At Sea

I have been adrift in a sea of unknowns this summer.  Wave after wave of new challenges, griefs, and general frustration has splashed over the edge of my little vessel, relentlessly pitching it toward new hopes then plunging it back down into uncertainty.  I know God is at work, I know He is faithful and true, but my ship is no less buffeted about by waves and wind simply because those things are so. I would steer with all my might if only I had a directional heading, but the arrow on the compass God has provided seems to still be spinning wildly at the moment.

I haven’t been able to think. I haven’t been able to write.  I’ve barely been able to pray. What is there to say, anyway?

Splat!   family & ministry concerns

Slam!   pressing unanswered questions: Where will we live next month?…                         where will we work?…

Tumble!   a miscarriage

Whoosh!   sickness strikes

Slosh!   the car dies

I know this might sound strange to some, but it is times like these when I find the lectionary surprisingly helpful.  Up until a year ago I had never attended a service in the Anglican tradition, so I am still new to its rhythms. And while there’s much that could be said about the place of liturgy in church services, one of the things that I have found profoundly beautiful in my Anglican Christian experience is the congregational collects and prayers that we say together. I like these prayers because they remind me of realities beyond my current storm. Moreover, in saying them, I join in one voice with thousands of brothers and sisters who have sailed rough seas before me and knelt down to utter the self-same words. Most of all, the weekly collects and prayers resonate with my soul because they give voice to the prayers I wish I could pray. They are the words that my jumbled thoughts cannot sort out amidst the sound of crashing waves. When my own mind and heart are too fragmented to formulate what to pray or where to begin, the collects provide a perspective that helps me glimpse truth over the looming swells, and find hope in dark places. 

The collect below is the one in the church calendar for the week that we lost the baby. Its timely reminder of God’s loving and watchful care brought me to tears as I read it after the miscarriage.  He hears, he knows.

                LORD God, you who have prepared for those who love You such good things that surpass our understanding: Pour into our hearts such love towards You that, loving you above all things, we may obtain Your promises, which are greater than we can desire; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. 

The words of the Prayer of General Thanksgiving invite me to daily embrace the many blessings, both seen and unseen, that God has brought into my human experience.  It reminds me to be humble and to treasure Christ as I live to bring him praise. He is the means of grace and hope of glory.

             Almighty God, Father of all mercies, we your unworthy servants give you humble thanks for all your goodness and loving-kindness to us and to all whom you have made. We bless you for our creation, preservation, and all the blessings of this life; but above all for your immeasurable love in the redemption of the world by our Lord Jesus Christ; for the means of grace, and for the hope of glory. And, we pray, give us such an awareness of your mercies, that with truly thankful hearts we may show forth your praise, not only with our lips, but in our lives, by giving up ourselves to your service, and by walking before you in holiness and righteousness all our days; through Jesus Christ our Lord, to whom, with you and the Holy Spirit, be honor and glory throughout all ages. Amen.

Ecclesiastes part 6

All you have is the moment – Live it well!

     Kohelet repeatedly reminds his listeners that “no one can fully know or understand God’s plans.”[1]  So instead of filling our lives with anxiety and vain striving in an effort to control what is out of our hands, we ought to accept each moment as a gift from God and act on what he has revealed to us. Each moment of our life under the sun holds a unique and fleeting opportunity to enjoy God’s gifts. DelHousaye and Brewer use the following illustration to convey the gist of Kohelet’s wisdom.

