SPEAKER_00: To be together this morning.
SPEAKER_00: My name is Pastor Miles.
SPEAKER_00: Incredibly excited to open up God's word with you this morning.
SPEAKER_00: If you're new here, I want to welcome you.
SPEAKER_00: Let you know that we've been praying for you.
SPEAKER_00: And as a church, we're really eager to welcome you into this encounter with the living God that we have every time we open up his word.
SPEAKER_00: Opening up his word is exactly what we're going to do.
SPEAKER_00: We are in Ecclesiastes chapter 9, starting in verse 13 this morning.
SPEAKER_00: And if you don't have a copy of God's word, the ushers are going to make their way to the front of the worship center.
SPEAKER_00: You can flag one of them down, and they will get a copy into your hands, which you can keep as our gift to you.
SPEAKER_00: We love God's word, and nothing makes us more happy than for you to go home with a copy of it.
SPEAKER_00: Ecclesiastes chapter 9, verse 13.
SPEAKER_00: I'm convinced of this reality.
SPEAKER_00: After years of pastoring, knowing my own heart, that the hardest part of Christianity is not often that we don't know what to do.
SPEAKER_00: The hardest part is that we know what to do.
SPEAKER_00: We just don't know what's promised after we do it.
SPEAKER_00: We're familiar with unclear instructions, aren't we?
SPEAKER_00: We've all set up that bookshelf.
SPEAKER_00: You open up the instructions, and you are told to attach piece B to piece G using screw Q.
SPEAKER_00: There's no screw Q, there's no piece G.
SPEAKER_00: You finish the shelf, there's three pieces left over, and it's sideways.
SPEAKER_00: We've been there.
SPEAKER_00: We've encountered unclear instructions.
SPEAKER_00: I'm convinced, knowing my own heart and sitting in the counseling room with so many Christians whose desire has been to faithfully follow the Lord, that following Christ usually isn't unclear.
SPEAKER_00: The instructions are clear, the outcome is not.
SPEAKER_00: That's what makes it so difficult.
SPEAKER_00: It's difficult when Scripture calls you to do something like give regularly, give sacrificially, and to give joyfully.
SPEAKER_00: And you find yourself sacrificing something which on the other side of that sacrifice, you wonder what's gonna what's life gonna look like now?
SPEAKER_00: What's life gonna look like without those resources that God has asked me to pass over?
SPEAKER_00: We know this is true of sharing the gospel too, isn't it?
SPEAKER_00: We're called to be like Jesus, to be soul seekers, to seek, to see the lost saved, and and to preach and share the gospel, and yet we're given no assurance on the other side of that difficult conversation when we call sinners to repentance and share the good news of hope we have in Jesus Christ, we're given no assurance of what their reaction to that conversation might be.
SPEAKER_00: We know also that Jesus told us to pray and to not lose heart.
SPEAKER_00: And yet, maybe there's been something you've been praying for for years and you expected the outcome would come sooner.
SPEAKER_00: You expected the result would happen with immediacy, and here you are praying faithfully, listening to the command, but not knowing the outcome.
SPEAKER_00: I think the greatest uncertainty we often struggle with in Christianity is not what should I do, but what will happen when I do it.
SPEAKER_00: And so so often then we're caught up in sort of this neutral gear where we're waiting for more clarity, asking God for more information, and there's a time and place for that.
SPEAKER_00: Waiting can certainly be an important biblical principle, and yet I just can't help but to examine my own heart and realize that sometimes the reason we're so hesitant to obedience and so hesitant to faithfulness and so hesitant to do what the scriptures call wisdom, so often the reason that we are so hesitant to do those things is because we don't want clarity, we want a guaranteed outcome.
SPEAKER_00: Now, Solomon then comes to speak to us in Ecclesiastes chapter 9, 13, and we're gonna cover a lot here.
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna get to chapter 11, verse 6, and he's what he's doing here is assembling a series of proverbs and sayings that all have this each of these sayings hit the exact same nail that wisdom matters, your choices matter, faithfulness matters, all of it matters.
SPEAKER_00: It's all very important, but none of it will give you control over your life.
SPEAKER_00: At the end of the day, God is sovereign, and he has called you to a life of faithfulness, and he has called you to leave the results to him.
SPEAKER_00: The name of our message this morning is the results belong to God and loved one.
SPEAKER_00: The implication is that faithfulness is your calling.
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna read this together.
SPEAKER_00: I'd ask for you to stand as we do, and I'm gonna read from chapter 9, verse 13 to chapter 11, verse 6, and I want you to notice what seems like a maybe random assortment of wisdom, Proverbs, has the same running theme that God has called us to faithfulness, leaving the results to him.
SPEAKER_00: Ecclesiastes chapter 9, verse 13.
SPEAKER_00: I've seen also, I've also seen this example of wisdom under the sun, and it seemed great to me.
SPEAKER_00: There was a little city with few men in it, and a great king came against it and besieged it, building great siege works against it.
SPEAKER_00: But there was found in it a poor wise man, and he by his wisdom delivered the city.
SPEAKER_00: Yet no one remembered that poor man.
SPEAKER_00: But I say that wisdom is better than might, though the poor man's wisdom is despised and his words are not heard.
SPEAKER_00: The words of the wise heard in quiet are better than the shouting of a ruler among fools.
SPEAKER_00: Wisdom is better than weapons of war, but one sinner destroys much good.
SPEAKER_00: Dead flies make the perfumer's ointment give off a stench.
SPEAKER_00: So a little folly outweighs wisdom and honor.
SPEAKER_00: A wise man's heart inclines him to the right, but a fool's heart to the left.
SPEAKER_00: Even when the fool walks on the road, he lacks sense, and he says to everyone, he is a fool.
SPEAKER_00: If the anger of the ruler rises against you, do not leave your place, for calmness will lay great offenses to rest.
