trying to tell yourself it's not hurting anybody. Maybe it's with money. You cheat in small ways. You know, your expense reports you lie on them a little bit. You little fudges on your taxes or maybe you skimp on your tithe. Maybe it's your temper. This is a big one. I know people who are just, I mean, amazing. But man, something flips their switch and they lose it. All your enemy has to do is put you in the wrong situation and you could lose everything. Maybe it's laziness. You just lack the discipline and drive and you can so easily settle into apathy. Maybe it's an inability to control your cravings. Proverbs says that a man without self-control is like a city that's broken down without walls. Meaning the enemy can just saunter on in any time he wants via your cravings and plunder you any time he wants. Maybe it's something with your ego. You'll remember him back to the future, how Marty McFly's fatal flaw was that he just couldn't stand to be called a chicken.

If you wanted to provoke Marty McFly to do anything, just call him a chicken and he would do whatever stupid thing to prove to you that he's not a chicken. And it was funny because we all know people like that. Some trigger that always gets them. Truth is, we're all kind of like that. For a lot of people, if they feel like, for example, they're looked down on or not being respected or they're not being admired or they're being criticized, you can manipulate them to do just about anything. My point is where is there a dead fly in your ointment? We could look five years into the future and know that Satan had ruined your life. What would most likely be the cause? By the way, this is one of the reasons that we strongly encourage you to be in small groups because small groups are where those things surface and others can point them out and help you with them. I can't do it from up here. You don't want me to do it from up here, right? You, this is your problem. No, you need to be in that kind of small group environment because that is where people take the word of God and the gospel and they help you root out where these dead flies are. That's the first thing that he wants you to do is you are leaving this book. Number two, he wants you to know that life is an adventure. So you got to take a risk. Solomon tells us that even though success

in this hevel of a world is never guaranteed, God wants you, he expects you to take a risk. Look at chapter 11, verse one, "Cast your bread upon the waters, for you will find it after many days." That is an ancient euphemism. Cast your bread upon the waters. It's an ancient euphemism for the shipping business. You'd put your stuff on a boat, your bread, so to speak, and you'd send it off into the vast uncontrollable ocean, knowing that it might never come back to you. In a day before insurance, that boat might sink or might get blown off course or pirates might plunder it and putting it out there, you were taking a big old chance. But unless you do that, Solomon says, "Well, yeah, you're never going to see a multiply." Even though the world is uncertain, even though you cannot have surety, risk he is saying is an important part of a faithful life. By the way, that phrase you don't know, that gets repeated four different times in this chapter. You don't know, verse two, what natural disasters might occur. You don't know, verse three, what the weather will do. You don't know what God will do. You don't know how many what's are going to show up in that verse. You don't know, verse six, which venture will succeed. A defining feature of life in a heavy world is you don't know. Even so, Solomon says, you should risk.

That look away, he says in verse two, give a portion to seven or even to eight. In other words, because of life's uncertainty, you should diversify your investments. Don't put all your eggs in one basket because there's no such thing as a sure thing. But some of you are not going to want to hear this and I'm ready for the emails. But sometimes people come to me with an idea, they are just sure is from God. Because it came to them in their quiet time and they get this warm, tingly feeling when they first thought about it. And then they saw a Bible verse later that reminded them of it and that proves it's from God. And because of that, they assume it's foolproof. It's got to work. And I always try to tell them. And they never want to hear this. But that is just not how God set up the world to work. I'm sorry, nothing in a hell of a world is foolproof. There's always a risk and even great ideas sometimes fail. You don't know what the weather might do or you don't know what God has in store. See, a lot of times what you're looking for, listen, what you're looking for is a path that won't require faith. The true faith requires embracing that you don't know exactly what's going to happen. But you trust that God will take care of you regardless.

