Ecclesiastes 12 - Bullets at the Back of the Book
Tom Shrader wraps up his 8-week series on Ecclesiastes by presenting what he calls "the bullets at the back of the book" - a summary of Solomon's credentials, wisdom, and ultimate conclusion. Despite experiencing unparalleled wealth, pleasure, success, and wisdom, Solomon declares all meaningless apart from God. Tom emphasizes that Solomon's authority comes from his extraordinary life experience and his role as a communicator of divine truth, culminating in the book's final message: fear God and keep His commandments, for God will judge every deed.
“Solomon speaks with extraordinary authority - you cannot question his credentials when he says life is meaningless, because he says this not as a loser in life, but as a winner.”
— Tom Shrader
Series: Reflections From the Top of the Heap (2002)
Recorded: November 14, 2002
Duration: 42 min
Themes: wisdom, meaninglessness, purpose, vanity, fear, obedience, judgment, authority, seeking life purpose, questioning meaning, successful professional, wealthy individual, middle aged, life reflection, spiritual emptiness, accomplished leader
Scripture: Ecclesiastes 12:9-14, Genesis 3
Theological Themes: ecclesiastes, old testament wisdom, divine judgment, biblical authority, fear of god, reverence, eschatology, solomonic literature
Full Transcript
Today is session 8 of our 8-session series, so this is it—the close of this series. We'll start a new series next week, and I've got to tell you, I have absolutely no idea what it's going to be. I had someone yesterday ask me to teach Genesis 3, and their thought process was that we keep mentioning this is the key chapter as it unfolds. If you want to understand the world, understand Genesis 3. So I might take a week or two and do that.
I am really not looking for suggestions—I want you to understand this. I do not have time to create a lot of new stuff. But if you do have a thought or idea, be happy to float it up and let me know, and we'll take a look at it. Genesis 3 is something that is such a linchpin that it might be just a good discussion, especially against the backdrop of what we see in the world around us.
Today, session 8, and the title is kind of an interesting title. The series title is "Reflection from the Top of the Heap," and today the title is "The Bullets in the Back of the Book." Most of the titles that we've used all the way through make sense to you. This one may not, and I can understand why. It will make sense pretty quickly.
Understanding Modern Book Marketing
What we're talking about are the things that are used now in marketing books. Research tells us that people buy books now—more people buy books based on the cover, the jacket, the flip on the inside, and the endorsements—than they do reading three or four pages of the book.
There's a book I have not purchased, but I know that I will buy this book. It's called "Understanding Jefferson"—it's on Thomas Jefferson. I have not bought the book, but I know I'll buy it simply because on the front cover there's a little box. In that box is a quote from Stephen Ambrose that says, "When I finished this book for the first time, I had an understanding of Thomas Jefferson." I'm saying there's no way I'm not going to buy this book. Based on that singular remark right there, I would have passed over, and did pass over, three, four, five books on Jefferson, but that one caught my attention.
More and more, that's how I find myself being intrigued by a new book. I'll take a book, I'll look at the back, I look at the endorsements. I look at who the people are. I look at some of the bullets—there's our title—some of the bullet points in the back of the book, and I begin to make my decision based on that.
Overview of Our Approach
What we want to do today—and if you're with us for the first time, this works out really well for you. If you've been here through this series, it works out not so well for you. In one case, we're going to give you a summary. In another case, we're going to give you a review of the book.
I said last week, and I mean it, it feels like I'm saying the same thing every week, and all the things that I've said for the last seven weeks, we say again this week, to get us to the last 15 minutes of this session. So what we're going to look at, in a quick overview—take some time on it, but not a lot of time—is the theme of this book, the author of the book, the source of his authority, and then the message of the book.
The Theme of the Book
When we look at the theme of the book, you have some things in your outline there, but not a lot of information here. If I said to you—you've been here now for seven weeks—if I said to you, "What's the theme of this book?" you would say what? Meaningless. Meaningless. Yeah, exactly. Meaningless.
