STRAIGHT OUTTA’ DENVER

A lot of people might say that Ecclesiastes is book that you keep going through a lot of terrible things and then right at the end you then start to get into the really good stuff. Well, if it’s anything that I tried to discourage in this study, it’s that sort of line of thinking. No the whole book is full of very good and valuable wisdom and it does have much beauty to it but it does have a completely different perspective than the rest of the bible. For the most part the rest of the bible starts off with God and what He’s like and then translates that to us and what it means for us. And that is good and it should be that way! However Ecclesiastes starts of with limited human wisdom and builds up to how that relates to God and then what it means for us. One of the best examples of this is in chapter nine:

Ecclesiastes 9:11
The race is not to the swift
or the battle to the strong,
nor does food come to the wise
or wealth to the brilliant
or favor to the learned;
but time and chance happen to them all.

So this is a very true point about life on this earth: it’s not fair! Thous that work the hardest get punished the most and thous that are lazy get rewarded! Brilliant inventors don’t get noticed and die penniless and thous that do what is right get mocked. This world is messed up and it’s all about chance that you ever get rich or end up poor. By shear chance did I have the opportunity to be born in a country that has been blessed with great wealth but yet there are billions of others that are born in a country that can hardly feed it’s people. But then yet you start looking at the other side of the coin and realize that the most of the people who are born in poorer countries are blessed with far happier lives than most of us have around here. Their lives are one’s where they are grateful for every little thing that they receive. But how did God deal with this injustice? He decided to bear the greatest injustice of it all! He sent His only son to die for the sins and injustices of this world! The one who was pure in justice and sinless took on all of the sins and injustice so that we may be reconciled to Him. But yet God is still going to make life fair because God also did what was fair by bringing Jesus back from the dead and anointing Him King over all of the universe. So what does that mean for us? Well this last poem that Solomon wrote is about the most beautiful poems that ever been written:

Ecclesiastes 12:1-8
Remember your Creator
in the days of your youth,
before the days of trouble come
and the years approach when you will say,
“I find no pleasure in them”—

before the sun and the light
and the moon and the stars grow dark,
and the clouds return after the rain;

when the keepers of the house tremble,
and the strong men stoop,
when the grinders cease because they are few,
and those looking through the windows grow dim;

when the doors to the street are closed
and the sound of grinding fades;
when people rise up at the sound of birds,
but all their songs grow faint;

when people are afraid of heights
and of dangers in the streets;
when the almond tree blossoms
and the grasshopper drags itself along
and desire no longer is stirred.
Then people go to their eternal home
and mourners go about the streets.

Remember him—before the silver cord is severed,
and the golden bowl is broken;
before the pitcher is shattered at the spring,
and the wheel broken at the well,

and the dust returns to the ground it came from,
and the spirit returns to God who gave it.

“Meaningless! Meaningless!” says the Teacher.
“Everything is meaningless!”

While saying repeatedly throughout the book “everything is meaningless” that’s also the one thing that Solomon don’t really mean literally. He keeps on saying it because everything in life is “meaningless” except for God who gave it. And that’s exactly the way that we should be thinking of this life! Everything under the sun is a gift from God– one that we can not repay God for! But it is one that we are to graciously accept from God and be grateful for. The writer then also adds His little bit to the end of the book. The book makes a lot more sense if you think of it as someone writing down what the teacher was saying or as someone that collected a lot of saying from the teacher and wrote them down. But this is what he said:

Ecclesiastes 12:9-14
Not only was the Teacher wise, but also he imparted knowledge to the people. He pondered and searched out and set in order many proverbs. The Teacher searched to find just the right words, and what he wrote was upright and true.

The words of the wise are like goads, their collected sayings like firmly embedded nails—given by one shepherd. Be warned, my son, of anything in addition to them.
Of making many books there is no end, and much study wearies the body.