And even though the path ahead of you is not sure the God who is above and in. The uncertainty of life and a heavy world is not a reason to freeze in paralysis. It is an occasion to trust God. Scripture commands us to adventure, to risk in the gospel of Matthew. Jesus tells a story about a rich master who goes on a long journey and he leaves his servants with various amounts of money to invest. Now investing was to deck, man was just like it is today. You'd never knew for sure what was gonna happen. Well, you probably know the story. To one, he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, a talent back then was some of money that represented about 20 years salary for the average day laborers. So we're talking pretty massive amounts of money. So here's what it says. He would receive the five talents when it wants to trade it with them to go risk on them. I put him out in the investment market and he made five talents more. So he doubled his return, turned his five into 10. So also he who had the two talents made two talents more. Same with him, less return, but he, you know, same percentage. But then watch this, he who had received the one talent went and dug in the ground and hit his master's money. Now to that guy, when the master returns, the master looks and he commends the first two servants

and to this third servant, he says you wicked and slothful, lazy, good for nothing, servant. You ought to have invested my money with the bankers and at my coming I would have received back what was my own with interest. So take the talent from him from this worthless serving, give it to the one who has the 10 talents for everyone who has will more be given and he will have an abundance, but from the one who has not even what he has is going to be taken away. Jesus called the one who did not take the risk, get this wicked. And my first reaction when I read that is wicked. I mean, what wicked thing had he done? He didn't steal the money, he didn't embezzle it, he didn't blow it on gambling and prostitutes. In fact, that servant returned 100% of it back to the boss. And yet Jesus calls this servant wicked because apparently failing to take a risk with what God gives you is wicked in Jesus' eyes. You see, one of the questions you've got to ask yourself in this parable is why that servant wouldn't take the risk. Now you think, well, maybe he's just being conscientious, but look at the excuse, he gives the master, verse 24. Master, I knew you to be a hard man. So I was afraid and I went and hid your talent on the ground. Why did he fail to invest? 'Cause he thought of his master as hard, a hard, uncaring man.

He did not trust his master. You see, faith recognizes that even in a heavy world of uncertainty, we have a father who will always take care of us and who wants us to risk what he's given us for his kingdom. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. So my question is, what's he saying to you? What's he saying to you, he's saying to you, take the risk, apply it for the job, start the company. Again, consider wisely, carefully, maybe diversify your risk in the seven or eight things like Solomon says, but take the risk, launch the ministry, yet pray about it, get lots of counsel, but when it comes time, take the risk, invest the money, maybe even better, give the money. Every year our church invests literally millions of dollars in church planting, and we know we know that money, that investment is not a guaranteed success, sometimes churches fail, sometimes disaster happens, but we also know that church planting is hands down the greatest kingdom investment that we can make. In fact, our study show, I've told you this, that for every one person, we've sent out the church plants, there's 50 new people and five new dollars coming into the kingdom. That's 50 new givers also, by the way, 50 new people as a result of everyone that leaves here that then come to church and begin to give. You show me a business venture with a 50 to one return rate,

and I'll show you a business venture worth investing in. So yeah, it's a risk, but we will gladly take it because nothing ventured, nothing gained. A point in his life is an adventure, he says, there is no sure thing, to take the risk, go on the mission trip, join the team. Some of you have been considering that, didn't live cent week, joined the team, go with the church went, even go overseas, I know it's a risk, that's the point. Start the ministry, start the company overseas. Here's one, hey bro, ask her out. I mean, is it me, or do you guys just not ask girls out that much anymore? Listen, I know, I know it's not a guarantee that she says yes. And if she does say no, you need to respect that. And maybe you'll get a little embarrassed if she says no, but hey, listen, we've all been there. The most risky, unrealistic chance I ever took in my life was when I put my bags down, buy my car, I can't pull a run, and I walk back to where Veronica so that I could try and ask her out. Everybody knew she was out of my league, my friends knew she was out of my league, her friends knew she was out of my league, and very help, unhelpfully kept telling her that, by the way. No thanks to them. She knew she was out of my, her dad knew that she was out of my, but she said yes,