Solomon does a great job of taking that point and just taking it and driving it home again, and again, and again, and again. That life, in and of itself, is meaningless. Vanity of vanities. That life doesn't make any sense. That life is just a series of what appears to be contradictions. By that I mean, it looks like if I get this, I'll be happy, but if I get it, I'm not. I look around, I see people who I would say are bad people, and they seem to have a good thing going. I see people who are good people—they got the bad lot in life. None of this seems to make sense. Meaningless. Meaningless. Everything is meaningless.
Solomon's Authority as a Winner
What makes that conclusion, in my mind, so powerful, is that Solomon says this not as a loser in life, but as a winner. Let me review some of these things for you.
When we look to education and wisdom, that's Solomon. Solomon didn't have a PhD. He had a PhD and PhDs, and he taught the PhDs. Solomon was the one who had an extraordinary amount of knowledge, but he had with it wisdom, insight, understanding. So if you're sitting here and saying, "Boy, if I can just get this degree, if I can just get through this class, if I can just get these initials behind my name, at that point I'll be happy," Solomon says, "Well, that's meaningless."
He also had unrestrained pleasure. We've had a little bit of fun just reviewing that. Food—the greatest of the food, all the wine that he needed. When it came to women, he had a thousand women, concubines and wives at his disposal—a thousand of them. Let me make a point, because I don't know that we made this point when we looked at that. He reigned for 40 years. He didn't have the same women for 40 years. The minute he saw a sag, a bag, or a drag, that one's gone and a new one comes in. So make sure we get this. If he's walking down the street and he sees somebody, boom, she's part of his deal.
There's another thing—and I don't want to make this more graphic than necessary—but these women were not just going through the motions. They lived to please Solomon. So when you're talking pleasure and you're sitting there saying, "Boy, if I can just get enough wine or the right wine, or if I can get the girl or enough girls," it doesn't matter. Solomon's saying to you what he said about it: "I've been there and I've done that, and I'm telling you, in the end of the day, it's meaningless."
He had accumulated wealth. His
His annual income in gold, 3,000 years ago now, was $600 million a year. That's just gold. It doesn't count silver. It doesn't count any of his other income. His income was as significant as he wanted it to be. You may sit down and say, "I made 50 grand this year and I want to make 60 next year." Then you strive and get it to 54 or something. If Solomon wanted to make X, he made X because he just taxed. He just put tax after tax after tax until he was happy. Solomon just went ahead and did whatever he wanted to do.
It's not just accumulated wealth. He had possessions. Listen to these. This is just one area. He had 40,000 chariot horses, 12,000 chariot drivers, stalls—thousands and thousands of stalls for this one mode of transportation, all at his disposal. He had everything that he ever dreamt of.
Here you go. It's Christmas time. You get the Sharper Image catalog. You're going through it: "Oh, I'd like that. I want that. I want that." Solomon gets the catalog and goes, "I got that. I got that. I got all of that stuff." You can't send something to him he doesn't have. He's got everything that he could ever imagine.
Solomon's Success and Achievements
It's not just possessions. He had success. We use the term in our notes "political success"—he reigned successfully for 40 years. His dad set him up in business there as king, and he reigned for 40 years. He had professional achievement. He had so many different things that he excelled in, but he was a prolific writer. He wrote 3,000 proverbs. He wrote 1,005 songs. He was a Steve Allen type of guy of his day. He wrote the book of Proverbs, the book of Ecclesiastes, the Song of Solomon. He built the temple.
Just listen to those things. That's an impressive resume. If I were to introduce a speaker to you and I said, "The speaker that we have here today has wisdom unseen before in the history of mankind. He's experienced more pleasure than anyone who's ever lived. He's accumulated wealth. He has possessions beyond anything you can imagine. He's reigned successfully for 40 years. His professional achievements are too numerous to be listed"—you're going to want to hear from this guy.
So I introduce him to you, and he gets up, and here's what he says: "Meaningless, meaningless. It's all meaningless." That ought to carry some weight with you.
