Living for Today and That Final Day (Ecclesiastes 12:9-14)

A king who had everything admits he almost drowned. We walk through Solomon’s final words in Ecclesiastes 12 and explore how a man who tasted every pleasure came back to shore with three clear steps for a meaningful life: fear God, keep His commandments, and prepare for the day when every secret is brought to light. The journey starts with Scripture’s uncomfortable kindness—words that delight, yet prod like goads and fix us like nails—because they’re given by one Shepherd who still leads people home.

We share why the source of wisdom matters as much as the content, tracing how God breathed truth through human voices without flattening their personality. That foundation frames a practical path forward. “Fear” becomes posture, not panic: favor God’s company, exalt His glory, acknowledge His sovereignty, remember His generosity. Obedience turns from a burdensome rulebook into a coherent, liberating way to live. And preparation shifts our timeline from urgent to eternal, helping us invest in what lasts when the spotlight is off and the motives are hidden.

Along the way, we contrast drifting with being anchored, name the risks of chasing meaning beyond God’s word, and offer everyday ways to live today for that day. From the ocean of sin to the safety of the Shepherd, the thread is simple and strong: truth that stings can save, and a life with the Son brings the wholeness life under the sun can’t deliver.

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Transcript

The Preacher’s Craft And Claim To Truth

Words That Prod And Anchor The Soul

Given By One Shepherd: Scripture’s Source

Beware Beyond These Words

The Meaning Of Life In Three Steps

Fear: Favor, Exalt, Acknowledge, Remember

Obey: The Whole Duty Of Man

Prepare: Live Today For That Day

Walk With The Son, Not The Sun

SPEAKER_00 1:16

Well, today we sail into port here in the final verses of Ecclesiastes, and as we do, we need to remember that Solomon spent many years of his life out there in the deep ocean of sin. In fact, he nearly drowned. He did come up for air, so to speak, only when he realized he was desperate for meaning and for purpose in life. And by the goodness of God, Solomon was brought to repentance, and he returned to his earlier walk with God, that is, with the wisdom of God on his mind. And we know that because as I've mentioned before, Ecclesiastes is a private journal about his life. It's written by Solomon, and then more than likely this is going to be given to his son, his successor, Rehoboam. Solomon doesn't want his son, nor does God want any of us, to dive out there into that deep ocean of sin where you never touch bottom. You never get anchored. You're going to simply drift along with the current of your culture without any direction, without any satisfaction in life. So this journal is for us. Now, in these closing verses of chapter twelve, Solomon delivers some final thoughts on what we could call here the true meaning of life. And he begins by reminiscing on his search for truth. We read here in verse nine, besides being wise, the preacher also taught the people knowledge, weighing and studying and arranging many proverbs with great care. Now you might remember that the word ecclesiastes means a gathering. We get the Greek term ecclesia or the church, ecclesia from that word. Solomon refers to himself as the preacher. He's the one who's called this gathering. He's got this message that he wants to preach. And he writes here in verse 10, the preacher sought to find words of delight, and uprightly he wrote words of truth. So Solomon is saying, you know, I might be using beautifully arranged words, but I'm I'm telling you the truth. I'm preaching to you the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Solomon now says here in verse 11, the words of the wise are like goads. In other words, these words are going to goad you. They're going to prod you along. He says they're like nails firmly fixed. Practically speaking, this means that you read a verse and you immediately know you need to nail that truth down in your mind and in your heart, and that's what God's word does in our lives. Sometimes it might hurt, sometimes it might sting, it can humble our pride, it can uh turn upside down our plans, it's going to question our behavior, it will challenge our thinking. God's word is intended, as one author wrote, to pierce through the crust of indifference. Well, Solomon understands, by the way, that this journal is powerful only because it isn't uh his truth. This is God's truth. And this is exactly what Solomon says next here in verse eleven. He declares that these wise sayings are given by one shepherd. Well, that's a reference to the Lord, the shepherd of Israel, Psalm 80 and verse 1. This is the shepherd Solomon heard his father David singing about in that great 23rd Psalm, The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want, there