and now we got four kids. Nothing ventured, nothing gained, okay? (audience applauding) No risk it, no biscuit. That's also somewhere in the Bible. So bro, listen, I'm just telling you, some of you, this is a word for you, get your backbone out of your mama's purse and go ask her out, okay? Test your bread on those waters so he can come back to you multiplied and all God's sisters said, Amen, all right. Yeah, my friend, my friend, Tony Marita, pastor actually here in the area says, verse two. So verse two says, give a portion to seven or even eight rather than sitting in fear, God invites us to be venture capitalists for the kingdom of God, doing seven or eight things for the gospel and wanting, waiting to see, waiting to see which ships come in. You're free to fail, but it's not failure if you're being faithful to the scriptures. That's the second thing Solomon wants us to see. Here's the third thing, he wants us to see number three that life is a gift. So enjoy it. So enjoy it, jump down to verse eight in chapter 11. So if a person lives many years, lives many years, let him rejoice in them all.

So let him remember that the days of darkness will be many all that comes is vanity. Enjoy every season of life to the fullest because all of them are gifts. None of them last forever. As I've said, literally every single week of this series, every season of your life is a once in a lifetime opportunity. Every era is the good old days. And so he implores you eight different times in this book. Live every season, every day, every minute to the fullest. Imagine, imagine if every morning, every morning somebody deposited $86,400 into your bank account with only one stipulation. That stipulation was whatever you don't spend by midnight, disappears forever. You can't save any of it. You can't roll any of it over until tomorrow at 11.59, 59 PM tonight, whatever's left in that account, simply vanishes. What would you do with that money each day? That'd be a fun way to live, right? In fact, some of you are thinking of an old movie with Richard Pryor called Brewster's Millions and this was the plot. The reason I tell you about it is because every single morning, God deposits 86,400 seconds into your time account. You don't get to keep or roll over a single second into tomorrow's account. At the end of the day, every unused second is gone forever. So enjoy every dinner, laugh with your kids,

call your parents, pursue excellent and meaningful work. Take the walk, watch the sunset, enjoy a good TV show. Every second is a gift from God and every second has an expiration date, but you don't use, you will lose. Like Bobby Jameson, another local pastor, puts it. Ultimately, you can't save time. You can only choose how you spend it, which is exactly Solomon's point. We can't preserve time. The only question is whether we're gonna spend today's gift and what matters most. That brings me to number four. Fourth principle he wants us to learn is that life is hevel. So don't cling to it. Yeah, life is a gift, so enjoy it, but it's also a hevel. So don't cling to it. This is the other part of verse eight. We already did the enjoy life part. The end of it says, let him remember though that the days of darkness will be many. All that comes is hevel. What's he saying? He's saying you can't hold on to the good days. You can't hold on to the joys and the gifts and the bad days are gonna come too. You don't remember that everything in this world, everything of the good things, it's all hevel, like a cloud. If you try to grasp it or hold on to it,

it's gonna slip right through your fingers. So enjoy it, but don't cling to it. And don't depend on it for permanence or happiness 'cause if you do, it surely will break your heart. My 16 year old son, Ed. He and I were talking about this sermon series the other day and he said, dad, you need to tell him that here's rusty illustration. We haven't heard that one in a while. Now, Ed, if you don't know this, it's kind of my sermon whisperer. So, you know, that's just kind of his role in my life. So I do what he tells me, so here goes, okay? Here's how it goes. Pastor Joby Martin talks about how when he first moved to Jacksonville, Florida, he got invited by one of his members to the dog racing track bear. And we don't have, far as I know, a lot of dog racing tracks in Raleigh, North Carolina. That's more of a Jacksonville thing. announcer, he says, comes on. He said, "I've never been in one force. I had no idea what was going on." The announcer comes on the loudspeaker and just bellows out, "Here's Rusty!" Joby said the first time he went when that voice boomed through the loud street, he didn't get no idea what was going on, but everybody stood up and started cheering and then this little fake rabbit popped up on a little railway out in front of the gates and shot down the track. He said, "Man, when those dogs behind those starting gates saw Rusty, they lost their ever-loving canine minds.