SPEAKER_00: There is an evil that I have seen under the sun, as it were, an air proceeding from the ruler.
SPEAKER_00: Folly is set in many high places, and the rich sit in a low place.
SPEAKER_00: I've seen slaves on horses and princes walking on the ground like slaves.
SPEAKER_00: He who digs a pit will fall into it, and a serpent will bite him, who breaks through a wall.
SPEAKER_00: He who he who quarries stones is hurt by them, and he who splits logs is endangered by them.
SPEAKER_00: If the iron is blunt and no one and one does not sharpen the edge, he must use more strength, but wisdom helps one to succeed.
SPEAKER_00: If the serpent bites before it's charmed, there is no advantage to the charmer.
SPEAKER_00: The words of a wise man's mouth win him favor, but the lips of a fool consume him.
SPEAKER_00: The beginning of the words of his mouth is foolishness, and the end of his talk is evil madness.
SPEAKER_00: A fool multiplies words, though no man knows what is to be, and who can tell him what will be after him?
SPEAKER_00: The toil of a fool wearies him, for he does not know the way to the city.
SPEAKER_00: Woe to you, O land, when your king is a child, and your princes feast in the morning.
SPEAKER_00: Happy are you, O land, when your king is the son of the nobility, and your princes feast at the proper time, for strength and not for drunkenness.
SPEAKER_00: Through sloth the roof sinks in, and through indolence the house leaks.
SPEAKER_00: Bread is made for laughter, wine gladdens life, and money answers everything.
SPEAKER_00: Even in your thoughts do not curse the king, nor in your bedroom curse the rich, for a bird of the air will carry your voice, and some winged creature tell the matter.
SPEAKER_00: Cast your bread upon the waters, for you will find it after many days.
SPEAKER_00: Give a portion to seven or even to eight, for you know not what disaster may happen on earth.
SPEAKER_00: If the clouds are full of rain, they empty themselves on the earth, and if a tree falls to the south or to the north, in the place where the tree falls, there it will lie.
SPEAKER_00: He who observes the wind will not sow, and he who regards the clouds will not reap.
SPEAKER_00: As you do not know the way the Spirit comes to the bones in the womb of a woman with child, so you do not know the work of God who makes everything.
SPEAKER_00: In the morning, sow your seed, and at evening do not withhold your hand, for you do not know which way will prosper, this or that, or whether both alike will be good.
SPEAKER_00: This is the word of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: You can grab your seat this morning.
SPEAKER_00: Number of things here, isn't there?
SPEAKER_00: Dead flies, snake charmers, leaking roofs.
SPEAKER_00: You wonder if Solomon's talking about wisdom or this building that we're sitting in right now.
SPEAKER_00: I can assure you, he is talking about wisdom, and he is not random in his collection of Proverbs this morning.
SPEAKER_00: He he is driving this nail home to us that loved one, your responsibility is faithfulness.
SPEAKER_00: Your responsibility is wisdom.
SPEAKER_00: The results belong to God.
SPEAKER_00: Now, faithfulness in these verses is not vague.
SPEAKER_00: It's incredibly clear that a faithful life looks like the wise life.
SPEAKER_00: And so as Solomon then is teaching us what faithfulness looks like, the first thing I want you to see he calls us to do is to be wise.
SPEAKER_00: Your choices really do matter.
SPEAKER_00: Be wise, your choices really do matter.
SPEAKER_00: I want you to notice that what the scriptures call us to is never a fatalism in light of God's sovereignty.
SPEAKER_00: Yes, God is in control of the results.
SPEAKER_00: Yes, God is in control of all things.
SPEAKER_00: The response of God's people is never to be to throw our arms up in the air and say, well, it doesn't matter.
SPEAKER_00: Let go and let God, He's gonna have to take care of the rest here.
SPEAKER_00: In fact, often in the church, we see this sort of gospel fatalism.
SPEAKER_00: One time I preached at a church.
SPEAKER_00: The person who invited me wrote me a card after, and you know, after preaching to the congregation, I went in the car and read the card, and it said, I know that God, what God did here had nothing to do with you.
SPEAKER_00: And I thought that's very discouraging to hear after driving all the way out here and preaching my guts out and writing this manuscript.
SPEAKER_00: And I get what he's saying, though.
SPEAKER_00: You know, Jesus said, Apart from me, you can do nothing.
SPEAKER_00: And there is a weakness that we are called to in Scripture, and yet I'm reminded that the Bible doesn't call us to a gospel fatalism, it calls us to a gospel reliance.
SPEAKER_00: We talked about that a few weeks ago, didn't we, when we talked about the weak that are made strong through the gospel.
SPEAKER_00: It's not that the instrument is irrelevant, that would be fatalism.
SPEAKER_00: It's that the instrument is powerless apart from God.
SPEAKER_00: And as the scriptures talk about wisdom and faithfulness, that same tension is true, that we are called to faithfulness, but just because you are faithful doesn't mean that you are in control.
SPEAKER_00: This just because you are faithful doesn't mean that you're guaranteed the results.
SPEAKER_00: And we see that at the beginning of our passage in chapter 9, verse 13, as Solomon tells us about a rich ruler who has many siege works.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you you can probably imagine it, you've probably seen enough movies before to imagine a little city and a horde of an army coming against that city.
SPEAKER_00: And you say, I mean, there is just no way that this city can be delivered from the rich king and all of his siege works, and yet Solomon points us to one thing the city has.
SPEAKER_00: It is hidden.
SPEAKER_00: You can't really see it at first.
SPEAKER_00: It's a poor man that you'd walk by on a street, that you drive by that intersection every time you drive home from work, they stand on the intersection, you just completely miss them.
SPEAKER_00: Solomon says there there is a man in that city who is poor, who is ignored, but there is a secret weapon.
SPEAKER_00: That man has wisdom.
