Sermon from May 3, 2026, Morning service

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

You have your Bibles, you'll turn with me to Ecclesiastes chapter 12. We'll be looking at verses excuse me, chapter 6. We'll be looking at verses 1 through 12 today. Have a little bit of trouble reading this morning. As we get started this morning, I just want to do something I don't normally do. If you know me, you know I do like to cut up and have fun a lot. Sometimes I'm I do that at the right time. Sometimes I don't do that at the right time. And if you know me, that a lot of times from the pulpit, I won't really tell a joke, but I done got it in me this morning to tell you a joke this morning. Don't worry, I'm going somewhere with the joke. So I don't think, oh, here comes just another one of his silly jokes, one of these dad jokes. The joke I want to tell you this morning was about the preacher who'd gotten his first job preaching. He goes to the church, he gets up there the first Sunday and he preaches this great message. And everybody's all excited. And he does what a lot of old school preachers do. They go back in the back and they greet everybody going out the back door. And everybody said, you know, we really loved your sermon. That was great. Praise the Lord, that was good. We're so glad you're here. Well, to make the joke a little bit shorter, the next Sunday, and the next Sunday and the Sunday after that, the guy got up and preached the same sermon again. The second Sunday, people kind of thought, this sounds familiar. But the third Sunday, they're like, wait a minute. They said, We're gonna give him one more chance. On the first fourth Sunday, he got up, and you know what he did? He preached the same sermon again. By that point, the deacons were like, something's not right here, what's going on? So they confronted him after church. He said, Pastor, we love you and everything. This was a great sermon that you gave us this first Sunday we're here, but we've noticed something. They said, Well, what's that, sir? And they said, Well, we noticed that you're preaching the same sermon the last three weeks. So it's four weeks now you've had the same sermon. What's up with that? And the pastor said, Well, as soon as you start baying what I just said on this one, then we're gonna switch to something else. Hmm. That's almost like an insult. I don't mean for it to be an insult, but let me tell you why I tell you that joke, especially if you haven't been with us for a couple weeks, this is the first time in a while you've been back. We're walking to the book of Ecclesiastes, okay? Not the easiest book to read. Not that it's overly difficult in English to read it, but it just seems to be a little bit repetitive. Now, excuse me, I'm not saying by that joke that we're not getting it the first time. But I do acknowledge for myself that I learn better through repetition. I think my elementary teachers were on to something back in the day of repeating, repeating, writing and writing and reading. They were on to something about repetition. So today, if you've been with us the last six, eight weeks that we've been here, some of this is going to sound familiar to you. Okay? It wasn't my choosing, because I'm not thinking you're not getting this. Matter of fact, you've heard my opinion on this several times that when they talk about wealth in the Bible, I don't know that I struggle with that because I'm working three jobs. I don't I ain't made it yet. Okay. Maybe some of you have, maybe you have, but not everybody has. So what I'm trying to say is I pray that you won't listen to me today, but you're listening to the Holy Spirit, because He can teach us new things in Scripture. What I've been doing, like I always do, I start with verse one and we walk through each verse in each chapter until we get into the book and we get another book. So I'm not trying to repeat the same thing over and over. It's just I'm reading what's written here. Okay. So just be aware of that as we walk through, okay? Now the joke makes a little bit of sense now. It's not that you're getting it, but repetition might be good. Even though we've heard some of this in other verses, other chapters, God's got something for us today. So let's take a look at it. And I put up here uh for the title, False Happiness. The reason I did that is because Solomon, the guy who wrote this, he was king, he was the son of David. He was the one that built the temple. Okay, he was a pretty smart dude. God had asked him to name anything, he God said he'd give it to him, and Solomon asked simply for wisdom. So God said, because you've asked for wisdom, I'm gonna give you riches, glory, and everything else, on top of the wisdom. So this Ecclesiastes, Solomon, he's writing as a teacher because he's gained a lot of wisdom and he wants people to understand that true happiness, true joy, can only be found in God. Or if you want the Sunday school version, true happiness can only be found in Jesus. Okay? What is it that makes you happy? I think about things that make me happy. Things like I wasn't gonna say chocolate, but chocolate makes me happy, and I've got a stash back here. Praise the Lord. But what's one of the things that makes me happy when when my wife says to me, hey, what are we gonna have for dinner? And it's on those occasions when I'm thinking of having steak and cooking that bad boy on the grill, and when it's almost medium rare, throw a little bit of butter and garlic on top, y'all, that brings joy to my heart. True happiness. Or happiness to me is seeing the kids and the grandkids when they're happy and doing