They'd start barking and jumping and banging up against those doors of those dates, and when they let down those dates, man, those dogs tore off after that fake rabbit like they'd been fired out of a cannon. They chased Rusty all the way to the end of the track." He said, "With suddenly Rusty disappeared back into a hole in the ground." Joby said, "You know, I'm sure later, in the kennel, all those dogs are like, 'Ahh!' And I was so close this time, I almost had it. Their dog friends were like, 'Gosh, me too, you know? I think we'll ever have a chance at Rusty again. Sure enough, next day, Rusty's back. The dumb dogs never learn that they're never going to catch Rusty." We were like, "Ah, yeah, dumb dogs, but consider this, listen. Every day, our alarm clocks go off, and I want you to imagine that little alarm clock bellowing out beside your bed, here's Rusty! And you hop out of bed, and off you go in pursuit of the promotion, the corner office, the new boyfriend, the biggest deal you've ever closed, the new car." Pastor Joby said he's gone to the track now enough. I don't even want to know why he's going to what he's doing there, but he's gone now enough to know that there are times when something goes wrong, and one of those dogs actually catches Rusty. He said the track, "Carry and Rusty breaks," or something, and one of those dogs latches under Rusty with his teeth, that object of his greatest passion and desire, his one ambition in life, and he chews into it, and then he thinks, 'Hey, wait a minute, I've been duped. This is not what I thought it was.' That dog, that dog, Joby says, will never run in quite the same way again. And this, and this is where the dogs might actually be a little smarter than us, because you see, some of us have caught Rusty. You moved into the new house, you got the corner office, and you chewed into it, you got the next marriage, and you thought, 'Hey, this is disappointing. This is not all that I thought it was.'

But unlike the dogs, you're like, 'I know, it must be a different Rusty that I need. It must be a bigger Rusty, a Rusty. This Rusty was not what I thought it would be. Sure the next one will be.' And again, that's where you and I might be even dumber than the dogs. There is nothing in this world. Nothing under the sun, Solomon says. That's actually going to satisfy you. There is no future circumstances in your life that is going to give you that satisfaction that you crave. If you cannot be satisfied now, there is no condition in the future in which you will be satisfied. God has put an eternity-sized hole in your hearts, which means that only something infinite can fill it. If it's an eternal gap, it needs an infinite filler to the gap. You keep trying to fill it up with little Dixie cup-sized amounts of water. You've got an ocean-sized hole in your heart, and you keep trying to fill it up with Dixie cups, which brings me back to C.S. Lewis' statement, which is so important. I told you last week I was going to give it to you two weeks in a row because you really need to ponder this. Here's what Lewis says, "You see, the things in which we thought the beauty was located, it will betray us. If we trusted them, you see, it wasn't in them. It only came through them. What came through them was longing. These things, he says, "The beauty, the memory of our own past, the nostalgia, either good images of what we really desire." But see, if we mistake them for the thing itself, it's like Rusty is going to turn into a dumb idol and it's going to break the hearts of the worshipers. Every single gift, every good thing, marriage, kids, retirement, a boat, all of it whispers,

not me, not me, not me. Every beautiful thing in your life says, "I'm not the thing itself, I'm just the scent of a flower you haven't found yet. I'm the echo of a tune you've not heard yet, news from a country we've never yet visited not to a new rusty, it is pointing you upward to God. It's pointing you to eternity. In fact, here's Lewis's conclusion. If I find in myself a desire which nothing in this world can satisfy, the only explanation must be that I was made for another world, a world above the sun, not under the sun, you were created for a relationship with an eternal God, and only knowing that God can satisfy you because you've been given eternity in your heart. So enjoy life's pleasures, but don't cling to them or don't grasp them because you try to grasp them, the crumble in your hands. Think of the pleasures of life like a butterfly. Got a beautiful little butterfly lands on your hands, and the only way to enjoy it is not to grab it. In fact, if you close your fist around it, you'll crush the very thing you were trying to keep. The only way to enjoy it is to hold your hand open and just hold it and receive it as a gift. If it stays, enjoy it. If it flies away, let it go, thankful for those moments you had with it. If I was life, life is heaven. Don't cling to it. Number five, last one, life is short. It's a revere God. Verse 13, 14, this is the author's big conclusion. This is the end of the matter, he says. And at this point, by the way, the editor that I was telling you about in this book, remember, I told you he had lights like a stage plate, he got one guy Solomon up here complaining about life. And every once in a while, the editor, the other guy standing, this is the other guy. He suddenly takes stage again and he's going to sum everything up for you. Let me show you before his grand conclusion, I want to show you first how he sets it up because it's pretty awesome. In the first few verses of this chapter of Solomon walks us through the inevitable aches and pains of aging, a process that is overtaking all of us. Now his presentation is light-hearted and almost humorous until you get to the end and then he sticks you with a knife. Verse three, he says, in the day when the keepers of the house tremble and the strong men are bent, what are you talking about? Some of that point in your life when your limbs start shaking and you hunch over or when you stand up and you have to walk stiffly for a few minutes like this, anybody else like that? Or when you get sore for no discernible reason? I hurt my knee earlier this year and I've been limping a little bit. I've been trying to mask