SPEAKER_00: That man has faithfulness.
SPEAKER_00: And because of the poor man's wisdom, he saves the city.
SPEAKER_00: Now that is a movie I want to see, isn't it?
SPEAKER_00: And yes, Solomon, he's calling us here to faithfulness.
SPEAKER_00: But notice the tension he's keeping us in in verse 16.
SPEAKER_00: Look down at your copy of God's word.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe I'll start in verse the the half section there of verse 15.
SPEAKER_00: Yet no one remembered that poor man.
SPEAKER_00: No one remembered that poor man.
SPEAKER_00: That poor man's wisdom delivered the city.
SPEAKER_00: Yes, your faithfulness matters, but that poor man's wisdom did not get him any fame.
SPEAKER_00: It didn't get him any riches.
SPEAKER_00: Nobody remembered him.
SPEAKER_00: But Solomon's conclusion is this: but I say that that wisdom is better than might.
SPEAKER_00: Wisdom is better than might.
SPEAKER_00: Loved ones, some of us need to hear that this morning because we feel ourselves to be called to very small things.
SPEAKER_00: And Solomon is here to say, hey, listen, if you're faithful in the small things, you don't need a stage for God to do much in your life.
SPEAKER_00: And through you.
SPEAKER_00: The only thing you need is faithfulness.
SPEAKER_00: You need faithfulness to God.
SPEAKER_00: Now, if wisdom then can accomplish enormous good, Solomon also wants us to understand the destructive power of a small amount of foolishness and sin.
SPEAKER_00: Yes, faithfulness in small portions and small people and small callings can accomplish enormous good.
SPEAKER_00: Foolishness and sin can destroy with like power.
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse 18.
SPEAKER_00: Wisdom is better than the weapons of war, but one sinner destroys much good.
SPEAKER_00: Chapter 10, verse 1, he carries on the same principle, another illustration.
SPEAKER_00: Dead flies make the perfumer's ointment give off a stench.
SPEAKER_00: One little fruit fly and a giant vat of perfumer's oil will make the whole thing rot.
SPEAKER_00: You can make a delicious cup of coffee.
SPEAKER_00: You ever had this before?
SPEAKER_00: And a little bug lands in it.
SPEAKER_00: And I mean, some of you, let's be honest, you didn't make a new cup, but you should have.
SPEAKER_00: One small little creature in a giant amount of liquid ruins the whole entire thing.
SPEAKER_00: What is Solomon telling you, loved one?
SPEAKER_00: Solomon is telling you a little amount of foolishness can destroy your entire life.
SPEAKER_00: Be careful with those sins that you label small, because they will become large things.
SPEAKER_00: The other day I looked out my back window.
SPEAKER_00: We we have a farmer's field, and beside of us is one of those neighbors.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if any of you guys have these neighbors who their lawn is like perfect and immaculate, and every bush is perfectly trimmed, and the grass is always perfectly cut.
SPEAKER_00: And I looked out into the farmer's field, and there's a number of weeds growing on the side of the farmer's field, and my neighbor was out in the farmer's field pulling out weeds from this tree.
SPEAKER_00: And I thought, wow, this I mean, he's really perfected everything in his yard.
SPEAKER_00: He's got to go and just now he's taming the wilderness in the farmer's field.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you guys have neighbors like that.
SPEAKER_00: You're pretty sure you're gonna look out one day, they're gonna be on your lawn, working on your lawn, because your dandelions are, anyways, another sermon we're preaching, aren't we?
SPEAKER_00: Well, I looked at him and he was pulling these giant vines out of a number of trees, and and I went to see what was going on, and he told me that that in his backyard, he's got this beautiful, huge willow tree.
SPEAKER_00: It's perfectly maintained, it's incredibly mature.
SPEAKER_00: And he said, This vine is is crawling up this tree and into his willow tree.
SPEAKER_00: And you could look at the trees that the vine had already taken over and see like they were dying because this vine was crippling them, these massive trees.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I could try to pull on them as hard as I could.
SPEAKER_00: There's no way I could get them out.
SPEAKER_00: And yet this small little vine was killing those trees and threatening to take down this huge willow tree.
SPEAKER_00: Now, I've seen this willow tree in storms, I've seen the thunder come, I've seen the wind blow, and the willow tree is immovable, but this little vine was threatening its life.
SPEAKER_00: And for hours, me and this neighbor, we we tracked the vine, pulling it out of the trees to the very root where it started just as a tiny little seed.
SPEAKER_00: And I was reminded of the power of allowing something small to remain until it has deeply rooted into our lives and destroyed everything.
SPEAKER_00: What bitterness are you holding against another person?
SPEAKER_00: Saying, well, it's not that big of a deal, and yet every time you see them, there's bitterness boiling up in your heart.
SPEAKER_00: What lust are you cultivating in your heart?
SPEAKER_00: That right now it's a small thing, right now it's an inconsequential thing, but but loved one, if you do not tear it up while it is tiny, it will become a very big thing that can destroy your life.
SPEAKER_00: What is God calling you to right now that you are delaying obedience, and you know delayed obedience is disobedience, but you're saying, God, it's just now, now is just not the right time.
SPEAKER_00: These little things Solomon says become big things.
SPEAKER_00: A little folly destroys much good.
SPEAKER_00: What Solomon then calls us to is a very ordinary faithfulness.
SPEAKER_00: This is what wisdom is.
SPEAKER_00: Wisdom is very rarely lived out in the in the biggest moments of life.
SPEAKER_00: We often think of our faithfulness and think of our life lived before God in the big grand moments.
SPEAKER_00: But what scripture often calls us to instead is to think about the little moments, the humdrum of life, the constant small steps of faithfulness that we need to take regularly that lead to a life of godliness and glory.
SPEAKER_00: It's ordinary wisdom.
SPEAKER_00: And I want you to see in the in the rest of chapter 10 that Solomon really calls us to wisdom in four different realms of life.