Three Ways to Learn
In my mind, we learn in three ways. One is to take in information. We read, we watch a movie, we watch a video, whatever it is. The second one is through personal experience. As a young man, I didn't do this very well. My mom and dad, when they gave advice—and I look back on it—gave me great advice. I know it's great advice because it's the same advice I give my kids. But I wasn't a very good student. If my mom said, "Don't touch that, it's hot," I would say, "That's because you don't know what hot is." Ouch, that's hot. But that's the process that I would go through.
There's a third way to learn. If you're really smart, you'll learn this way. That's to learn from other people. In other words, there's the old phrase, "learn from your mistakes." I'm saying, learn from yours or others' mistakes. God has been so good to me, and one of the great blessings He's given me are people, friends, people in the church who have screwed up lives. I get to watch them. I watch myself, and I look at that, and I say, "God, I don't want to make that mistake. Let me learn from that."
If you are here today, and you really want to take life, and you want to make it as best you can, as trouble-free as you can—which we know it's impossible to get it trouble-free, but as trouble-free as you can—one of the great ways to do that is to not make a bunch of stupid mistakes. One of the great ways to not make stupid mistakes is to learn from the people that have gone ahead of you. I want to say to you, Solomon speaks with extraordinary authority. You cannot question his credentials. This is what he says. He speaks with authority, and he speaks in a way that he does not stutter or stammer. Life is meaningless.
The Author's Credentials
Here's the second point. It's the author. Who is he, and what do we know about him? Ecclesiastes 12:9 says this: "Not only was the teacher wise, but he also imparted knowledge to the people. He pondered and searched out and set in order many proverbs. The teacher searched to find just the right words, and he wrote, and what he wrote was upright and was true."
Solomon speaks of himself, and he says, "Listen, there is this wisdom to be sure, but even more than that, he communicated that wisdom." I'm certain that every person in here has had the very unpleasant task of sitting under someone and listening to them, and you know that they have this great wisdom, or you know they have these profound insights, and yet as they speak, they can't communicate to you.
Solomon says, "Listen, I imparted the knowledge," and it says he pondered and searched out. Let me deal with the second one first. Solomon says, "I reflected on this life. I didn't just go through it." There was a group of people—I think there were 50 people who were at least 90 years of age—and they were asked, "If you had your life to live over again, what would you do differently?" One of the points they made was, "I would reflect."
The Lost Art of Thinking
That word ponder is a great word that we don't even use in vocabulary anymore. Probably the closest word that I believe we have to this would be the word think. And in our culture, not only do we not think, we discourage people from thinking.
I'll give you a simple exercise. You can prove it to yourself today. When you go into the office today, get a beverage. Got to have a beverage to make this work. Diet Coke, a cup of coffee, doesn't matter to me what it is, get a beverage. Then, go to your cube, if you have a cube, or go to your office. If you have an office, it's imperative at this point that you leave the door open. Then sit down and begin the exercise of pondering. Just ponder. Just begin to ponder.
And in a period of time, somebody will walk by and here's what they'll say. "What are you doing?" "Nothing." "Are you okay?" "Yeah." "You sick?" "No." "What are you doing?" "I'm thinking." Well, pretty soon, the word's going to spread through the office. There's somebody down there thinking. We've never seen this happen before. He's thinking. And they'll walk by and maybe even sell tickets. There'll be a little tour and they'll come by. They'll say, "There he sits thinking."
Then pretty soon, management will arrive. They have to bring their own people. When management comes, they're going to come in and they're going to say, "What are you doing?" "I'm just here." "Are you sick?" "No." "Problems at home?" "No." "Anything you want to really talk about?" "No." "Well, what are you doing?" "Well, boss, I'm just thinking." And He or she will stagger back for a moment. They'll recover. And then they will say, what are they going to say? "We don't pay you to think."
Making Time to Think
See, we don't even honor this anymore. To think. So Solomon says, I pondered. I tell you, my life, and it's no different than yours, is very, very, very busy. But one of the things that I will not give up is my think time.
I'm supposed to play golf Monday. And I called yesterday and said, I can't play. And part of it is I'm so busy. But the other thing is, I need Monday to just think. To just lay around, watch it. I don't know if you realize it or not, but if you play TV right, I can get Bob Newhart, Mary Tyler Moore, Dick Van Dyke, and Lucy all in a row now in one day. And that may sound stupid to you, but that allows me to just think. And I'll lay there, and I'll spend next Monday, and I'll spend most of the day laying around with a pad of paper thinking. So you've got to be able to do that.
The Art of Communication
But here's the other thing that He did. This is really important. He said, I imparted knowledge to people. In other words, what He's saying is, I learned to communicate. Let me make this plea to you. In fact, let me read you what He wrote: "The teacher searched to find just the right words, and what he wrote was upright and true."
This whole process of communication can break down. Let me encourage you, because you are a communicator. You're communicating to somebody around you. And I've discovered I don't think that communication is effective as it used to be. Part of it is, we feel if we have a platform and somebody's listening to us, that we have to dazzle them with how bright we are. So you've got guys speaking who are saying words that I've never heard and trying to communicate ideas, and it doesn't work.
I had a guy who wanted to meet, and we started meeting. And in our first meeting, He's talking. I said, "Stop. I have no idea what those words are that you just said. I don't know what they mean." He said, "You've never heard of them?" I said, "I don't know how else to say this. I've got no clue what you're saying to me. I've never heard those words in my life." What's the point of that? What's the point of getting up and your yap is moving here, but nobody's getting it?
The Goal of Teaching
The whole object—and I know this, and people get the tapes as well—many of you in here are in positions where you teach. You teach Sunday school classes, you teach groups. The object in teaching is not to have them walk away impressed with how smart you are. The object is to have them walk away and take the idea that's in your head and get it in their head. Do you see that?
I'm in a Sunday school. I hadn't been a Christian very long. And I'm going to this Sunday school class, and I'm in there. This guy's talking. I haven't got a clue what He's saying. I don't have the foggiest idea. When He said, "Are there any questions?" I was ready to say, "Yeah, but I don't know what it is, because I have no idea what you said."
We're walking out, and I heard personally, "That was incredible. That was incredible. That was really incredible." So finally, a guy that I know says, "That was incredible." I said, "What did He say? Give me the point. Give me one, two, three. What did He say?" He said, "Well, I don't know. It was so deep." Which is synonymous with confusing, you know. The object's to communicate.
Speaking So People Understand
Let me encourage you, and try to bring this right down to where you and I live. As Christians, you are constantly presenting Christ to the world around you. Oftentimes, just in deed. But ultimately, in word. You have to communicate in words people understand. To talk about justification and sanctification and propitiation, those are all fine, dandy words. And they may dazzle your friends, but they don't mean anything to the guy, if He doesn't have a context and a background for them. Do you see that?
I met a guy in my office the other day, and He's trying to witness to some of His family members. And He's got this long, long series of questions, and getting into all of these nuances of Scripture, and "Can angels sin now? Could angels change their mind now?" Just all these questions. And I'm saying, "You think a guy who's
Not a Christian is remotely needs to know this stuff? Does this even show up on the radar screen? Why are you jacking around with this stuff? I don't understand it. This guy doesn't know Christ, and he's going to hell. That's the message. Right? Don't be trying to answer questions nobody's asking. And just because you're processing something, and you're at a point in life where you're processing it, and now you sit down with this poor guy who's brand new to the faith or not a Christian at all, and it's like drinking out of a fire hose at that point. You're just telling him everything you've ever learned.
Solomon says, I had knowledge, I took my time, and I communicated. Now that ought to interest you. Here's this author with a profound resume, and he communicates.
The Source of True Wisdom
Here's the third thing, and he has a source. And his source is the good shepherd. He said, the words of the wise are like goads, and they are collected sayings that are firmly embedded nails given by the shepherd. This is why I wrote what I wrote. I want to be warned of the truth. I want to know the truth.
And he says, and warn them of anything that's in addition to them. Of many books there's no end, but much study wearies the body. In other words, I can read and read and read and read and study and study and study and study, but it has to be the right thing. Listen, when Solomon writes, he writes as part of the canon, the sacred scripture, the Old Testament and the New Testament. This is the infallible Word of God.
And as Solomon alludes to it here, we've applied it in your life, and we don't add to this thing or take away from this.