it so hard so that you guys would not notice it. But here's the thing, here's the thing, honest truth, I have no idea how I hurt my knee. I went to the doctor here in one of our church, Dr. Kanan, and he x-rated and he told me that I'd torn my meniscus and we talked about possible things that could have caused it. I have no idea. I'm like, I don't know, I don't know. We said, look, JD, the real problem is that this thing was made in 1973 and the warranty has long since expired on that thing, okay? We don't even make parts for this anymore. I've told you all, sometimes I wake up sore and all I did the day before was watch TV and sleep, somehow going from this position in the bed to this position is enough to make me sore and limp around the next day. Solomon continues, the grinder cease because there are few, which means your teeth fall out. Those who look through the windows are dimmed, what do you think that's a reference to? Yeah, eyesight goes bad. Listen, I covered this up pretty well too. You can't see it, but the font in this notebook right here gets a little bigger every single year. And I know, I know, it's inevitable. One day, one day, I'm going to have to pull out glasses and put them on to read something up here. And I am not looking forward to that day. You can be like, I feel like there's one word for page in that notebook and you're going to be right. The worst thing is I can hardly ever read the menu in a nice restaurant without turning on my flashlight and it drives my wife crazy. I mean, she's like, stop it. And I'm like, why can't they just turn the lights on in here? Yeah, laugh it up, young adults. It is coming for you, okay? And it's going to be here before you think it's going to be here. The doors on the street are shut when the sound of the grinding is low. What's he talking about? Hearing loss, the doors are shut. Veronica says the way that she knows she's getting older is that one of the most important factors in choosing a restaurant now is how quiet it is. So that we can hear each other. We used to choose restaurants based on food and vibe. Now we choose them based on lighting and sound. How about this? He goes on one rises at the sound of a bird. Anybody else wake up at 3am and think, getting in trouble for this, but I told Molly Vittevich, who's one of our worship leaders, that her voice is so beautiful, and this is true, I've told her I want her to sing at my funeral as long as I don't die when she's 90, because at that point I'm going to request somebody younger, I'm just telling her, I'm not being mean, that's just ecclesiastes, the daughters of song get brought low.

Even those beautiful voices don't say beautiful forever. Verse 5, they're also afraid of what is high and terrors in the way. Older people live with a heightened sense of risk, that is a polite way of saying it. Stairs look steeper, curbs look more dangerous. By the way, this seems to be what the entire cable news industry is built on, right here. There's so much out there to be afraid of. Or by the way, you ever notice if you're watching TV during a time period when they think it's only older people that are watching TV, have you noticed the themes of the commercials? Like 10 a.m. on a Tuesday morning, you're watching TV, that's not a good idea by the way, get a job? But if you watch TV at 10 a.m. on Tuesday morning, they're always trying to sell you stuff to address some fear, identity, theft, protection, reverse mortgages, gold, because China is messing with our economy, buttons to press in case you fail or you fall, special locks for your prepper bunker or whatever, right, something. That's a function of old age Solomon says, you just become more fearful. When you're 25, you think you're invincible. When you're 75, you realize gravity has remained undefeated for a really long time, and you're not going to be the first person to beat it. Still verse 5, the almond tree blossoms. Almond blossoms are a pale white in springtime, so that's a reference to your hair getting white and gray, something I would know nothing about. The grasshopper drags itself along, and desire fails. This was kind of funny, because the Hebrew word that we translate here as desire abi-yona refers to the caperberry, a berry which was considered to be both an appetite stimulant and an aphrodisiac. As you get older, he says, desire for everything, dims, those who once bounced through life like grasshoppers now moped through the days, not feeling much of anything. Again, listen, you just sit there, you young people, looking all smug, it's coming for you. Reminds me of the words that old British author, Terry Pratchett, inside every old person is