SPEAKER_00: The first place that he calls us to wisdom in is to be wise in our reactions, to be wise in our reactions.
SPEAKER_00: Solomon says in verse 4, look at your copy of God's word with me.
SPEAKER_00: If the anger of the ruler rises against you, do not leave your place, for calmness will lay great offenses to rest.
SPEAKER_00: Solomon's looking at us this morning and saying, listen, if you want to live faithfully, if you want to live wisely, your reactions matter.
SPEAKER_00: The way that you react to that thing that your spouse said again when you asked them not to say, it matters.
SPEAKER_00: The way that you react to your kids when they do that, a completely infuriating thing.
SPEAKER_00: It matters.
SPEAKER_00: Solomon's saying that if you want to live wisely, you're gonna have to leave the outcome to God.
SPEAKER_00: You're gonna have to leave other people's actions to God, and you're gonna have to practice.
SPEAKER_00: This is a beautiful word we need to embrace, self-restraint.
SPEAKER_00: Self-restraint.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna have to need then resist the need to win every moment in argument.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna have to resist the need to defend myself immediately when I feel that I'm wronged.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna have to resist the need to control the way that another person responds to me.
SPEAKER_00: I if I'm gonna live wisely, I may have to leave the results to God and say, God, you got this one.
SPEAKER_00: There's nothing that I can do in my reaction right now that will contribute to making this situation better.
SPEAKER_00: And so I'm trusting in you, God.
SPEAKER_00: What does that practically look like in our life?
SPEAKER_00: Well, it practically means that to be a wise Christian means often refusing to send that text message when you are angry and instead choosing to have that conversation face to face in love for the person's restoration.
SPEAKER_00: It means that when you are in that conflict and that conversation, you refuse to walk out on a person just because you are offended by what they said.
SPEAKER_00: You are fighting for clarity.
SPEAKER_00: It means that when someone treats you foolishly and sinfully, you refuse to react foolishly and sinfully.
SPEAKER_00: Someone else's uh actions don't permit your foolishness.
SPEAKER_00: We're being wise in our reactions to things.
SPEAKER_00: But notice here in verses 8 to 11 that Solomon moves to the next realm where we need wisdom.
SPEAKER_00: He calls us to be wise in our work.
SPEAKER_00: A number of illustrations here, all to say that work is a very dangerous thing.
SPEAKER_00: The person who's digging a pit, he says in verse 8, can fall into it.
SPEAKER_00: Serpent will bite him.
SPEAKER_00: The person who breaks a wall will be bit by a serpent.
SPEAKER_00: The person who quarries stones is hurt by them.
SPEAKER_00: The person who splits logs is endangered by them.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Work is a very dangerous thing.
SPEAKER_00: And so in verse 10, if the iron is blunt and one does not sharpen the edge, he must use more strength.
SPEAKER_00: But here's the point wisdom helps him to succeed.
SPEAKER_00: You better work with wisdom because wisdom is dangerous.
SPEAKER_00: Now, this is directly applicable to some people in this church who maybe you work in the trades and you're like one move away from being electrocuted.
SPEAKER_00: And so you understand what the, you know, the person chopping wood, why they have to be wise.
SPEAKER_00: Many of the rest of us read something like this and say, listen, I work on the 11th floor of a tall building in Toronto.
SPEAKER_00: I don't think any snakes are coming up to bite me up there.
SPEAKER_00: And yet the principle that Solomon wants you to understand is not just that work can present a great physical danger to you.
SPEAKER_00: Arthritis is not your greatest enemy here.
SPEAKER_00: The thing that Solomon is pressing into our lives is that work can be a spiritual danger.
SPEAKER_00: Work can be a relational danger.
SPEAKER_00: And so you listen, you better know, you better sharpen the axe.
SPEAKER_00: You better work with wisdom.
SPEAKER_00: You better make sure that you are not working to such a degree that you are sacrificing from your family, because we've all seen how dangerous a workaholic can be to their family.
SPEAKER_00: You better make sure that you're not working to such a degree that you are sacrificing your physical health.
SPEAKER_00: We all know people who they work so hard for so many years just to get to retirement to find that they never actually cared for themselves.
SPEAKER_00: Work can be an incredible danger to the health of a church when its members are so caught up with work that they are unwilling to carry the burden and the weight of the ministry of seeing lost people saved and saved people matured and mature people multiplied all to the glory of God.
SPEAKER_00: You better work wisely, Solomon says.
SPEAKER_00: Be faithful in your work.
SPEAKER_00: Now listen, isn't work somewhere where we need the most wisdom?
SPEAKER_00: Doesn't weekly worship for you mostly look like work?
SPEAKER_00: If you're working forward, I mean most of your waking hours maybe are at work.
SPEAKER_00: Work with wisdom, Solomon says.
SPEAKER_00: Third realm of wisdom we need is in our words, in our words, verses 12 to 14.
SPEAKER_00: Solomon is telling us about our words.
SPEAKER_00: We know the destructive power of words.
SPEAKER_00: You, some of you, I mean, you had maybe a parent or a teacher who, with just words, caused years and years of damage in your life.
SPEAKER_00: And yet Solomon is not only warning us of how foolish, destructive our foolish words can be, he's warning us of how good and gracious and healing a right word can be.
SPEAKER_00: And I just I find it fascinating that when Paul talks about Christian growth in Ephesians chapter 4, he says, speak, speak words, speak the truth of love.
SPEAKER_00: Speak the truth in love by which you grow up into him who is the head.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm reminded, loved ones, that your words have the power to either tear down those around you or to build them up in Christ's likeness.
SPEAKER_00: Are you being wise in your words?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, can we get really practical with this?