     Picture “a conveyor belt with one apple passing by every twenty-four hours. Either we let it pass because we think there may be a better one coming, or we let it pass because we are distracted by previous ones we’ve enjoyed. Meanwhile, the one apple right in front of you passes untouched and “unenjoyed.” People are usually divided into three categories: Those who only know how to enjoy the past; those who only know how to anticipate the future; and those who have learned the wisdom of enjoying it all by living in the moment! The point is, life is enjoyed in the moment. The wisest thing you can do is to take the biggest bite of every apple that comes your way.[2]

          Kohelet’s message is not communicating a fatalistic or epicurean sentiment, but rather sharing a realistic outlook based on humankind’s mortality. If time under the sun is limited, do not waste it “striving after wind” (4:6). “Remember your Creator – remember that God has given you his gifts for your pleasure. Make the most of them while you have the energy and the vitality.”[3] Act now (“do not be idle”, 11:6), to squeeze the juice out of every moment of life, but do so with the knowledge that God will bring all of one’s actions into judgment (11:9). Finally, Kohelet concludes, “fear God and keep his commandments, because this applies to every person” (12:13). A healthy reverence for God will keep us grateful and content with his good gifts, free us up to enjoy life to its fullest capacity while we still have breath in our bodies, and remind us to live with good sense because we are accountable to God alone in the end.

            The words of another wise man, Walter C. Kaiser, appropriately sum up the core of Kohelet’s message and its ongoing impact today:

[K]oheleth urges acceptance of the grace and joy of life, not pessimism, nihilism, and blind determinism . . . Out of a distorted view of worldliness, wherein every pleasure ordained by God for man’s enjoyment is either denied or begrudgingly used, many have developed a superpious, unhappy, and even miserable existence. This text proclaims liberation to them. Brother and sister: rejoice in God’s good gifts, and ask for his ability to rightfully use them.[4]

“Remember your Creator” and make the most of the hevel that he has provided for you to enjoy.

---

                [1] DelHousaye and Brewer, The Personal Journal of Solomon, 197.

                [2] Ibid, 116.

                [3] Hubbard, Beyond Futility, 119.

                [4] Walter C. Kaiser, Ecclesiastes: Total Life (Chicago: Moody Press, 1979), 101.

Ecclesiastes part 5

Live with wisdom and practice the art of good sense. 

In the closing chapters of Ecclesiastes, Kohelet directs us to “steady ourselves with reminders to be sensible (chapter 10), so that we may launch out more surely upon the call to be bold (11:1-6), joyful (11:7-11) and godly (chapter 12).”[1] Whereas Kohelet earlier presented a strong case against wisdom as the solution to life’s difficulties, he now advocates using one’s head to avoid unnecessary pitfalls. David Allan Hubbard explains Kohelet’s reasoning:

He warned us not to bank on wisdom as life’s highest good . . . He was speaking to extremists, to those who touted wisdom as the key to life’s problems, as the pearl of great price for which everything else must be sold. He warned those who praised wisdom to the heavens that it would produce at least as much pain as blessing. He made his misgivings clear about those who overvalue wisdom. Yet nowhere did he celebrate folly. With all its problems, wisdom was to be heartily preferred to folly. Do not let wisdom be your god, but let it be your guide, was his advice.[2]

One of the major domains in which Kohelet recommends letting wisdom be a guide is the use of our mouths. Kohelet warns against speaking ill of those in authority, because words have a way of travelling farther than we intend: “In your bedchamber do not curse a king, and in your sleeping rooms do not curse a rich man, for a bird of the heavens will carry the sound and the winged creature will make the matter known” (10:20). Having the good sense to speak less may preserve one’s reputation and protect us from untold harm. Furthermore, “words from the mouth of a wise man are gracious, while the lips of a fool consume him” (10:12). In this verse Kohelet “says the words of a wise man are literally ‘grace.’”[3] Part of using our mouths wisely means that by our speech “we are either giving grace to others or receiving it.”[4] Once a word is spoken it cannot be reclaimed, so think before letting careless words fly; let the words of your mouth extend grace to others. This is not only a blessing to the listener but good common sense for the speaker.

---

                [1] Kinder, The Message of Ecclesiastes, 87.

                [2] Hubbard, Beyond Futility, 102.

                [3] DelHousaye and Brewer, The Personal Journal of Solomon, 188.