well. True happiness is when that old saying when when uh happy wife, happy life. She's doing well, that makes me happy. I can name a couple other things. Well, let me be straight up with you for a second. If I can get it, this little bag of chocolate is getting low. That's not an announcement to put some in there, but praise the Lord if you want to do that. I'm not gonna say no. But that's to let you know that there's gonna come a day when that chocolate's not gonna be there. And when it's not there, could it be that I could lose my happiness? Yeah. The same way that I'll eat that big old steak, send a picture of it to a couple of y'all, or put it on Facebook, it gives me happiness, but guess what? The next morning that happiness is gone because I'm craving it again. True happiness and the wife being happy, is she happy all the time? She should be, but I mess up, make her unhappy sometime. So my happiness changes sometimes. Same with the kids. Things going great with them, and every once in a while, something might happen. Okay? Happiness in the world's eyes is almost like in vain. It's never ending. You never can quite get it. You think you're there, then all of a sudden something happens and it goes away. So that's why I put up here false happiness. Now, don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with being happy over chocolate and food. There's nothing wrong with that. Just like anything else that you would have named, you probably have different things that make you happy that maybe you're not the same for me, right? But true happiness we need to see is found in Christ. Now, how does that look? We're going to look at that at the very end, but keep that in mind as we walk through this this morning. Uh, one of the commentators says there's nothing more pitiful than to be rich but able to enjoy it. No amount of prosperity can make up for a life without joy. Now, they say money can't buy happiness, but it can buy coffee, which is good because that keeps me going sometimes, right? But what we're gonna look at in scripture is a sample or an example that Solomon gives of people who have, first of all, the first section is gonna be about wealth, the second part will be about wisdom, but people who have sought after money, never ending money to make them happy. You'll see that it might make them happy temporarily, but not permanently because they're never fully satisfied. Okay? So that's kind of what they're saying here. Nothing is more sad or pitiful or disappointing to have all this money and to not be able to enjoy it. There's no amount of prosperity can make up for a life without joy. That's not saying that you don't have people who have a lot of money and do have true and joy. There are believers who God's given them the gift of acquiring money and using it for his glory, that brings them happiness. But it could be believers who God's given them a lot of money, and instead of using it for his glory, they've hoarded it for themselves and not been obedient to what God told them to do with the money. So that's what we got to watch out for. Another thing to look at here as we move on. In the old days, maybe back in the Oriental days, maybe other cultures, maybe in our culture as well, there was this concept that happiness was if you had wealth or money, if you had many children, and you lived a long, prosperous life. So Solomon is going to walk through those three things to look at what true happiness is all about. Okay, wealth, children, long life. So the first one, Ecclesiastes chapter 6, verse 1. There is an evil that I have seen under the sun, and it lies heavy on mankind. So I'm saying there's something wrong, there's something wrong that I've seen with mankind, but not quite clicking. And what is it? Well, let's look what he says in verse 2. A man to whom God gives wealth, possessions, and honor, so that he lacks nothing of all that he desires, yet God does not give him the power to enjoy them, but a stranger enjoys them. This is vanity, this is a grievous evil. Notice your first money comes from. I could say that the wealth that I have, what little bit it may be, comes from working three different jobs. Pastoring, running the little business, and doing adjunct work that Southern Methodist, okay? The money from here comes from y'all. The money from the business comes from the customers. And teaching it Southern Methodists, that money comes from the students who pay. But I have to be reminded that it's God who gives the wealth. Now he'll give it, and he'll want us to use it appropriately the way he wants us to, for his glory, manage it well. But what's the sad part here? What's in vanity or what's the grievous evil? That God would bless somebody with all that, and yet the person would never be able to enjoy it. Given to someone else to enjoy. Partly because they're so focused on trying to gain more money that they're not able to truly enjoy life. And then because of that, eventually they're going to die and they don't get to take any of it with them. They get to leave it for, as named here, a stranger, for somebody else to enjoy. Again, nothing wrong with acquiring money, God give you that ability, but make sure you use it for his glory. Make sure you use it based off that relationship that you have with him. That's where the true happiness is will be found, as we're going to see at the end. Verse 3, we did the wealth, and then we're going to look at having a lot of children, and then we'll look at living long. It says, and if a man fathers a hundred children and lives many years, so that the days of his years are many, but his soul is