a young person wondering what happened. Verse 5, "Because man is going to his eternal home, and the mourners go about in the streets," in other words, the mourners for your funeral. Before the silver cord is snapped or the golden bowl is broken, probably a reference they say to losing your mind or losing your life spirit, or the picture is shattered at the fountain, could be a reference to some heart attack, or the wheel is broken at the cistern, maybe incontinence in your digestive tract, or getting up four times a night to use a bathroom or something. The dust returns to the earth as it was, and the spirit returns to the God who gave it. We live in a world under the Genesis curse of death. We live in a world of heaven, and God did not design it to be that way, but that's what it is, because God said to man, "The day that you sinned against me, I'm going to curse the earth, and you're going to die." And after man's sin, God cursed him and said, "From dust you came, and to dust you will return," which is Solomon basically saying, "This whole curse of heaven I've been telling you about for 12 chapters, it's the curse of sin, and it goes back to Genesis 3. We sinned." God put futility on the earth. From dust we came into dust we're going, and so it all just vanishes and goes away. This Solomon in those verses is not just trying to get you to laugh about getting old. He's trying to wake you up, especially if you're younger. This is where it's all headed, he said. All of us, it's all headed here. This is the end of the matter. Remember your Creator in the days of your youth. That's the point. He is saying to young people, "I know you assume that you're invincible, and you think life is going to last forever. Wake up, your enemy in the Garden of Eden said you will not surely die." He is still saying that to you, but you are not invincible and life doesn't last forever.

David Gibson, whose book on Ecclesiastes, called Living Life Backward, offended immensely helpful in preparing this series. If you had one book you were going to read on Ecclesiastes, it would be his. Simple wisdom is preparing for the end when God will bring every deed into judgment. Much of this, one of the hardest things about Ecclesiastes is letting it instruct us that there are no immediate answers for some things in this life like oppression. There's ultimately only one answer. God will put it right. We should prepare to meet him. Chapter 12, verse 13. This is the end of the matter. All has been heard. Fear God, keep His commandments. This is the whole duty of man for God is gonna bring every deed into judgment. Every secret thing, whether it was good or evil, God's gonna judge all of it. Have you ever had one of those panicky dreams in which you find yourself in a situation that you are totally unprepared for? In college, it would always be me showing up in a class and there's some assignment due and I have no idea what's going on. Now I've got this recurring dream where I show up here to preach, but I'm totally unprepared and no idea what I'm supposed to be up here talking about.

And I literally fumble around up here for 45 minutes, trying to make jokes, trying to get in a groove, maybe figure out what I'm supposed to be saying, taking a cue from you, what I'm supposed to be saying. And you're all sitting there with a weird, almost pitting look on your faces. It is my worst dream and I had it probably once every six months and I'm sure psychologists will tell me it's got something to do with my inner imposter syndrome or something like that and they're probably right. But most of us have a dream like that, right? Don't you have some version of that dream? And is it the most relieving thing in the world when you wake up and you realize that it was all just a dream? That you haven't missed the deadline, that there's still time to prepare for whatever it is that you're worried about. Solomon is warning us that a day is coming when a lot of people are gonna discover that they're not ready for the most important moment of their entire existence. That moment they stand before God and it's not gonna be a dream. Their whole life has been one long exercise in avoiding reality and shutting their eyes to reality, shutting their eyes to the truth about judgment and death. Every day they got up and looked in the mirror and the mirror told them that it was happening

and they said not today. It's not gonna be a dream when you wake up in that moment, it's gonna be real. Solomon says fear God and keep his commandments, that's the whole duty of man. But God is gonna bring every deed in the judgment with every secret thing, whether good or evil. See, I got good news for you this weekend, you don't have to be afraid of that moment, I know what I just said, terrified some of you. 'Cause there's time to prepare now. You don't have to fear judgment. In fact, believers look forward to the judgment. You see, for us, judgment means the end of pain and suffering. That's all it means. It means the restoration of justice, it means reunion with God and loved ones. We do not fear judgment because listen, we know our sins have already been covered, they've been paid for by Jesus. We accepted his offer to cleanse and forgive us and we have been reunited with him. You see, none of us, here's the truth, none of us have lived in a way on our own, none of us have lived in a way that is worthy of God's acceptance, we should all be terrified of judgment because God is gonna bring every deed in the judgment, every secret thing, every straight thought that I've had, all that comes into judgment.

And on that day when every secret thought is brought into judgment, the book of Romans tells me exactly what the verdict on the entire human race is gonna be, watch this, there's none righteous. No, not even one, all have sinned, all fall short of the glory of God, everybody is guilty before God. And if you haven't received Jesus' forgiveness at that point, you're gonna enter into eternal judgment for every secret sin you've ever committed. And that is a terrifying thought, it should make you terrified. But if you've accepted Jesus' forgiveness, you don't have to be afraid to, there's a great irony about final judgment. For those who are in Christ, I'm not talking about 'cause they're good and righteous and good, I'm just, those are in Christ. Judgment is a joyous thought 'cause it means the end of pain and means the end of everything good, or everything bad, excuse me. For those who are outside of Christ, it means the end of joy and everything good. Like Randy Alcorn always says for the believer of this world, it's the closest thing to hell you will ever experience for the unbeliever, this world is the closest thing to heaven you will ever experience. Listen, I'm telling you,

I don't have to be afraid of judgment. The whole Bible is about how Jesus entered into this world of heaven for you, for God. So loved this world under the curse of heaven but have eternal life. If you receive him, you can be confident in judgment and even look forward to it because for you, it'll just mean the end of pain and futility. Now when you do that, even life in a helpful world starts to become enjoyable. I'll show you one last thing here. Solomon's spent a whole book warning us. There's no gain to be had under the sun, right? Now at the whole point, you think it's in the accident when the Apostle Paul talks about death in Philippians one, 21. And he says, for me to live as Christ and to die is gain. That's the Christian's life right there. All the gain I couldn't find here. I'm going to inherit with him there. I'm going to go into eternity with him where there is no more pain. And there I'm going to find out that everything I did for him here with Christ mattered. Every bill I paid his name, every test I took in his name, every order I fulfilled, every person I helped, every dollar I invested. And most of all, every person I helped know Jesus a little bit more. It all matters. Martin Luther said, when you understand those things, when you understand he cleans you ass, he's only two days in your calendar are going to matter that day and this day, today, that day, the day that you know that you'll stand before God in this day, the day that the Lord has made for you to rejoice and be glad in it and be faithful to him in whatever assignment he's given you, which is why we say, the summit, only one life to live will soon be passed. Only what's done for Christ will last. So some of it, listen, listen, make the most of your mist, make the most of your heavy mist of a life. Enjoy it, but make the most of it. That's the whole point of Ecclesiastes.

Listen, I'm going to ask you to all of our campuses, if you would, I want you to stand to your feet. I'm going to return it over right now to our campus pastors at every campus. We're going to give you some ways. We're going to come and give you some ways specifically you can respond to this. All right, so I just want you to bow your heads, bow your heads. I want you to enter into a time where the Holy Spirit speaks to you. All right, just bow your heads and just want you to listen for what he might be saying to you in campus pastors, you come, you come. [MUSIC]