Now all has been heard;
here is the conclusion of the matter:
Fear God and keep his commandments,
for this is the [duty] of every human being.

For God will bring every deed into judgment,
including every hidden thing,
whether it is good or evil.

So the narrator also understands that what the teacher was saying throughout the book was quite harsh but that the teacher was a wise man and you should listen to the words that he is speaking. I can sort of picture it now. After Solomon had committed his sins and turned his heart away from God and then after God had dealt His judgment to Solomon. Solomon is then sitting in his courts, knowing that after he dies, his kingdom is going to start falling apart. He then tells one of his few faithful servants to him to help him write down his last words and so he went on with his final speech and his servant named it Ecclesiastes. But that’s just my theory, first Kings doesn’t tell us how Solomon died nor does Ecclesiastes tell us who actually wrote it. The book just suggests that it was Solomon who was speaking and it does sound like Solomon. But if there is any one mistake that the speaker made that he is most certainly trying to make sure you don’t repeat in your life– it is that you need to remember all that God had done for you in your life. For the mast part of my life, I had lived one were I was ignoring God in every respect. Sure I went to church and that was nice but it wasn’t real to me. It wasn’t until I had a night that God did allow for me to see where my life was headed– to hell. That’s a place where God is not present, were all you have there is just the memory of the things you did wrong. You’re far removed from everything that brought you joy in your life and everything that was good. But yet when you do remember God in you life, you do remember everything that is good in you life. You remember all of the ways that he has blessed you and all that He’s given you. And then you can live your life in peace.

Lord you are our God–
and we are your children.
Teach us how to forgive–
as you have forgiven us
Teach us how to love–
as you have loved us.
Teach us how to see–
as you see us.
Teach us how to hear–
as you hear us.
And teach us how to live–
as you have lived.
Allow us to remember to you in all our days–
and allow us to be grateful for all that you have given us.
Amen.

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Ecclesiastes series part six: Chapters ten and eleven, the proverbs

Posted on July 13th, 2009 by Darth B'strad.
Categories: Reviews, Books, Philosophy, Religon, Christianity, Cultural.

These two chapters are full of proverbial wisdom just like the book of proverbs and that does go along well with Solomon’s style throughout the book. Solomon kept on saying and writing many Proverbs and the book of kings attributes 3000 to him. So it’s no surprise that he would start to end this book with a bunch of more proverbial wisdom. So why don’t we have a look at them:

Ecclesiastes 10:3
Even as fools walk along the road,
they lack sense
and show everyone how stupid they are.

So what does this one mean? The more you do something foolishly the more people see how dumb you are! Simple right?

Ecclesiastes 10:4
If a ruler’s anger rises against you,
do not leave your post;
calmness can lay great offenses to rest.

Another simple one, calm treatment to problems will resolve them far better and getting hysterical about them.

Ecclesiastes 10:8-9
Whoever digs a pit may fall into it;
whoever breaks through a wall may be bitten by a snake.

Whoever quarries stones may be injured by them;
whoever splits logs may be endangered by them.

The line of work you pick can endanger you and that one fits in well with the very next one:

Ecclesiastes 10:10
If the ax is dull
and its edge unsharpened,
more strength is needed,
but skill will bring success.

If you’re going to do this sort of work then work smartly! Make things easier on yourself.

Ecclesiastes 10:11
If a snake bites before it is charmed,
the charmer receives no fee.

So if you’re trying to work some ploy then you better make sure it works because otherwise you end up dead with nothing.

Ecclesiastes 10:12-14
Words from the mouth of the wise are gracious,
but fools are consumed by their own lips.

At the beginning their words are folly;
at the end they are wicked madness—

and fools multiply words.
No one knows what is coming—
who can tell them what will happen after them?

So it’s best to be gracious with people and not be trying to manipulate to get what you want. The more you manipulate people the more you get eaten up by your own words and end up in a place of “wicked madness.” Fools keep on talking and talking but their words are not backed by anything and they don’t know what’s going to happen. So it is best to be gracious with people because then they’ll be gracious with you.