SPEAKER_00: After the service, it is very likely that if you stay for just a minute or two and talk to like one or two people, you're gonna talk to someone who maybe they need some encouragement.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe they need your hand on their shoulder praying for them for something they're facing.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I can almost assure it.
SPEAKER_00: Is there anyone in here who says, listen, I don't need any ministry this week, I don't need any encouragement this week, I don't need anyone to tell me any truth or remind me of anything this week.
SPEAKER_00: We all need it.
SPEAKER_00: Be wise in your words, loved ones.
SPEAKER_00: Fourthly, be wise in your responsibilities.
SPEAKER_00: Be wise in your responsibilities, Solomon says.
SPEAKER_00: You see that in verse 18, don't you?
SPEAKER_00: Through sloth, the roof sinks in.
SPEAKER_00: Through indolence, the house leaks.
SPEAKER_00: Roofs don't collapse on the first day, they're neglected.
SPEAKER_00: First they sag, then they leak, then they rot.
SPEAKER_00: And the damage that a lack of faithfulness and wisdom does in your life is often something that happens slowly, so that when you see the results of your unfaithfulness and foolishness, often it is too late to respond.
SPEAKER_00: As we look at our lives, some of us know where the roof is leaking right now.
SPEAKER_00: Some of us know the faithfulness that God has called us to, the wise decision that God has asked us to make.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's a conversation in your marriage, you keep avoiding it.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's that your children are receiving whatever attention remains after everything else is finished.
SPEAKER_00: It's a responsibility at work you hope someone else would take care of.
SPEAKER_00: It's that your Bible remains closed.
SPEAKER_00: Well, you wonder why your soul is so dry.
SPEAKER_00: God is calling us here to a steady faithfulness, an ordinary wisdom.
SPEAKER_00: Be faithful in your responsibilities, Solomon says.
SPEAKER_00: Now I'm fascinated here that in this first chapter and a half here, Solomon tells us to be wise because our choices really do matter, that faithfulness is rarely spectacular.
SPEAKER_00: That faithfulness is often lived out in the humdrum of life.
SPEAKER_00: It's an endurance to do the things that you know are right even when you don't see the results coming from them.
SPEAKER_00: And so what God is calling us here is to believe that the outcome belongs to him.
SPEAKER_00: But the upkeep of faithfulness belongs then to us.
SPEAKER_00: Calls us to keep then discipling our kids.
SPEAKER_00: To keep serving in the ministries where we just wonder, I mean, I don't know if this ministry is really working.
SPEAKER_00: I felt that this morning because I don't know, somehow my kids were let loose this morning, and someone came this morning to set up all the chairs, and I looked, and my kids had kind of made every row look like a snake.
SPEAKER_00: And I wondered if that person looked at those rows and said, Well, I mean, I'm my service really means nothing around here.
SPEAKER_00: And it's the pastor's kids who are doing it, and now I'm addressing it because I want you to know, okay, it really does matter.
SPEAKER_00: We love you.
SPEAKER_00: Okay?
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you're serving in a ministry and you just need to know like it's it's faithfulness over years and years and years, and you might be in kids' ministry, and you might not have a kid come up to you and say, Oh, kind and gracious teacher, how great of a teacher you have been.
SPEAKER_00: I'm giving my life to the Lord and I'm becoming a missionary as of today.
SPEAKER_00: I'm flying out tomorrow.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that won't happen.
SPEAKER_00: And yet, what the Lord will do over years of steady, constant faithfulness.
SPEAKER_00: You do not know.
SPEAKER_00: And that's what Solomon wants us to see next.
SPEAKER_00: You don't know the results.
SPEAKER_00: So act anyway.
SPEAKER_00: Take action, Solomon says.
SPEAKER_00: It's the second thing I want you to see.
SPEAKER_00: Take action, certainty is impossible.
SPEAKER_00: Now, all throughout scripture, God's people have been called to faith, and that faith exists because clarity in their life does not.
SPEAKER_00: Don't you see that in the life of Abraham?
SPEAKER_00: You remember, Abraham is told to go, and he's not told where, he's not given a map, he just says go.
SPEAKER_00: And what does Abraham do?
SPEAKER_00: He goes.
SPEAKER_00: Moses and Israel and Egypt, they're they're called to leave the land of the Egyptians, where there's meat and food and sustenance, and sure life's bad, but at least we got resources, and they're to go in the wilderness where they have no idea how they will be provided for, and they have no idea what the Lord will do, but they're called instead to faithfulness.
SPEAKER_00: This is what God calls of his people.
SPEAKER_00: They are to act on what God has revealed without demanding what God has hidden.
SPEAKER_00: Take action, loved ones.
SPEAKER_00: Certainty is impossible.
SPEAKER_00: What Solomon says then in chapter 11, verse 1 is this call to action.
SPEAKER_00: Notice what he says: cast your bread upon the waters, for you will find it after many days.
SPEAKER_00: Now I need you to know that as I prepared to preach on Ecclesiastes, this was the verse that I was looking forward to the most.
SPEAKER_00: And that is because I had no idea what it meant.
SPEAKER_00: And so over these last few months, I have taken every opportunity to find out what it's meant contextually.
SPEAKER_00: There's been elders' meetings where we're talking about the future, and I say to the men, guys, we just gotta cast our bread on the waters here.
SPEAKER_00: And they look at me and they're confused, and so I know, well, okay, they don't know what it means either.
SPEAKER_00: And so I'm with the staff the next day, and the staff are reviewing a service, and I say, Well, guys, we really casted our breads on the waters there.
SPEAKER_00: And I look around, hoping that someone knows what I'm talking about.
SPEAKER_00: No one has known what I'm talking about.
SPEAKER_00: And so I decided as I prepared this message, I would finally look up what it means to cast your bread on the waters.
SPEAKER_00: And what I found were that was that the commentators are just as confused as I am.
SPEAKER_00: Some believe Solomon is describing maritime trade.