                [4] Ibid, 189. The apostle Paul reaffirms this concept in Colossians 4:6.

Ecclesiastes Part 4

*Excerpt from a paper on the key themes of Ecclesiastes*

Life is a gift, yet it can only be enjoyed when received as such from the hand of God.

After systematically demonstrating that none of the good things in this life hold the key to fulfillment, satisfaction, or living well when considered on their own merits, Kohelet brings his listeners to the point where we are left asking, ‘If not wisdom, wealth, pleasure, or prestige, what then? What is the key? In the face of quickly-approaching death, what will yield a profit (yitron) of any true value?’ Kohelet then invites us to see that life itself is a beautiful gift to be enjoyed; however the irony is that not all people have been empowered to enjoy the gift of life. Kohelet exposits:

Behold, what I have seen to be good and fitting is to eat and drink and find enjoyment in all the toil with which one toils under the sun the few days of his life that God has given him, for this is his lot. Everyone also to whom God has given wealth and possessions and power to enjoy them, and to accept his lot and rejoice in his toil—this is the gift of God (5:18-19).

DelHousaye and Brewer put it this way: God “has given us all things to enjoy, but we cannot enjoy them without Him!”[1] (Eccl. 2:25; 1 Tim. 6:17). A worldview that eliminates anything beyond life “under the sun” will tend to short-circuit our capacity to enjoy life because God, who created the earth and eternally exists beyond it, is the one who graciously gives to mankind both the blessings of this life and the ability to find enjoyment (and more critically contentment) in what he has given. God is the one with the plan, a plan grander and more excellent than any that humankind can fathom or grasp (3:11) . . . “Mankind has no higher good than to synchronize with God’s beneficent purposes for him.”[2] This is why Kohelet advises, “In the day of prosperity be joyful, and in the day of adversity consider: God has made the one as well as the other” (7:14). God’s universal plans may be largely a mystery to human beings, but they are good plans, and ones that remind us of our place in the universe – we are not gods. When we try to act like gods, injustice is the result. Look at the evidence all around us; no, try as we might, human beings do not make very good gods. There is one God alone whose deeds are righteous and whose works endure forever (3:14), only he “has made everything beautiful in its time” (3:11).

---

                [1] DelHousaye and Brewer, The Personal Journal of Solomon, 199.

                [2] Eaton, Ecclesiastes, 86.

Ecclesiastes Part 3

             Periodically throughout Kohelet’s exploration of humankind’s quest for significance in this life he calls attention to the one inescapable reality that is common to all of us. “The fact of death brings the search to a sudden stop. If one fate comes to all, and that fate is extinction, it robs every man of his dignity and every project of its point.”[1] Kohelet means for us to face death squarely, for if “our aim is to keep our actions and words from being a chasing after the wind, or mist that evaporates from a mirror,” then “the only way to achieve this is to begin by crashing into a reality that is anything but wind!”[2] Since death is such a stark and inevitable reality, many of us tend to want to avoid having to think about it. Kohelet does not allow his audience the option of escaping death’s reality because, as he sees it, “the main obstacle to living well in the world is that mortal beings refuse to accept their mortality and finitude.” [3] As a result of mankind’s refusal to face the coming end of life "under the sun," injustice, anxiety, and folly pervade our choices and our world at large. The wiser thing is to honestly contemplate that no matter what we have achieved or accumulated on earth, our life will end sooner or later, so we should live life fully and wisely in light of that fact. This is why Kohelet says:

It is better to go to the house of mourning  than to go to the house of feasting, for this is the end of all mankind,  and the living will lay it to heart. Sorrow is better than laughter, for by sadness of face the heart is made glad. (7:2-3).

Adequately pondering death does not necessitate sitting in a gloomy, depressed state for the rest of one’s life. What Kohelet is getting at is simply that “death brings us to think about life [because] . . . every funeral anticipates our own.”[4] When death comes “it is the same for all” (9:2); “all go to one place. All are from the dust, and to dust all return” (3:20). Death eventually overtakes every person born under the sun, and “as he came from his mother's womb he shall go again, naked as he came, and shall take nothing for his toil that he may carry away in his hand.” (5:14). Kohelet wants those who hear his words to think not just about death itself, but about life in view of death; he is inviting us to step back and gain a better perspective than the one of the man who strives ceaselessly without every stopping to ask “For whom am I toiling and depriving myself of pleasure?” (4:7). Once we take death properly into account, there is a greater freedom to embrace life, to rest in the enjoyment of simple things, and to live with wisdom in the moment. Hence, Kohelet urges:

Go, eat your bread with joy, and drink your wine with a merry heart, for God has already approved what you do. Let your garments be always white. Let not oil be lacking on your head. Enjoy life with the wife whom you love, all the days of your vain life that he has given you under the sun, because that is your portion in life and in your toil at which you toil under the sun. Whatever your hand finds t0 do, do it with all your might, for there is no work or thought or knowledge or wisdom in Sheol, to which you are going (9:7-9). 

Life is hevel; soon enough our days under the sun will be over. So seize the moment while you still have the opportunity, take joy in the pleasures of this life that God has allowed you to experience.

---

                [1] Kinder, The Message of Ecclesiastes, 34. Emphasis original.

                [2] J. Ellul, The Reason for Being (Trans. G.W. Bromiley; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1976), 172.

                [3] Provan, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs, 38.

                [4] Eaton, Ecclesiastes, 125.

Ecclesiastes Part 2 - Striving after wind

*Excerpt from a paper on the key themes of Ecclesiastes*

            It does not take more than a cursory glance at world today to see that mankind is restless. In the quest for satisfaction and meaning we study for years in universities, chase after wealth, jump from one relationship to the next, build monuments of power and prestige, indulge in (or deprive ourselves of) food and drink, and employ a wide array of other strategies for personal success. Kohelet puts mankind’s classic strategies for fulfillment to the test. He mines human wisdom, earthly pleasures, and the accumulation of wealth and success for all they have to give and concludes that they all come up empty; they are “vanity and a striving after wind” (1:14; 2:11, 17, 26; 4:4, 16; 6:9). After having conducted grand experiments in each realm of pursuit, Kohelet reveals why each of them fails to deliver the fulfillment it seems to offer.

            The first to be leveled is wisdom. This may come as a surprise since elsewhere in Scripture Solomon repeatedly upholds the virtues of wisdom. For instance, in Proverbs 4:7-8 he recalls the admonition of his father to “Get wisdom, and whatever you get, get insight. Prize her highly, and she will exalt you.” Even within Ecclesiastes itself he declares that there is more gain in wisdom than in folly” (2:11) and that wisdom is “an advantage to those who see the sun” (7:11). Passages such as these begin to make it clear that the issue is not that wisdom has no benefits whatsoever, but rather that its benefits have limits. In spite of all its advantages, “wisdom cannot change reality.”[1] Wisdom can discern and warn against error, but in and of itself wisdom cannot fix the problems of this world. Possessing wisdom in the present cannot change ongoing consequences resulting from past choices. Moreover, in order to effect change in the present one must not only have wisdom of what needs to be changed but also possess the power or influence to bring about the desired change. As if these limitations of wisdom were not enough, Kohelet goes on to say: “in much wisdom is much vexation, and he who increases knowledge increases sorrow” (1:18). Having great wisdom is no guarantee that others will listen to one’s wisdom and take it to heart. Instead of bringing ultimate fulfillment and peace, wisdom on its own simply compounds frustration and sorrow as the wise person watches and grieves over the preventable mistakes of others.