not satisfied with life's good things, and he also has no burial. I say that a stillborn child is better off than he. So you get this idea of wealth, and you think there's happiness in debt, you think there's happiness in many children. I could see happiness in one or two children. Maybe back in the day of my grandparents or my great-grandparents, when they had 12 to 14 kids, there'd be happiness because they could help out on the family farm, things like that. But 14 children right now would not bring me happiness. That would bring me stress, y'all, to no end. Okay. No offense if you've had that many, bless you, but not this old boy. I'm not made for that. But as old saying would go, many children, on a proverb, many children bring happiness. But it says, as a father has a father of a hundred children, and he lives many years, there's that longevity of life would bring happiness. So his days are many, but his soul is not satisfied with good things. He is also, he also has no burial. I say that a stillborn child is better off than him. This is where the sermon might take a little bit of a sad note as we talk about death and stillborn. We know people who have lost children like that in birth, or there'd be a miscarriage or stillborn like that. But listen to what he's trying to say in this. You think the world would say, wealth, long life, many kids would bring you happiness. But the catcher is a person that would have gotten all the children, the uh wealth, and lived a long time, finds out that his soul is not satisfied, he's not happy with that. Why? Because he's searching for more and more and more. And maybe it's so bad that he doesn't even get a proper burial. Now you think if he had all the money that he would get a nice burial, uh, unless he ticked a bunch of people off, you know, they're mad at him. But the contrast to somebody who's got all those things, he's saying a stillborn child would be better off. Now, how is that? Well, a stillborn child does not have the opportunity to take a breath on this earth to live and experience not only the joys but the pain. This child, a human being is on the earth in the mother's womb, passes, goes to the presence of the father. Yeah, that didn't have a long life here, didn't live many years, and obviously is not gonna have children. But they're restored with the father. Look at what it says in verse 4. For it comes in vanity and goes in darkness, and in darkness his name is covered, referring to the stillborn child, the fact that they don't have an opportunity to flourish here on this earth. They come and go. But look at verse 5. Moreover, it has not seen the sun nor known anything, yet it finds rest rather than he. So you take somebody who's God's blessed with immense wealth, children, long life, they can't seem to enjoy it. It's better off a stillborn child who says there can find rest in God, missing out on all the things that life has to offer, the good, the bad. Verse 6 Even though he should live a thousand years twice over, yet enjoy no good, do not all go to the one place. So, no matter how many blessings you've got, or if you're have a child, or even one who is stillborn, the fate is the same. Death, burial. Then after that, being before God. When I say being before God, that that could be a positive thing for like a stillborn child who's gonna be in the presence of the Father. But for someone who has racked up all their monies or wealth and never enjoyed it and truly didn't know God, they're gonna have to stand before God as well. The difference is, God's gonna say, Depart from me, I never knew you. And they'll be separated from God for all of eternity, to where the stillborn child would be forever in eternity with the Father. Looking at wealth, we switch over to the concept of wisdom and we do it through desire, or as you'll see the word in uh some of your Bibles, it'll say appetite. The idea that we have a never-ending appetite. Just like I mentioned steaks a minute ago, if I don't have they're frozen right now, but if they weren't, I'd be having steaks for lunch today. I'm craving that, okay? It's a never-ending desire. Look at verse 7. All the toil of man is for his mouth, yet his appetite is never side, satisfied. People ask me sometimes, um, why do you work? Why do you do all this stuff? And I always say, if I don't work, I don't eat. Right? I want to be able to eat, I gotta get up and work, got to earn some money, be able to buy the groceries or grow them in the garden or whatever, right? What does it say here? All the toil for his mouth, yet the desire never ends. Verse 8. For what advantage has the wise man over a fool? And what does a poor man who had knows how to conduct himself before the living? The idea is comparing from going from one who is wealthy to a stillborn, now we're looking at somebody who's extremely wise versus somebody who's extremely poor. It doesn't matter how wise you are, how smart you are, how many degrees you have, if you're not satisfied with Jesus, all that other stuff is in vain. Whether that means you're a rocket scientist or you have a PhD in religion. True happiness, where does that come from? Does it come from God or do you find it somewhere else? I would challenge us to think about that because if we've got it in God, no matter how rich or poor we are, we've got it made. Little song we used to sing, This joy that I have, the world didn't give it, and the world can't take it away because it comes from the Father. Verse 9. It is better in the sight, the eyes, than the wandering of the appetite. This also is a vanity in striving after the wind. This may sound a