in verse one. God is ultimately the source of these words of wisdom. The Apostle Peter explains first that God moved through the biblical authors in such a way that they wrote the truth God wanted recorded. He writes in 2 Peter 1 21 that men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. Now that doesn't mean the biblical writers were robots. No, God used their activities, their experiences, their personalities, even their vocabularies, but his spirit is supervising this project. He's moving through them so that in the end, here Solomon's private journal happens to be the very word of God. In fact, Solomon delivers a warning here in verse 12. My son, beware of anything beyond these words. See, Solomon knew these were the words of God. And that's a warning for us all today. Don't stray beyond those green pastures of God's word. Beloved, every religion out there goes beyond the word of God. The Mormons have their Book of Mormon written by Joseph Smith. The Hindus have their Bhagavad Gita, the Muslims have their Quran, and the Baha'i Faith has the writings of Bav. You can go all the way back to the religious pyramid texts of ancient Egypt. You can go back to the Babylonian epoch of Gilgamesh. Those writings are all going to lead you to different gods. Not one of them is about the true and living God. It might be interesting reading, by the way, but it doesn't have the power to cleanse you. It's going to be able to set you free from sin. Now, with that, Solomon delivers a concise summary on what we could call the meaning of life. It's introduced in verse 13 with these words The end of the matter, all has been heard. Well, he's simply saying here, these are the concluding remarks in my journal. Here's the summary of it all. And as you dig into these final verses, you find what I'd like to call three action steps to take. And the first action step is worship. He states it very simply here in verse 13. Fear God. What does it mean to fear God? Let me give you an acrostic using the letters of this word fear, and it might help you in the days ahead. F stands for favor, favor the Lord's company. In other words, fearing God means you're interested in being in his company. You you favor his company more than that of anybody else on the planet. E stands for exalt the Lord's glory. If you fear the Lord, you're going to want to tell others about how great he is. You're going to talk about him, and you're going to talk about him more than you talk about yourself or your latest accomplishment. You are exalting his glory. A stands for acknowledge the Lord's sovereignty. To fear God is to trust him, especially when he doesn't explain himself. And as we've learned in our study through this book, during those times when you can't trace his hand, you need to keep on trusting his heart. God will always do what's right for you. F-E-A, now the letter R. R stands for remember the Lord's generosity. And listen, beloved, the distinguishing mark of the unbeliever is that they never thank God for anything. Romans 1 21. Whatever they have in life, whatever they have become in life, they have they they have only themselves to thank as far as they're concerned. So this first action step is to fear the Lord, that is, favor the Lord's company, exalt the Lord's glory, acknowledge the Lord's sovereignty, and remember the Lord's generosity. That's how you fear the Lord. Now the second action step is obey. Solomon writes here in verse 13, fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man. Now frankly, we don't need any acrostic to help us understand what it means to obey the Lord. Just obey Him. Solomon now gives us a final action step, and we'll call it prepare. He writes here in verse 14. For God will bring every deed into judgment with every secret thing, whether good or evil. Solomon's journal here is like a hand on your shoulder that shakes you and says, Hey, stay alert. Take a good hard look at your life in light of that future day when you're going to stand before the Lord. Live today in light of that day. My ninety-two-year-old father reminded me of that the other day on the telephone when he said to me, You know, Stephen, there are only two days you need to think about today and that day when you see Christ. Hey, that sounds like wise counsel, the wise counsel of Solomon, as he invites us not to invest our lives in anything, in everything that would please the Lord, our shepherd, today. So as we come to the conclusion of Solomon's private journal, here's the reminder. Let's not just live life down here under the sun, su-n. Let's walk through life down here with the sun, S-O-N. And that means walking in wisdom with the Son of God, knowing and following Him as our Savior, our Lord, and our Shepherd. Until that day when we see Him face to face. And until then, and until our next study together, beloved, may the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen.