Everything Is Meaningless - The Vanity Of Wisdom

All right, turn to me, with me to the book of Ecclesiastes.

If you're new to Trinity, you'll learn that we take time to preach through whole books of Scripture.

We do that for a reason We believe that exposing people.

When I first started in teaching ministry, the Lord told me one time give my people raw exposure to my word and I'll change their lives.

And so we believe that by preaching through the whole Bible, verse by verse, we give God's people a full retinue of the word of God.

So I wanna encourage you to read through the passages of these series.

We're starting in this series this morning.

It'll go for several weeks.

Let me.

When I first started in expository teaching, i remember I told the church I had a love hate relationship with it.

I love it because I get to speak, to share and teach from all the Scriptures.

I hate it because I have to teach from all the Scriptures.

So it's so I wanna read chapter one and then we'll pray.

I wanna pray for Mark.

I know in Mark.

You know I went to the airlines last week and I said I want this bag to go to Milwaukee, this to go to Tulsa and this to go to Denver And they said we can't do that.

I said why you did last week.

So anyway, hallelujah, the words of the preacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem.

Vanity of vanity, says the preacher.

Vanity of vanities, all is vanity.

What does man gain by all the toil of which he toils under the sun?

A generation goes and a generation comes, but the earth remains the same, remains forever.

The sun rises and the sun goes down and hastens to the place where it rises.

The wind blows to the south and goes around to the north.

Around and around goes the wind and it's on its circuits.

The wind returns, all streams run to the sea, but the sea is not full To the place where the streams flow.

There they flow again.

All things are full of weariness.

A man cannot utter it.

The eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing.

What has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done.

And there is nothing new under the sun.

Is there a thing of which it is said see, this is new.

It has already been in the ages before us.

There is no remembrance of former things, nor will there be any remembrance of things yet to be among those who come after Verse 12,.

I, the preacher, have been king over Jerusalem, israel and Jerusalem, and I applied my heart to seek and to search out, by wisdom, all that is done under heaven.

It is an unhappy business that God has given to the children of man to be busy with.

I have seen everything that is done under the sun and, behold, all is vanity and a striving after wind.

What is crooked cannot be made straight and what is lacking cannot be counted.

I said in my heart.

I have acquired great wisdom, surpassing all who are over Jerusalem before me, and my heart has had great experience of wisdom and knowledge and I applied my heart to know wisdom and to know madness and folly.

I perceive that this also is but a striving after wind, for in much wisdom is much of excation, and he who increases knowledge increases sorrow.

Father, we thank you for this book and that you placed in your wisdom and scripture so we can be instructed as to the vanity of life.

apart from you, we pray for every mind and heart in this room and those who couldn't make it, those who are away on vacation.

We pray, lord, that you feed them the rich word of God, help them to understand, give us a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him.

We ask Lord, god, for Mark.

Father, we do pray that you bring him his luggage.

We pray, father, for a miracle that Swiss air will find it and get it to Warsaw.

We ask for Mark to be empowered by the spirit to continue to minister this week as he ministers to various situations in Poland.

We ask these things in Jesus' name and everyone said amen.

Well, again, we are starting a new series this morning on the book of Ecclesiastes, a wisely called Ecclesiastes.

Everything is meaningless.

Aren't you encouraged that you came?

You know, when I actually mentioned to a couple of friends recently that we're gonna start a sermon series on the book of Ecclesiastes, they gave me the look You know that look of like.

Why would you bother to do that?

Some wondered why?

Why would you wanna preach from such a negative book as that?

And I get that.

At first glance it appears that this book is totally depressing.

I mean, right out of the gate the author tells us vanity of vanity, says the Lord, vanity of vanities, all is vanity.

But I think, as you go through this book with me and I'll be traveling some of it, but I'll be here, for I have a date in August.

I'm gonna preach again, but I think you'll see that this book, that the only thing that gives meaning to life is Jesus Christ and him crucified.

So to begin with, let me answer three basic questions in the introduction, because part of what I wanna do this morning is to convince you to be committed to make the journey through this book, and that's gonna require you to read with us each week.

Let me answer three basic questions here in the introduction that I think will be helpful And I believe it'll make us clear as to why we wanna study it.

The first question is who wrote it?

Secondly, when was it written And, more importantly, why was it written?

Who wrote it?