SPEAKER_00: You send your goods on a boat across the water, across the sea, it's sort of like an investment.
SPEAKER_00: Eventually you will receive a return.
SPEAKER_00: Others think he's commanding generosity.
SPEAKER_00: Give your bread away, and in time that generosity will return to you.
SPEAKER_00: Others see farming.
SPEAKER_00: You cast your seed on wet, flooded ground, and eventually something will grow there.
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't matter the weather, just cast your seed wherever and you'll get bread.
SPEAKER_00: One scholar lists nine interpretations, and one of his possibilities is that Solomon is talking about making beer, to which I thought, at least I'm not as confused as some people.
SPEAKER_00: Now, all of these thoughts carry one same theme: that what Solomon is calling us to is to release something valuable beyond your control, to be faithful, to release it to God, and trust that God will do with it what He wills.
SPEAKER_00: Faithfulness is my responsibility.
SPEAKER_00: The outcome is God, the results are God.
SPEAKER_00: And as I think about what that means in our life, I just I can't, I mean, there's so much application here.
SPEAKER_00: But but uh isn't it right for us to apply this to the way that we share the gospel with unbelievers?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, if we were given the certainty that every time we shared the gospel, someone would believe.
SPEAKER_00: Nothing would stop us.
SPEAKER_00: You agree, church?
SPEAKER_00: Nod your head with me if you agree.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, nothing would stop us if every time we shared it, someone would believe.
SPEAKER_00: What stops us?
SPEAKER_00: It's the uncertainty.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe this person will reject us.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe I'll mess it up in like this person's progress towards salvation, even though it doesn't work like this.
SPEAKER_00: It's gonna take like a few steps backwards.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it just won't work.
SPEAKER_00: We have all of these uncertainties, all of these questions.
SPEAKER_00: God says, You take care of the faithfulness, you leave the results to me.
SPEAKER_00: Proclaim Christ.
SPEAKER_00: God will determine the response.
SPEAKER_00: God will determine what part of the puzzle you are in that person coming to Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you'll be the last one.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you'll be the first, maybe you'll be somewhere in the middle.
SPEAKER_00: You'll just be a piece of that person's conversion.
SPEAKER_00: You you take care of the faithfulness, God will take care of the results.
SPEAKER_00: I can't help but to think that this not only applies to the way that we share the gospel, but it applies to the way that we give.
SPEAKER_00: That in giving, what do we do?
SPEAKER_00: We release security to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: We could reserve what the what God has given to us to buy a nice pool, to get a better car, to get a bigger house, to make life a little more comfortable, but in giving sacrificially and joyfully and regularly, as the Lord calls us to in his word, we are sacrificing that comfort to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: We are taking up our faithfulness, and we're saying, God, I don't know.
SPEAKER_00: You're gonna have to take care of the results.
SPEAKER_00: Called to take action because certainty is impossible.
SPEAKER_00: Now Solomon then gives us an illustration of that in verse three and four, doesn't he?
SPEAKER_00: He's talking about a farmer here, and he says, look at look at verse three with me.
SPEAKER_00: If the clouds are full of rain, they empty themselves on the earth, and if a tree falls to the south or to the north, in the place where the tree falls, there it will lie.
SPEAKER_00: But notice the problem he who observes the wind will not sow, and he who regards the clouds will not reap.
SPEAKER_00: The the wise farmer notices the weather.
SPEAKER_00: They read their interpretation of what's gonna happen, and they say, Well, I bet I have to sow, anyways.
SPEAKER_00: So I'm gonna sow this seed, and I'm gonna leave the rest to God.
SPEAKER_00: Because there's not, I mean, I cannot control the weather.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna leave the results to God.
SPEAKER_00: Look what the foolish farmer does, Solomon says.
SPEAKER_00: The foolish farmers looking at the clouds and says, I mean, it's looking like this isn't gonna work, so I'm not gonna sow any seed.
SPEAKER_00: And who at the end of the year has a better chance of having a crop?
SPEAKER_00: It's the one who takes action knowing that certainty is impossible.
SPEAKER_00: The controlling farmer waits for guarantees, and because of that, he never sows seed.
SPEAKER_00: And loved one, the application here is so good for our lives.
SPEAKER_00: Where are you postponing faithfulness because God hasn't guaranteed the outcome?
SPEAKER_00: Where are you postponing faithfulness because God hasn't guaranteed what will happen if you do it?
SPEAKER_00: Loved ones, hasn't most of what's happened in your life happened in an unexpected way?
SPEAKER_00: Every time you've suffered, hasn't it been like that?
SPEAKER_00: You enter into the suffering.
SPEAKER_00: There's no way God can use this one.
SPEAKER_00: God, I don't know what you're doing, and you obviously don't know either.
SPEAKER_00: And you get to the end and you look back at the suffering and you see all the seeds that were planted in the valley of the shadow of death are now taking root into a beautiful trees of sanctification in your life, and you look back and you say, I would have never written my story like that, but God thank you that you do.
SPEAKER_00: And some of you are in suffering right now, you need to be convinced of that because it doesn't seem like it, does it?
SPEAKER_00: Where are you postponing faithfulness?
SPEAKER_00: Because God hasn't guaranteed the outcome.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe there's someone you need to apologize to.
SPEAKER_00: Can't guarantee that they'll forgive you.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe there's an area in your life you need to confess sin, but you just have no assurance that after this comes out, after you confess this sin, that the people who love you will still love you and still care for you.
SPEAKER_00: And God has called you to bring that to the light.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's in a step of faith.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's in the call to faith in Jesus Christ that you need to hear that call and place your faith in Jesus Christ for salvation.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's in the call to baptism, maybe it's in the call to membership, into service, into community, whatever it is, what is that thing that God is calling you to that you know, okay, scripture plainly says this is what I'm to do, but I gotta wait for more clarity here.