            Once wisdom has been eliminated from contention as a source of lasting satisfaction, Kohelet turns his gaze to examine the merits of pleasure, prestige, and success in one’s toil/career. Quickly the vaporous nature of self-indulgent pleasure becomes apparent; it lasts only as long as the wine is on the tongue, the perfume fills the nostrils, or the dancer twirls before the eyes. As soon as the sensory stimulus fades, so does the pleasure, and one is left to seek out more sources of momentary satisfaction. In light of this, Kohelet summarizes his findings on pleasure:
          I said of laughter, “It is mad,” and of pleasure, “What use is it?” . . . 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. 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. (2:2, 10-11).

Pleasure may yield no lasting profit (Heb. yitron), but the bad news does not end there. Kohelet continues to dash hopes in rapid succession by stating that one’s pursuit of fulfillment through the prestige or legacy of a successful career is also futile. We never know when an unexpected tragedy might strike or if the person charged to carry on our legacy will prove to be wise or foolish, and why should another person get to enjoy the fruit of our hard labor anyway?[2] We cannot bank on circumstances, prestige, or hard-earned success for fulfillment because they are prone to change. Kohelet observes: “I saw that under the sun the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, nor bread to the wise, nor riches to the intelligent, nor favor to those with knowledge, but time and chance happen to them all” (9:11).

                The last pursuit to be examined is that of wealth and possessions. From the outside looking in, wealth has a lot of advantages; wealthy people seem to have more friends, they can often buy their way out of trouble, not to mention the fact that they enjoy ‘the finer things in life’ that most of us only dream about. Yet things are not always what they appear to be, and material wealth is no exception. The more a person has the more that others expect or demand from them, so while wealth may attract other people it “doesn’t add friends, it only adds consumers, those with expectations and claims upon what you have”[3] (cf. 5:11). Furthermore, instead of engendering contentment, “wealth drives us to acquire more wealth.” [4] Kohelet reminds us of the dangers inherent in the drive to acquire more by coupling his observations on wealth with a story depicting the danger of loss (5:14-17). Hubbard writes: “We are pushed to make more, he has told us, yet that very push puts us in jeopardy of losing everything and leaving our family as paupers.”[5] Sadly, even when riches are successfully gained they can be “kept by their owner to his hurt” (5:13); anxiety and lack of sleep abound as he strives to maintain what he has gathered (5:12; cf. 2:22-23). The vexation of gaining wealth and the anxiety of holding on to it only serve to deepen the disappointment of the one who possesses it when he or she finds it does not deliver the satisfaction it promised  . . . “If anything is worse than the addiction that money brings, it is the emptiness it leaves. Man, with eternity in his heart, needs better nourishment than this.”[6] Looking back over the each of the possible sources of fulfillment that Kohelet has examined, it is worth noting that wisdom, pleasure, success, and wealth are all admirable things; the only catch is our perspective or expectation of them.“For in themselves, and rightly used, the basic things of life are sweet and good [. . .] What spoils them is our hunger to get out of them more than what they can give.”[7] Each has been designed by God with a specific purpose, and God does indeed want us to enjoy his gifts, but fulfillment comes not from the gifts alone (they were never designed to give it). To fully enjoy a gift from God we must first acknowledge that it is indeed a gift[8], but a perspective which only takes into account human effort and life “under the sun” precludes this acknowledgement [9].

---

                [1] DelHousaye and Brewer, The Personal Journal of Solomon, 34-36.

                [2] See 2:16-19

                [3] DelHousaye and Brewer, The Personal Journal of Solomon, 104.

                [4] David Allan Hubbard, Beyond Futility (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1976), 79.

                [5] Ibid.

                [6] Derek Kinder, The Message of Ecclesiastes: A Time to Mourn and a Time to Dance (BST; Downers Grove: Intervarsity Press, 1976 ), 56.

                [7] Kinder, The Message of Ecclesiastes, 35.

                [8] In other words, it is not something one has earned, inherently deserves, or is entitled to receive.

                [9] One cannot acknowledge something as a gift from the hand of God if God is not in the scope of one’s worldview. 