The Adders and Takers-Away
Let me spend a second on it, and then I'll get to the application here at the end. We've got those that add to the Word of God, we've got them spotted. They're easy to find. Because what they'll do is to say, that's what the Bible says, and they'll say, yes, but our tradition says this. Our teaching says this. Or they'll say, you have the Holy Bible, but you need another testament. You need something more. We've got the adders spotted. They're easy to find. They just take the Word and they add to it.
Here's what we don't do so well. We're not good at the takers away. Here's a Dear Abby from Monday. And again, I don't get the local newspaper, so as you guys see stuff, clip it and give it to me. I love it, because I don't read that stuff, that Republic. I haven't for five years. I've been Republic-free for five years. And my life is better for it.
Here's Abby from Monday. Now just listen to this. Dear Abby, Sick Heart wrote that she's trapped in a loveless marriage, because after being divorced, she made a religious commitment that she wouldn't leave her second husband. She said the love is gone, and that the doctor hasn't been able to successfully medicate her severe depression. You advised her to talk to a spiritual advisor.
I am a spiritual advisor, and I'd like to direct my comments to that woman. I strongly feel that in a marriage made by God, two people become one. From your description of marriage, it is clear God never sanctioned this. Therefore you're released from any pledge you've made. Learn to forgive yourself for this mistake. As Jesus forgave the woman at the well who had five husbands, and one she was living with who wasn't her husband. Listen to the Holy Spirit within you, and you are free to go your way.
So, Abby writes back, you're a caring and compassionate man. I hope Sick at Heart sees your letter, and that it gives her the courage to do what she must for her own mental, physical, spiritual health. Just crazy.
Here's the letter right after it. And we know we got problems here early, as a female ordained minister. So we know we're in trouble right out of the box on this deal. As a female ordained minister and spiritual counselor, I'd like to comment on the letter from Sick at Heart. God has admonished us to love everyone. Sick must remind herself that that includes her. Loving herself cannot include living with a spiritually or emotionally absent man. It is never God's will for any of us to be sick, especially in our heart. I've got no clue what that means. Medication cannot improve or will not cure such deep heartache as this woman is experiencing. The God in whom she believes is happy to grant her a new beginning. Signed, Reverend Doctor. She wasn't just a reverend, she's a reverend doctor.
Dear Doctor, bless you for writing. Now listen to this garbage. This is Abby now. We cannot love another person until we first learn to love ourselves and we cannot make another person happy until we're happy within ourselves.
Spotting the Takers-Away
See here's two people pawning themselves off as ministers of the gospel who are saying get divorced. God's a God of love. Do you hear the theme? You guys have been around us long enough now. You know the theme. You know how to do this. When they come at you and they say God is a God of love. God doesn't want you sick, especially sick at heart.
Now let's take a second. Is God a God of love? Absolutely. That's not a trick question. Is God a God of love? Absolutely. But is God also a God of justice and mercy and wrath and all of these things? Here's how we get the takers-away. We got them. Not another book. The takers-away, they're harder to spot because they will take one attribute of God and they will exalt it at the expense of the others.
So they'll say God is a God of love and He wants you happy. Does God want you happy? I don't know if God wants you happy or not. God wants you obedient. That's what He wants. And God doesn't say listen, you got to love yourself first. Here's what He says. Deny yourself. Not love yourself. He says obviously love your neighbor as yourself because He assumes you're consumed with yourself. That's what He's saying. He says love them like you have this love here. That's how you start to spot those takers-away. Do you see that? Start to see that in there?
Here's the last point. It's a big one. It's the message. We got
The Punchline After Seven Weeks
Solomon has spent, in our context here, seven weeks and now almost into an eighth week. Now he gives us the punchline. Life's meaningless. Nothing makes sense. He says this in the last two verses of the book: "Now all has been heard." In other words, now we got all this information in. Now we've taken it all in. "Now all has been heard and here's the conclusion of the matter."