When was it written And, more importantly, why was it written?

First of all, who wrote it?

Regardless of the arguments against it that some scholars have raised, we believe it is clear that Solomon, the son of David, wrote it.

He's called he calls himself the preacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem.

The term preacher is translated from the Hebrew koalet, and koalet in Hebrew is really closer to teacher than preacher.

So Solomon writes this book as a teacher, to instruct, and translated from the Hebrew, that's an important role.

He sees In verse 16, solomon identified himself as the one who acquired great wisdom, surpassing all who were before Jerusalem, over Jerusalem, before him.

Do you remember how Solomon acquired his wisdom?

Let me remind you of it if you don't remember.

When Solomon's dad, david, died, solomon was firmly placed on the throne of Israel And when he was, the Lord appeared to him and he said ask what you will.

And you remember?

Solomon wisely asked you know, i like to put yourself in that position.

Can you imagine if God came to you and said ask whatever you will and I'll give it to you.

What would you ask for?

That would be a test.

There's no doubt that most Oriental kings of that day would ask for long life or fame, or riches or a power for army, but that's not what Solomon does.

Solomon says Lord, give me a wise and understanding heart that I might have wisdom to govern your people, israel.

And God was so pleased with the fact that Solomon didn't ask for riches and wealth and a long life and fame that God said I'm going to give you your request.

You're going to have wisdom above all those who are before you and after you, and because you didn't ask for it, i'm going to bless you with riches and honor and length of days.

And so Solomon became the wisest man on the face of the earth.

It actually says that men and women came from the four corners of the earth to be with Solomon, to inquire of his wisdom, and we know that from people like the queen of Sheba, who came.

Secondly, when was it written?

Well, we're not told the date per se.

The book of kings tells us how Solomon sadly, in his latter years, departed from the Lord.

Remember that.

The book of king tells us that he departed from the Lord And in fact, in the Torah, god had warned Israel, the kings of Israel having foreseen that they will ask for a king.

He warned them not to acquire many wives Lest his heart, your heart, turn away.

Deuteronomy 1770.

They were not to intermarry with foreign wives.

Well, i don't think Solomon obeyed.

He had 700 wives and 300 concubines.

He was a busy man.

And what God exactly warned against in the Torah Solomon did?

It says when Solomon was old 1 Kings 11.4,.

His wives turned his heart after other gods And his heart was not wholly true to the Lord, his God, as was the heart of David, his father.

Now we have no record in Scripture of Solomon ever turning back to the Lord, and that gives us a clue, possibly, as to when he wrote this.

Some believe that he wrote Ecclesiastes during the time when he departed from the Lord and therefore it contains the musings of a backslidden man.

That's one view, but it is also possible, from studying the book of Ecclesiastes itself, that it was after his period of backsliding, when he returned to the Lord, that he wrote it.

That's the view that I hold.

You might get a hint of that from the fact that the last verses of the book says the end of the matter.

All has been heard.

Fear God, keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man, for God will bring every deed into judgment with every secret thing, whether good or evil.

And perhaps good old Solomon learned that the lesson that pray each of us will learn as we go through this that the living God is the only way to sensibly live is to live for God.

Thirdly, what is the most important reason this book was?

what was the reason it was written?

when you read this book of Scripture and you want to understand it, always ask the question why was it written?

and I want to answer that question as to why it was written.

First of all, to understand, to answer that question, you have to understand that Ecclesiastes is part, with other two other two books, of the wisdom literature of Scripture The book of Proverbs, job and Ecclesiastes.

All was part of the Bible's so called wisdom literature.

They reveal the collected wisdom of generations of godly people and invite us to consider the complexity and simplicity of living wisely.

The key to understanding that is perhaps asking another question, two questions on the basis of the one question why was it written?

and that is is the author's view of life pessimistic?

That is, was he a pessimist?

and the second question is the author a skeptic?

So let me say something about that in the beginning, and really we'll answer that again and again as we go through the book.

But many view this writer, whoever was, as being a pessimist.

You know what a pessimist is right.

A pessimist is.

The pessimism is the tendency to see the worst aspects of things or believe the worst to happen, a lack of hope or confidence in the future.

Now we have to admit there is a tone of sadness throughout this writing, but that's because the larger part of it deals with some of the most somber realities of life.

Facing up to these rad realities is not pessimism, it's better called brave honesty.

It's been called brave honesty.

The author is waiting in to deal with the most somber realities of life, and he does so with brave honesty.

This is the opposite of pessimism.

In the words of the Apostle Paul, the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God.

Notice it says in Romans A 20-21 that I just read that he subjected it, god, to hope.

He subjected the whole creation to the hope of restoration at the appearing of the Lord.

The second, the book of Ecclesiastes had been charged with skepticism.

That the writer was a skeptic.

The definition of skepticism is doubt as to the truth of something The writer appears to be but at closer glance will find he's not a skeptic but one who realizes that it is only viewing things from the eternal perspective of life beyond the life beyond that makes sense of this life.

Above all, ecclesiastes teaches us the emptiness of everything apart from God.

Now, we've already seen that in the opening words to the book Vanity.

Vanity, says the preacher, all is vanity, vanity of vanities, all is vanity.

The word vanity, which occurs throughout this book, refers to the emptiness of life lived for this world alone.

The Hebrew word for vanity is a word that is used in several verses that really it is vapor.

It's translated literally in the English Bible from the English words vapor or mist.

Do you remember how James used that idea vapor or mist?

James said it when he was dealing with those who make plans without acknowledging the sovereignty and providence of God.

And he said James says come now.

You who say today or tomorrow we'll go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit, yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring.

And then, in lieu of the brevity of life, he says what is your life For?

you are a mist that appears for a little time and vanishes.

That word mist there is translated in the Hebrew Bible, in the book of Ecclesiastes, as meaningless or vapor, without vanity or vanity of vanities.

It's also translated by the Hebrew word wind.

You ever hear someone we talk about someone chasing the wind?

It means they're pursuing things that are meaningless or pointless.

So the opening verses are translated in some versions, more modern versions, more meaningless, meaningless.

Everything is meaningless And what Solomon, the author of the book, discovered, since the desirous of teaching us, is in order to live life well, we must reflect on the vanity and fleetingness, fleeting nature of life.

I was having a conversation with someone recently about how this life appears so quickly.

It's but a vapor.

We're talking about how our lives have gone by so quickly And it seems that they're just a vapor.

That's why Solomon wrote it in the first place.

He says in the next to last verse in our reading this morning.

He said so.

I set out to learn everything, from wisdom to madness to folly, but I learned firsthand that pursuing all this is like chasing the wind.

Solomon spent his entire life pursuing these things, persuaded that by acquiring them it would lead to a meaningful life.

Let me give you three examples of things he talks about seeking to acquire in the book of Ecclesiastes that failed to bring the fulfillment he thought it was.

For example, during his life he pursued wealth as the ultimate goal, believing that amassing money would bring him ultimate fulfillment.

By every calculation, solomon was one of the richest men who ever lived.

He had so much gold that the scripture says he made silver value lists during his reign.

It had absolutely no value, but he learned during his lifetime that riches are deceiving.

He really did.

How does material wealth deceive us?

By making promises it can't keep?

Money promotes itself as the answer to all our problems, a barometer of God's blessing and his ability to provide for us.

The Bible speaks elsewhere of the deceitfulness of riches.

That riches deceive, and it's true they do.

Steve Jobs, the founder of Apple Computer, one of the most successful businessmen ever to grace the American business scene, while he was on his deathbed and close to death, said this, recorded by friends I reached the pinnacle of success in the business world.

In others eyes, my life is an epitome of success.

However, aside from work, i have little joy.

In the end, wealth is only a fact of life that I am accustomed to.

At this moment, lying on the sickbed and recalling my whole life, i realized that all the recognition and wealth that I took so much pride in have paled and become meaningless in the face of impending death.

Thus said one of the most successful businessmen ever to grace the American scene.

He used the word meaningless as he discovered that all his wealth and all his gain was meaningless.

Now I like his computers, but still it's meaningless.

In Ecclesiastes 5, which we'll get to in a few weeks, solomon said it this way he who loves money will not be satisfied with money, nor he who loves wealth with his income.

When goods increase, they increase.

Who eat them?

and what advantage has their owner?

but to see them with his eyes.

I don't know if you know this, but there's a lot of history of people that won the lottery that ended up being absolutely miserable.

Another magazine, in an article, said here's how winning the lottery makes you miserable.

It said if you win the $1.5 billion dollar Powerball lot jackpot, you may not be as lucky as you may think.

Many winners befell before the so-called curse of the lottery, with some squandering their fortunes and others meeting tragic ends.

So many of them wind up unhappy or wind up broke.

People have had terrible days.

Terrible things happen, said Don McNay, 56, a financial consultant to lottery winners and the author of life lessons from the lottery.

People commit suicide, people run through their money.

Easy come, easy goes, they go through divorce or people die.

Now I'm tempted to pray to win the lottery to test this, but I didn't.

I wisely resisted.

How sad is it that many people pursue riches and wealth only to discover that they achieve.

When they achieve it it doesn't fulfill.

Second thing Solomon clearly pursued during his time, which he tells us in the book of Ecclesiastes he pursued sexual pleasure as the ultimate goal.

He had 700 wives and 300 concubines And he ultimately discovered that sex with multiple partners doesn't ultimately satisfy either.

You know the founder of Playboy magazine, hugh Hefner, who epitomizes that lifestyle.

It's come out after his death that he himself abused many women, because it's not having sex with many people as you can, but it's having faith, being faithful to a life partner in marriage, that God designed the gift of sex to be enjoyed.

I remember listening to an actor on the Tonight Show.

I couldn't, for the life of me, remember the actor, but I remember what he said.

He was talking about.

Johnny Carson said you're known as a great lover And he said the greatest lover is not the man who loved many women, but the one who loved one woman perfectly.

I forget who that was, but it's wise.

Solomon writes in Proverbs, the other wisdom book, one of the other wisdom book drink water from your own sister.

Flowing water from your own well.

Should your springs be scattered abroad?

streams of water in the streets.

Let them be for yourself alone and not for strangers.

With you, let your fountain be blessed and rejoice in the wife of your youth, a lovely dear, a graceful dough.

Let her breast fill you at all times with delight.

Be intoxicated in her love.

Why should you be intoxicated, my son, with a forbidden woman and embrace the bosom of an adulteress?

For a man's ways are before the Lord and he ponders his paths.

The iniquities of the wicked ensnare him and he is held fast in the cords of his sin.

He dies for lack of discipline and because of his great folly he is led astray.

That's the result of waiting the adulterer.

Another thing Solomon acquired, or sought to acquire, was he decided that industry might be the ultimate way to satisfy his heart.

By industry I mean building programs.

He spent years building the temple of God, the most beautiful house ever adorned to any God.

And not only that.

He launched many different building projects, which he tells us later in the book.

He built temples and gardens and parks and houses for his wives, all in the idea that this will fulfill him.

But he soon learned what he said in our reading earlier The eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing.

So I want to go back to verse 2 of chapter 1 and just quickly roll through some of these statements Meaningless, meaningless, all is meaningless, that's.

Some versions translate verse 2.

But looking at it as a whole, this is one of the most difficult books in Scripture because there's no praise, there's no didactic teaching.

But yet, looking at it as a whole, it shows us the futility of the life lived without an eternal perspective.

And Solomon begins with the premise that life is meaningless apart from God.

He starts by saying in verse 3, what does man gain by all the toil at which he toils under the sun?

Does your work life ever seem meaningless?

It can become meaningless, you know, day after day.

You go to sleep, you go to work, you come home, and it can be a sense of meaninglessness.

Verse 4, a generation goes and a generation comes, but the earth remains forever.

The preacher gives the reason why he sees no profit in all human labor.

That's because nothing ever changes In the midst of apparent activity.

The earth remains the same.

We should notice that in the physical world that remains the same.

But while the human world is constantly changing and Solomon points that out continually The first example he uses is the sun, verse 5.

The sun rises.

The sun goes down and hastens to the place where it is where it rises.

This is the author's view of pointing out the repetition and monotony of the physical universe.

The second illustration is verse 6.

The second one says it deals with the wind.

The wind blows to the south, goes around to the north.

Around and around goes the wind and on its circuits the wind returns.

The wind at first glance gives the appearance of great change, but in reality it remains the same.

Look at verse 7 for the last illustration of the sameness of the physical universe.

He refers to the activity of the waters.

All streams run to the sea, but the sea is not full.

To the place where the streams flow, there they flow again.

This is like the winds of the previous verse.

The apparent changes of the waters of the earth really are only circling back to their point of origin.

Looking carefully at these verses, they seem to be changing, but in reality you're staying the same.

All things are full of weariness.

A man cannot utter it.

The eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing.

This verse has been said to deal with the restlessness of life, the restlessness of life.

Solomon is observing that while there is an inherent restlessness in everything and he has two proofs for that first human desire is never satisfied.

The eye has never had enough of seeing.

The word translated things in verse 8, all things are full of weariness is really the Hebrew word debar, which means words.

One might be saying all words are weariness, and we are bombarded by so many words today through social media.

And Solomon reminds us that all words are weariness.

The following three lines of the poem provide a cluster of three images Words that can't be told, eyes that cannot see with understanding and ears that cannot hear.

Each of them has a certain amount of inadequacy.

The words are wearisome and men are not able to properly speak.

And he's talking about human explanations falling short and are inadequate.

The eye is not satisfied with what it sees, it wants to see more, And neither is the ear fulfilled with what it hears.

I remember going to the Grand Canyon a number of years ago with my family And it was an amazing sight to stand there and look at this beautiful valley in the mountain mountains, and it's one of the most.

But after a while you've seen it, it sort of wears off.

And I felt the same way when Philip Adams took me to the Louvre, the world's most exquisite art museum, and I remember looking at the Mona Lisa and all this.

But again I felt a measure of letdown because the eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear with hearing.

That's why your TV show is being constantly updated, because people run out of that.

Explanations from others won't provide the answer either.

I want to read a commentary called The Bible Says, commenting on verse 8 of chapter 1, said The senses are not satisfied, they are not fulfilled, so they seek more.

And even when what they heard they do not comprehend.

These three senses are all inadequate to reach an answer in our search for meaning.

Exhausted from trying to understand, longing for more.

But more is never enough.

Just as in verses 3 through 7, human endeavors are pictured in this chapter as cyclical.

What has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done, and there's nothing new under the sun.

That phrase, by the way, under the sun appears 29 times in the book of Ecclesiastes because it's so important.

This refers to events in the earth that are meaningless because they're divorced from God.

Whatever you see is a repeat of something that's already happened, and we human beings are really not creators.

We are reorganizers, is the better term.

Solomon asked the question is there anything of which one might say, see, this is new?

No, it has already existed for ages.

Some might take issue with that sighting technology as evidence of something new, and that's true.

There have been new inventions over the centuries, yet while the inventions change, the results are the same.

Take nuclear power, for example.

It provides a source of energy that allows us to flourish while at the same time providing us with weapons of mass destruction, which has become a very real issue today as we deal with Iran.

We have created computers, which have allowed us to accomplish such great things, but look, today we live with a fear that AI may take over and really control the people, the human beings that have created it, and it's scary as people look at the future.

There is no remembrance of former things, nor will there be any remembrance of later things yet to come, yet to be among those who come after.

These verses explain what it seems new to us is actually not new, but a repeat of the old.

Old things seem new to us because we have forgotten or ignorant of them, but these verses remind us that we should not expect anything different in the future.

Those generations that follow us will be ignorant of who we are and what we are doing, just as we are ignorant of the past and those who precede us.

Now Colette the preacher, the teacher, speaks in verse 12.

I, the preacher, have been king over Israel and Jerusalem and I applied my heart to seek and search out by wisdom all that is done under heaven.

It is an unhappy business that God has given to the children of man to be busy with.

I have seen everything that is done under the sun and behold, all is vanity and a striving after wind.

What is crooked cannot be made straight, what is lacking cannot be counted.

I said in my heart, i have acquired great wisdom, surpassing all who are over me, over Jerusalem, before me, and my heart has had a great experience of wisdom and knowledge, and I applied my heart to know wisdom and to know madness and folly.

I perceive that this also is a striving after wind, for in much wisdom is much vexation, and he who increases knowledge increases sorrow.

This is the preacher identifying himself as the one who sought out by wisdom to understand all that is done under heaven.

He calls it an unhappy business that God has given to the children of man to be busy with.

This section deals with what Solomon discovered that life should not be expected to be self-fulfilling, but only has meaning when it is lived in a right relationship with God.

Solomon reveals his first attempt at finding meaningless wisdom in a meaningless world the pursuit of wisdom.

Look at verse 15 again.

It says what is crooked cannot be made straight, what is lacking cannot be counted.