SPEAKER_00: Loved ones, it's not faith.
SPEAKER_00: It's not faith.
SPEAKER_00: Faith exists because clarity does not take action because certainty is impossible.
SPEAKER_00: Some of us, right now, in this moment, we need to pray to the Lord, Holy Spirit, give me courage, give me courage because I've been living in fear.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know what's gonna happen, but I'm I'm living in this fear, and we need courage to have that conversation, to seek that restoration, to confess that sin, to cast your bread on the waters.
SPEAKER_00: Do we know what it means now, loved ones?
SPEAKER_00: We've got some clarity.
SPEAKER_00: Take action.
SPEAKER_00: You don't know.
SPEAKER_00: You don't know what the results will be.
SPEAKER_00: But the next certainty that God gives us is this amazing promise that even though we don't know the results, God is working.
SPEAKER_00: And it's the third thing I want you to see this morning.
SPEAKER_00: If we're gonna live a life of faithfulness, we need to keep sowing because God is working.
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse 5 with me.
SPEAKER_00: So I mean, Saul is such a great illustration, Solomon is such a great illustrator here.
SPEAKER_00: It's verse five, he says, You don't know the way the spirit comes to the bones in the womb of a woman with child, which is true, right?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I mean, a pregnant woman, everything is hidden.
SPEAKER_00: And you could imagine before the days of ultrasound how much more of this was true.
SPEAKER_00: Everything is hidden, and yet you trust without much visible evidence, except that that I'm treading carefully here as I talk about pregnant women, the baby's getting bigger.
SPEAKER_00: Not the woman.
SPEAKER_00: The baby's getting bigger.
SPEAKER_00: There's not much visible evidence here, and yet you you trust that things are progressing over this long period.
SPEAKER_00: You can't see the baby.
SPEAKER_00: Apart from ultrasound, you don't know if it's a boy or if it's a girl, you don't know if it's got one arm or three arms or an eye in the middle of its head.
SPEAKER_00: I've been watching some sci-fi movies recently, so it's kind of inflecting what I'm saying.
SPEAKER_00: You don't know what that baby looks like.
SPEAKER_00: In the same way, verse five, you do not know the work of God who makes everything.
SPEAKER_00: And Solomon is telling us just because the results are hidden from us does not mean that the work is absent.
SPEAKER_00: Doesn't mean that God is absent from us.
SPEAKER_00: So then, what are we to do?
SPEAKER_00: Verse 6, in the morning then, sow your seed, and at evening withhold not your hand.
SPEAKER_00: For why?
SPEAKER_00: God's at work.
SPEAKER_00: God is at work, God can take that act of faithfulness as small and inconsequential as you think it is, and he can multiply it for fruit and glory.
SPEAKER_00: So keep sowing because God is at work.
SPEAKER_00: Keep harvesting even when there's no visible harvest.
SPEAKER_00: Do not confuse loved ones.
SPEAKER_00: Do not confuse a delayed harvest with dead seed.
SPEAKER_00: Keep sowing.
SPEAKER_00: Keep walking in faithfulness.
SPEAKER_00: Keep with living in wisdom.
SPEAKER_00: Loved ones, can we not agree that the way that God works is so different than the way that we do?
SPEAKER_00: That we, as we look to the future of our lives, we cannot tell with certainty what God will do.
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that true of the way that you were saved?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, no matter how boring you feel your testimony is, it is this miraculous event where it required more than just your parents' faithfulness.
SPEAKER_00: It required like a friend, or maybe it was a pastor.
SPEAKER_00: Or I mean, I hear so many kids who grow up in Christian homes and then they go away to camp and they're saved at camp.
SPEAKER_00: And I just can't help but to think what those parents think at home.
SPEAKER_00: They're like, you know, I've been doing this for 15 years.
SPEAKER_00: And yet, isn't that the way that it works?
SPEAKER_00: Like, don't we often think when it comes to salvation and sharing the gospel in our own salvation, we think, man, I better get this conversation right because if this person doesn't believe because of this conversation, it's ride or die on this conversation.
SPEAKER_00: We treat ourselves like we are the only thing that matters in that conversation, the only piece of the puzzle that God is going to use.
SPEAKER_00: And loved one, I've never heard a testimony that has not required a miraculous, sovereign hand of God working in a person's life.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's multiple different conversations where a parent taught them the gospel, but they walked away, and then they met a friend who they had a you know extraordinary encounter with the Lord and were transformed, and that transformation was the thing, and they were at a low point in life, and so it was the circumstances of their life, and an external friend and a family that was raising them up in the gospel, and God had to use all of these things.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I just think God, this is the way that God works in salvation, so that none of us get a you know, sort of bloated head to think that it all depends on us.
SPEAKER_00: It hard, I mean, you are just a small piece of the puzzle.
SPEAKER_00: God has to work in so many different ways.
SPEAKER_00: It reminds us that the way that God works isn't often what we will we imagine, so we can keep sowing.
SPEAKER_00: I love a story.
SPEAKER_00: Man in our church told me last week he's sharing the gospel with his neighbor.
SPEAKER_00: And he's had a few conversations with his neighbor about the gospel, and some of them have been really confronting, where he's kind of confronted the neighbor in their sin and called them to repentance and told them about the good news of Jesus Christ, and the neighbor's listening, and he's he just says, You know, I'm I hear what you say, and and uh part of me wants to believe it, but I just I can't I can't believe it.
SPEAKER_00: And they walk away and they do not believe, and and later, sometime later, this this person is outside and and they get stung by a bee.
SPEAKER_00: And now they find themselves being rushed to the hospital, they find themselves like near death, thinking about the words that this man had said to them, thinking about the gospel.
SPEAKER_00: And loved ones, I I love that assurance that when God calls you to keep sowing and you respond in faithfulness, God sometimes will then send a bee as a witness who can witness more powerfully than you.