little bit confusing. Listen to it again. Better in the is the sight of the eyes, better is what you see with your eyes, than this wandering appetite. Always warning more, never getting full, never being getting all your desires. But this is also vanity and striving after the wind. Solomon, the idea here, it's like what it says on the screen. He wants us to be content with what we have. Are you content this morning with what you have? How great that may be, or how little that may be? Are we truly content? Sometimes it's hard because I look at the neighbors. They might have a bigger tractor than I got. All of a sudden, that's sin, exactly. That's coveting, yeah. Alright? Or I look on Facebook and somebody cooked a better looking steak than I did. Alright? Are we content with our lot in life? Are we enjoying it? We may have wealth, we may have knowledge, but is our true contentment in God? He wants us to be content with what we have, then to always be seeking more to remain content. That makes sense? The problem is if we're looking to have contentment with wealth and knowledge, if we acknowledge that from God, we're good with that. But if we don't acknowledge that from God and we keep seeking more for our own glory and not for Him, that's where the problem is, because we're seeking more to try to be content. We're not satisfied with what God has given us. Let's pause here for a second and go back to the book of Genesis. Remember the book of Genesis? Genesis starts off with the creation, it says in the beginning God, and it talks about how the world was created. Creation, Adam, first man, is given a role. One of them is to name the animals. All right. He named the animals, and then they've realized God said there was not one suited for him, so God did a little work. But Adam took a little nap, woke up missing a rib. Now you got this thing. He looked at this object and it's like, whoa, man. End up being a woman, right? It's a blessing. You missed that joke. Or whatever. Adam and Eve lived in the garden to be content. They had everything they needed, right? You had the the tree of knowledge of good and evil in the garden, right? Adam finds out, because of his sin, him and his wife's sin have eaten off that tree. That he's just a mortal man. Just like me and you. Matter of fact, scripture says it lived about 930 years. So keep that thought in mind as we walk through these next uh verses 10, 11, and 12. Adam named all the animals, he's a mortal man, and he sought wisdom not from God, but through disobedience by going after the tree. Verse uh 10 whatever has come to be, whatever's come to be has already been named. And it is known what man is, that he is not able to dispute with one stronger than him. Who did all the naming in scripture? The animals is Adam. Okay, that's where they've already been named. What is known about man? He cannot dispute with somebody stronger. Did he try to dispute with somebody stronger? He was given instructions to enjoy the garden, but he listened to the serpent or Satan and was deceived into sinning, thinking he could find out more and be more. Can't contend with God. God is all powerful. Verse 11 The more words, the more vanity, and what is the advantage to man. Verse 12, for who knows what is good for man while he lives a few days of his vain life, which he passes like a shadow. For who can tell man what will be after him under the sun? You take Adam, he lived nine hundred and thirty years, and yet to him and to us. That's just a shadow. We're lucky to get 80, 85, maybe 90 years. You know, as well as I do, time passes quickly. Because I'm really not supposed to be about 25 right now. And obviously something happened and time's got away from me because I'm not in the 25 no more, right? I'm 26. But here's the deal. What's going to come after us? Adam had no idea what was going to come after him. You know, TVs, electric cars, computers, etc. etc. We don't know what's going to come after us. But what we do know is that we cannot contend with the Almighty God. We should seek to find true happiness in him. Let's look at some verses that talk about true happiness. Look at this first one. It says in Psalm 16, you make known to me the path of life. David here talking to God, okay? So God makes David's path known, shows him how he wants him to go, right? And then it says, In your presence there is fullness of joy. At your right hand are pleasures forevermore. So true happiness, true joy, where can you find that? You're not going to find it on TV. You're not going to find it on TV with one of them TV preachers. It says, in your presence. Not meaning that if you want to be truly happy, you need to end your life and go be with Jesus. See, God is spirit, he's everywhere. He's in this room because we know he dwells in believers. What that means is you can find true happiness at your home when you're by yourself. When you take that Bible, open it up, and say, God, I come to you. I want to spend time with you. Forgive me my sins. Help me understand what I'm about to read. Thank you for your love. Thank you for your blessings. Speak to me. That's being in his presence. You see what I'm saying? It's like, let's take Mary for a second. I want to pick on Mary for a second, okay? Mary, we can be friends, we can communicate, we can talk and pick up the phone, right? But there's a difference in doing that, especially like if I were one of her grandkids, being overseas, serving the military. It'd be different when I come over here and I'm face to face in her presence. Wouldn't that make a big difference when your grandbabies come? You're gonna cry when