Our world is fleeting and frustrating because it is crooked due to sin.

The term crooked there is a Hebrew word that has several different meanings evil, twisted or bent or mysterious.

And it's only the Christian doctrine of the fall of our first parents that gives us a reason for the crookedness of things.

You know, if you don't have the doctrine of depravity, that sin, the fall, occurred and gave sin power over our lives, if you don't have that, you can't understand the wisdom of God.

Wisdom is vanity, because Solomon says it increases sorrow.

Wisdom is good, but sin has distorted.

It is what he means.

And the false idea of modern man is that knowledge and wisdom will free us from the futility of life.

But wisdom, solomon points out, is fleeting and frustrating.

Clearly, solomon tells us.

For in much wisdom is much vexation, and he who increases knowledge increases sorrow.

What he is saying is the more we attempt to figure out, the unhappier we are.

How do the world get in this condition?

We'll look later at Ecclesiastes 7.13.

It says consider the work of God.

Who can make straight what he has made crooked Now?

did God make the world originally crooked?

No, again no, a thousand times no.

The world became subjected to futility after Adam and Eve rebelled against God, and only then.

Only God can remedy this situation.

Wisdom is vanity because it overpromises.

Salman says wisdom cannot be considered apart from madness and folly.

That means that wisdom is better than foolishness.

Secondly, while wisdom is better, it cannot alone keep you from suffering the same events that happen to a fool.

He'll say in the next chapter, salman, for of the wise as of the fool, there is no enduring remembrance, seeing that in the days to come, all who have been long forgotten how the wise dies just like the fool.

So I hated life and because what is done under the sun was grievous to me for all its vanity and striving after when Salman goes on to say wisdom is vanity without God.

Look at the various attempts people make today to fix man's problems.

It promises answers but fails to provide solutions.

One way this is evident is by what we might call the wisdom of education.

Many believe that the answer to people's problems today is education.

In fact, nelson Mandela believed that.

He went on to say education is the most powerful weapon to change the world.

Now I agree that there's no doubt that education can be very helpful, but education alone cannot change the world.

Are you aware of that?

Not a change of heart?

education alone cannot change the world.

All education can do is create smarter criminals.

That's why we need the Holy Spirit to regenerate our hearts so that we love God and people made in His image.

And only the Holy Spirit can do that.

Some believe that government is the answer to man's problems.

If no government Republican or Democrat can solve our problems, none can Sure.

Good and wise government can help and a wicked government can hurt.

But man's hope is not found in good government.

It's found only one place in the cross of Jesus Christ.

So this book promises to help us to understand that life is meaningless apart from what God has revealed about himself.

And let me close by reading one of my favorite sections of an epistle from Paul that really relates to wisdom and the failure of wisdom, the wisdom of man to achieve anything except the wisdom of God.

He says the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved, it is the power of God.

For it is written I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart.

Where is the one who is wise?

Where is the scribe?

Where is the debater of this age?

Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?

For since in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God, through the folly of what we preach, to save those who believe.

For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified as stumbling to Jews and folly to Gentiles.

But to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, christ, the power of God and the wisdom of God.

For consider your calling brothers.

This pertains to you and I.

For consider your calling brothers, not many of you were wise according to worldly standards.

That means, when God chooses people for salvation, he doesn't do it by choosing those who are the wisest according to worldly standards.

Not many were powerful.

Not many were of noble birth, but God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise.

God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong.

God chose what is despised in the world, even things that are not to bring to nothing, things that are so that no human being might boast in his presence.

This is the wisdom of God to use foolish things to confound the wise.

I want to challenge you to read through this book regularly and work with us through these chapters, for this book will yield the great riches of the gospel.

It's one of the best preparations to receive the gospel is to understand that everything is meaningless apart from God.

Amen, amen.

Would you stand with me, father?

we ask you again to grant us rich understanding of these precious words.

We believe that you design this book to be part of the canon of Scripture and we thank you for it.

I pray that you help us to recognize its intrinsic meaning and how powerfully it can change our image of life in this world.

I pray for us, lord, not to be saddened or grieved by this book, but to be rejoicing.

Lord, many people, when they prayed for me, hearing I was doing this series, said God's going to give people joy, and this really is the pathway to joy to understand the meaninglessness of that which is apart from God.

So give us joy as we work through this book In Jesus' name.

Everyone said Amen.