Ecclesiastes Part 1 - Life is hevel

The post below is “Excerpt #1” from a recent paper I wrote on the themes of Ecclesiastes. I took a class on Ecclesiastes this semester and have absolutely fallen in love with the book. So honest, timeless, and immediately relevant... but then again, isn’t that what all true wisdom is?

By the way, if you are looking for an easy-to-read, humorous, brief, and reliable guide to what Ecclesiastes is all about, I highly recommend DelHousaye and Brewer's book (though the commentaries on Ecclesiastes by Derek Kinder, David Allan Hubbard, and Walter C. Kaiser are also good resources).

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The book of Ecclesiastes records the personal wisdom of Solomon, known in this book as Kohelet (the wise preacher/sage), as he unpacks universal human questions concerning the meaning and purpose of life. As far back as it is possible to go “in the history of the interpretation of Ecclesiastes, this book has provoked controversy. And it still does, with contemporary commentators polarized as to how to read it, whether as a positive book affirming life or as deeply pessimistic.”[1] Despite the controversy of its interpretation, the wisdom of Kohelet continues to attract attention and resonate deeply with the existential struggles of people today[2], perhaps because in many ways the observations of Kohelet have never been more relevant. As Kohelet’s own words reveal, “The words of the wise are like goads, and like nails firmly fixed are the collected sayings” (12:11). Hence modern audiences are finding his “delightful words” (12:10) both stimulating and able to hold true when bearing the weight of life’s experiences. 

            Life under the sun is hevel. In the preface statement of Ecclesiastes we find the motto that summarizes much of Kohelet’s findings about life here on earth: “‘Vanity of vanities,’ says the Preacher, ‘Vanity of vanities! All is vanity’” (1:2).  To begin with utter futility may sound overly morose, but Kohelet is a realist and honestly pronounces the bad news first, before taking us on the journey of how he came to this conclusion. Lest we be tempted to counter Kohelet’s statement too quickly or to simply write him off as a pessimist, there are two important pieces of information to keep in mind. First, Kohelet’s approach is to thoroughly examine human life from the perspective of that which is lived “under the sun” (1:3, 9, 14); the afterlife and divine recompense are not yet in view. Therefore, hevel is the most logical, appropriate conclusion for the incessant striving and futility that Kohelet has observed. As Michael Eaton comments, “Vanity characterizes man and the realm he occupies and dominates. If his resources are entirely this-worldly, ‘No profit’ is the motto over all he does.”[4] Secondly, the Hebrew word hevel, translated in English as “vanity”, primarily means “vapor” or “breath”.[5] So another way of translating the preface (which is repeated again in12:8) is literally “vapor of vapors, the thinnest of all vapors.”[6] This being the case, it is likely that the word hevel does not necessarily denote meaninglessness so much as it conveys “a brief and transitory status.”[7] Indeed, the emphasis of hevel throughout Ecclesiastes “lies on the passing nature of existence and on its elusiveness and resistance to intellectual and physical human control.”[8] In other words the substance of our lives under the sun is as elusive and brief as a vapor, yet much like steam, it can be wasted or utilized.[9] Kohelet’s use of hevel reflects the reality that life is short and that all one really has is the present moment. Each fleeting moment can pass by untapped, be pressed in vain for more than it can deliver, or be embraced as a gift from God.

---

                [1] Craig G. Bartholomew, Ecclesiastes, (BCOTWP; Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2009), 17.
                [2] Ibid.
                [4] Michael A. Eaton, Ecclesiastes (TOTC; Downers Grove: Intervaristy Press, 1983), 68. Emphasis Original.
                [5] Darryl DelHousaye and Bobby Brewer, The Personal Journal of Solomon: The Secrets of the Kohelet (Maitland, Fla.: Xulon Press, 2008), 26.
                [6] Ibid.
                [7] Ibid, 22.
                [8] Iain Provan, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs (NIVAC; Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2001), 38.
                [9] Ibid.