So here's the wisest man that's ever lived who now says listen, I have searched all of these things. I've taken in all this information and here's what I concluded. Two things: Fear God and keep His commandments for this is the duty of man. Then he writes verse 14: "For God will bring every deed into judgment including every hidden thing whether it's good or whether it's evil."
The Reality of Divine Judgment
Let me start with the second part first. Here's what Solomon is reminding us: in this world that looks unjust, there is justice. For there to be justice, there must be judgment. Solomon is saying judgment will come ultimately by God. Every person who's ever lived—14, 15, 16 billion people—every person who's ever lived will at one day be judged by God.
Now if you're here and you are not a Christian, that judgment is that great white throne judgment at which time you will be declared lost and you'll spend eternity in hell. Your judgment is not a judgment looking to try to acquit you or find you guilty. You stand condemned and that's the point at which you now understand eternal consequences. And if you have any sensibility at all, you're going, man, I'm glad that's not me.
Let me finish. If you're a Christian, you too will be judged by God. It's the Bema seat judgment where God will look at your life somehow and He will judge those things that have eternal value. And He will somehow reward them.
Let me be clear now. As a Christian, the things that are sinful in me are not judged. They were judged on the cross, right? So I'm not going to stand before God and have Him judge those sins. He is looking at my life since I've been a Christian and He's looking at my life and He's evaluating how I've handled that life. What have I done with those gifts, those resources, those talents that He's given me? And there's a judgment that's there.
I remember as a young man, once in a while I would hear, "wait till your father gets home." And that scared me. Well if that scared you as a kid, this ought to petrify you because here's what's going to happen: you're going to stand before the Creator God of the universe for judgment.
Fear God: Understanding the Gravity
So he says, fear God and keep His commandments. The idea of fearing God is the idea of reverential awe. It's a respect. It's understanding who He is.
I had a friend who was into whitewater rafting. So he's whitewater rafting one day and they're out and they hadn't planned to be out. It just schedules came together so they didn't have all their gear. They didn't have wetsuits and stuff. So they decided to whitewater raft in shorts and t-shirts. Water temperature that day was about 39 degrees.
So they're just going down, no big deal. They're pros at this. They're doing that, having a blast. They come around the bend and there is a raft that's turned upside down. And he sees a gal in the water struggling. So he jumps in. He goes and gets her into the boat. He's under the raft and he's bobbing up and down. They can't see him. And then all of a sudden, he gets pulled down into a suck hole. That's where this guy hits in the water. He gets down in the suck hole and he fights his way out. And they determine he's in the water about four minutes.
As he's telling the story, he said it took him almost a day to get warm, to get feeling back. Here was a comment that he made, and I wrote it down: "I now have a healthy fear of that which I have been enjoying on the surface for years, but never understood the gravity of our relationship." He's talking about the water. He said, "I've got a real respect for it now. I never understood the gravity of this."
My sense is that most people in this world have this cavalier relationship with God and don't understand the gravity of the relationship. That's why Solomon says, listen, God will bring every deed into judgment, every hidden thing, whether it's good or whether it's bad.
This Is Reality
Here we go, closing her up. This is reality. This is the real deal. Solomon is saying all of life here is an illusion, but this is the real thing.
Remember a couple of years ago, the Suns were playing the Lakers in a best of five series when the Suns were pretty much favored to win that, and they lost the first two games. This is when Paul Westphal was coaching. After the game, walking down the tunnel, they were asking Paul questions, and he made the comment, "Bosnia is reality." You remember that? "Bosnia is reality." What he's saying is, this is a game. He said, "We're going to go to L.A., win two there, and come back and win this, and we'll win this series." And that is exactly what they did. They won those two games, and they won the series.
The night that Paul said, "Bosnia is reality," the phones lit up with fans who were absolutely furious. "Doesn't he understand this?" I don't know if you remember, but the police said that calls went up during the playoffs that year, that calls of battered wives went up 300% during the playoffs.