they come. I know you are, right? Same with us in God. There is joy, there's fullness in his presence. If you have an experience that I pray today that you'd have an opportunity to know more about Christ, you see the deal is Adam and Eve, when they messed up, that messes up for all mankind. They sinned, now we are sinners as well. Because of that, we're separated from the Almighty God. The Bible says that God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, Jesus, so that whoever would believe in him wouldn't perish but have everlasting life. Sitting Jesus on the cross, kind of like the one behind us here, to take away my sin and your sins. So if I place my faith in God, believe that God is God, believe that Jesus is who he says he was, the Son of God, understand what he came to do to take away our sins. If I confess my sins, knowing there's nothing I can do to be truly happy, nothing I can do to get rid of my sin, except God's forgiveness, place my faith in him, they have a relationship with him. Lost people don't understand that. So if they go to get in his presence, it might be difficult. But God can bring them into a relationship. You're looking for joy and happiness, get in his presence. Not just coming to church on Sunday morning, Sunday night, and Wednesday. That's one way. But every day. Get in the word, get in his presence, sing to him. Another one, look at verse 37. Delight yourself in the Lord, and he'll give you the desires of your heart. Desires of heart, things that make you happy. Well, if you want that, delight yourself in God. Enjoy him. Get to know him, walk with him. Philippians 4, 4, we see a command. Rejoice in the Lord always. Again, I say, rejoice. I pray that we would evaluate our lives this week. Think about what truly makes us happy. It's different for each of us because we have different personalities, different likes. You know, some of us, true happiness is going to be going on vacation and cruising around the world. Others would be truly happy to not have to go to work and just stay at home and not go outside. But true, true happiness, commonality that we should all experience is being with Jesus. If we're not happy with him now, finding joy, how in the world are we going to find joy and happiness with him in heaven? We won't even hardly know him. And if we don't know him, I promise you, you're not going to be there because he says, Depart from me, I never knew you. And that scripture, people say, Well, I did all these things in your name. And he's like, Yeah, but you didn't really know me. So I pray that we would seek to know the Lord, rejoice in his presence, delight in his presence, and watch how he can fill us with an everlasting joy and happiness. So to close up today, things to think about. Three questions. What brings you true satisfaction? What brings you true joy and true commitment? Think about that. Ask God to reveal that to you. And if it's anything but Jesus, ask forgiveness. Because what we have, our true joy is, where our true joy is, where our true contentment satisfaction, if it's not in Jesus, it's in something else. And only God is worthy of our worship, our praise, and our love. And again, don't get me wrong, it's okay to get happy about having chocolate. It's okay to be happy about getting a $100 bonus at church at work or something like that. But true happiness is in Jesus. Number two, who are you before an omnipotent God? The reason I ask that is because we look back at Adam. He thought he knew better than God, so they're going to take a bite on this uh this fruit, and all of a sudden their eyes are opened. God is all powerful. He knows all things. He knows how to truly make you happy. So why try on your own without seeking him? Let him be the one to show you true happiness. And then number three, will you accept God's plan for happiness? The idea of having a relationship with him. So to close up, are we happy? Is that happiness coming from the Lord? If not, if it's coming from somewhere else, we need to repent. We understand who we are for God, that He's God that we're not. He created us to worship Him and to enjoy Him forever. And finally, can we accept His plan for happiness, which starts with a relationship with Him? You don't have a relationship with Him. I pray that after the service or during the invitation, come talk to me. Let's talk about that or call me during the week and let's talk about how you can have true happiness and knowing Christ. But let's we're gonna have, I'm gonna pray for us. We'll have a time of invitation. We're gonna sing a song. Joyce is gonna come up and lead us. And as we do that, ask the Lord to speak to your heart about your happiness, where you're at in your walk with life, with him. Anything you need to repent of, do that. Anything you need to praise him for, do that. And let's watch and see how he's gonna work enter our lives and how other people will take notice that we've been with Jesus and that we're happy with Jesus. That'll make a difference in their lives. And God can use that to bring them into relationship with him as well. Would you pray with me? Heavenly Father, thank you for this day. Thank you, Father, for your word. Thank you, Father, for the opportunity to read your word, to study your word. Thank you, Father, that your word can guide us and lead us to true happiness in a relationship with you. I pray this morning in our time of invitation that you would speak to our hearts, convict us of sin, give us clarity for the week to come. We love you, Father. We pray this in the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord and our Savior. Amen.