SPEAKER_00: Or come alongside and aid your witness.
SPEAKER_00: And loved ones, that's what God calls us to.
SPEAKER_00: He calls us to faithfulness.
SPEAKER_00: God's creative.
SPEAKER_00: Leave the results to him.
SPEAKER_00: You take care of the faithfulness.
SPEAKER_00: I can't help but to take this moment just to hit the pause button and reflect on our lives and ask what area of life we need to take this up in.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's in your prayer.
SPEAKER_00: In your prayer life.
SPEAKER_00: Praying for that person who who is lost or or sick or praying for that change in your life that you've been praying for and it still remains.
SPEAKER_00: And so you've just stopped and God is pressing you right now to take the next faithful step and just say, I don't know what, I don't know what this looks like in the future.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know how you're gonna act, but I know what you've called me to do today, so I'm gonna do it.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's in the way that you serve your family.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you need to keep doing family devotions, even though every time you try to talk about the gospel, your kids bring up paw patrol.
SPEAKER_00: And you just gotta keep going, keep pushing through, keep faithfully walking and teaching and discipling your children.
SPEAKER_00: What is it?
SPEAKER_00: Is it serving?
SPEAKER_00: That needs to be the next faithful step for you.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna keep serving, I'm gonna take that next step into leadership in the church.
SPEAKER_00: Is it in your holiness?
SPEAKER_00: God's called you to get rid of that sin, to take up holiness, to put on the righteousness of Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: And you need to make that change in your life and cut off that sinful hand that's causing you to sin.
SPEAKER_00: And you just say, God, I don't know what life and joy is gonna look like after this, but I trust you.
SPEAKER_00: I trust you.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna keep sowing because God is working.
SPEAKER_00: You know, I can't help but to realize that as we read Ecclesiastes and Solomon's understanding of the world from his perspective under the sun, you know, that this the conclusion is true for him and it's true for us.
SPEAKER_00: We don't know what will prosper, and so we must sow because God is at work.
SPEAKER_00: But but loved one, do you know that that the resurrection gives you a greater assurance?
SPEAKER_00: Do you know that the the greatest, most fruitless-looking action that ever could have been taken was taken by Jesus Christ when the king of the universe, the very word of God Himself, came to this world and he was crucified on a cross.
SPEAKER_00: He declared, I am not only the king of the Jews, I am the king of the world and of the universe.
SPEAKER_00: And when he hung on that cross and a power as small as Rome and the religious authorities were held against them, and it looked like he was defeated.
SPEAKER_00: It seemed like faithfulness would never work.
SPEAKER_00: And Paul tells us in Corinthians that even the evil spiritual authorities thought that they had won.
SPEAKER_00: It looked like Christ was defeated.
SPEAKER_00: But in 1 Corinthians 15, Paul tells us and shows us how through the resurrection we see the faithfulness of Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Though it looked like an apparent failure in the tomb was God's unseen working.
SPEAKER_00: And because of that, loved ones, this is Paul's declaration in 1 Corinthians 15, 58.
SPEAKER_00: Therefore, my beloved brothers, sisters, be steadfast, be immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing because of the resurrection that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.
SPEAKER_00: Why is it in the book of Acts when the disciples and apostles share the gospel and they are completely rejected, and people are throwing stones at them and they leave the city and no one is converted?
SPEAKER_00: Why is it that they go away rejoicing?
SPEAKER_00: Because they have been steadfast, they have been immovable, they have been abounding in the work of the Lord, and they know because of the resurrection of Jesus Christ in the Lord their labor is not in vain.
SPEAKER_00: And loved one, it is true for you as well.
SPEAKER_00: There is no faithful step you can take so small that will not be recognized by the great mercy and grace of our Lord Jesus Christ on that final day that you will stand before him.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it looks like here under the sun, nothing is growing and nothing is coming.
SPEAKER_00: Paul says, carry on, keep going.
SPEAKER_00: In the Lord, nothing is done in vain.
SPEAKER_00: There is no step of faithfulness that you will ever look back and say, I shouldn't have done it.
SPEAKER_00: Everything will be made right on that day.
SPEAKER_00: And so you keep praying, you keep serving, you keep discipling, you keep evangelizing, you keep fighting sin.
SPEAKER_00: Love one, as we finish our time together, I feel compelled to ask you to take action right now and to consider what is the next faithful thing you need to do.
SPEAKER_00: What is the conversation you need to have, the confession, the gospel you need to share, the responsibility you've been neglecting?
SPEAKER_00: Where do you need to sow in your life, knowing that you cannot guarantee the outcome, but believing that the outcome was never your responsibility.
SPEAKER_00: Your responsibility is faithfulness.
SPEAKER_00: You leave the results to God.
SPEAKER_00: And one day when you stand before the Lord, the Lord will look at you and he will not say, Well done, my good and successful servant.
SPEAKER_00: Look at all the fruit that came from your life.
SPEAKER_00: He will say, Well done, my good and faithful servant.
SPEAKER_00: Your responsibility is faithfulness.
SPEAKER_00: You can leave the results to God.
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray.
SPEAKER_00: Father, we thank you.
SPEAKER_00: That because of the resurrection, we can be steadfast in the Lord, immovable in faith, endurant in the face of opposition, and steadfast when we don't see anything happening.
SPEAKER_00: God, if you have spoken, I pray that by your Holy Spirit, the confidence of your people in this room right now will be to say that we will do it.
SPEAKER_00: And God, I pray just for our supernatural courage, that you would infuse into our life through your Holy Spirit to take the next faithful step, to do what we know is right, and trust, Lord, that you that your promise is true, that in the Lord our labor is not in vain.
SPEAKER_00: We thank you that that is now so true of us because of the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: And we respond to you now to give you all the glory and to declare that the faithfulness is our responsibility, God.
SPEAKER_00: We pray that the name of your son, amen.