Can I just put a little shoe leather on this? Here's what we've done. We've taken our things that are games and made them serious, and we're taking things that are serious and turning them into games. And we've turned God into a game. He's the big guy upstairs. I tip my hat to Him. I acknowledge His existence. If I have something like 9-11, I'll get real serious and go to church for a week or two. But I've got to tell you, it's just a game. And what Solomon is saying, screaming over the corridors of time to you and me, is that this
The Heart of True Faith
This isn't a game. And you need to understand who He is, and you need to keep His commandments. Jesus says it this way: "If you love me, you'll keep my commandments." Not for purposes of salvation. Let me be really clear here.
Who is a Christian? What is a Christian? What does it mean to go to heaven? How do I understand that I have that secure?
The Gospel Message
The Bible teaches this: that all of us have sinned, and our sin has separated us from God. And there's nothing we can do. There's no church we can join. There's no money we can give. There's no service we can perform that will satisfy God's wrath against our sin. The wage of sin is death. Somebody's got to die for our sin.
And Jesus does. Jesus dies on the cross. When He dies on the cross, in this miraculous, sacred transaction, the sin of His people is traded for Christ's righteousness. And if I believe that, and I respond to that, I have heaven as sure as the saints that are already there.
Now my life begins to change. Now there's a desire to do what He says. Before, you do it now. That's what religion is. You're going through the motions trying to make God happy. Trying to get enough positive credits on your ledger that somehow God can say, "Yes, heaven is for you." And the Bible teaches there's no way that that's possible.
Works vs. Grace
A friend of mine was talking yesterday. Susan and I are buying a house and moving. Twenty-one years, and we're moving. It's going to be a lot of work for this young lady. And so during the inspection, the broker who attends our church is sitting there with the people, and they're talking, and they start talking about religion, and this gal begins to talk about different things.
So my friend says, "Well, how do you go to heaven? What do you have to do to go to heaven?" She said, "Well, after you die, you go to purgatory. And you go to purgatory," and she said, "Well, how do you go to purgatory? Well, you have to go to purgatory in order to be made righteous enough to go to heaven."
See, so what that is, is salvation by works. That is not biblical salvation. That's works salvation. Do you get that? I mean, I'm not asking you to agree with it. I'm just saying you understand what I'm saying. I'm either saved or I'm not saved. I'm either in or I'm not in. I don't need to go in and be remodeled.
True Assurance
And what the Bible says is that at that point where I believe Jesus is who He said He was, I'm saved. And that will transform my life, and now the works flow freely from that. We are saying that there are works that are done, good deeds that you do, a loving response to God's grace. But it doesn't produce salvation. It results from salvation.
"If you love me, you'll keep my commandments." What's He saying there? He's saying, "Listen, in the course of this life, you're going to want to ask yourself this question: Am I really a Christian? And one of the ways you're going to understand that is, am I doing what God calls me to do?"
If I just walk down an aisle and just say, "Yeah, put me down for yes," or I check a box at a breakfast, or I pray a prayer, and then there's no change in my life, I believe the Bible teaches, then you have no reasonable assurance to believe you're a Christian at all. Do you sense that?
The Gravity of the Situation
And again, I'm not asking you to accept it right now. I pray that you would. I'm just saying, I hope you understand that. That's the gravity of this situation. And perhaps you, like my friend who took water for granted, now understands the gravity of this relationship with the holy God. That's what Solomon's saying.
Now, because I understand who God is, now all these things that were meaningless have meaning. I can find fulfillment in work. I can find joy in relationships. I can find satisfaction in things, because God now has transformed my heart. That's his message. Eight weeks of that.
Looking Ahead
Next week, something new, a new series. Like I said, maybe a discussion on Genesis 3. I don't know, but you'll be here. I guess we have one week. What's today? Fourteenth. So one week, and then that break for Thanksgiving. So maybe that is a perfect thing to take a look at, Genesis 3. And then we head toward Christmas and two or three lessons in there.
So hang in there with us. We'll break for Thanksgiving, and then we'll take our normal Christmas break. But we look forward to seeing you again next week.
Father, help us take these truths, place them in our heart, let them be real to us. God, thank You for Solomon. Thank You for granting him the privilege of experiencing all these things so he can speak to us with such extraordinary authority. God, we praise You, we worship You. In Jesus' name, amen. Have a great week. We'll see you next week.