Ecclesiastes 10:16-17 (ESV)
Woe to you, O land, when your king is a child,
and your princes feast in the morning!
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!

This one illustrates perfectly why I didn’t want Obama to be president. But then again I also need to hear this one too:

Ecclesiastes 10:20
Do not revile the king even in your thoughts,
or curse the rich in your bedroom,
because a bird in the sky may carry your words,
and a bird on the wing may report what you say.

So even if your king is a child you should be thinking a hoping for bad things to him because otherwise people might tell on you. But what about this one:

Ecclesiastes 10:19
A feast is made for laughter,
wine makes life merry,
and money is the answer for everything.

Man! Didn’t think you would ever see the bible say that money is the answer to everything considering that Paul told us this:

1 Timothy 6:9-10
Those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.

But yet Paul said the love of money not that money it’s self is evil. And that does go along with the proverb of being gracious with people. If you’re using money right and not seeking to take as much as you can, then yes, money is the answer to everything. But that also requires, like always, that we guard our own hearts so that we don’t start loving money.

Ecclesiastes 11:1-2
Ship your grain across the sea;
after many days you may receive a return.

Invest in seven ventures, yes, in eight;
you do not know what disaster may come upon the land.

So keep what you earned safe! and invest in a lot of different things. This principal works on a lot of different things and not just in money. Make a lot of friends and guard them, have a lot of hobbies and keep at them, and you’ll see that when disaster falls on you then people come to your aid.

Ecclesiastes 11:3-4
If clouds are full of water,
they pour rain on the earth.
Whether a tree falls to the south or to the north,
in the place where it falls, there it will lie.

Whoever watches the wind will not plant;
whoever looks at the clouds will not reap.

You have to live life now and not in the future! If you keep on watching for what might be then you’ll be missing out on what’s going on now.

Ecclesiastes 11:5
As you do not know the path of the wind,
or how the body is formed in a mother’s womb,
so you cannot understand the work of God,
the Maker of all things.

Well this one is a little absurd now considering that we can track the wind now and we do know how the body is formed in the mothers womb now. but the point is still well taken, we don’t know what all God is doing in the world so what are we do do about it?

Ecclesiastes 11:9-10
You who are young, be happy while you are young,
and let your hearts give you joy in the days of your youth.
Follow the ways of your heart
and whatever your eyes see,
but know that for all these things
God will bring you into judgment.

So then, banish anxiety from your heart
and cast off the troubles of your body,
for youth and vigor are meaningless.

This one is the best piece of advice that Solomon gives us here right now because it is fear and anxiety that keeps us from approaching God. We get tied down in our troubles and and try to make things work in our lives but yet we need to learn that all thing are from God. With every trouble that we face in this life, God always has a solution for us. There is always some way that God provides a way out but you have to hear Him. Like it says in Isaiah:

Isaiah 64:4
Since ancient times no one has heard,
no ear has perceived,
no eye has seen any God besides you,
who acts on behalf of those who wait for him.

So too we need to learn to wait on God and give up all of our troubles to Him in every way.

3 comments.

Ecclesiastes series part five: chapters eight and nine, the coming King

Posted on July 7th, 2009 by Darth B'strad.
Categories: Reviews, Books, Philosophy, Religon, Christianity, Cultural.

Chapter 8 starts off with a very odd question:

Ecclesiastes 8:1
Who is like the wise?
Who knows the explanation of things?
Wisdom brightens the face
and changes its hard appearance.

So who do you think that Solomon is talking about here? Who is he looking for that can explain everything that troubles him? Well If we just consider the last thing that he said in the last chapter, that gives us a good hint:

Ecclesiastes 7:29
This only have I found:
God created humankind upright,
but they have gone in search of many schemes.”

So in other words he is saying the only one who is like the wise is God and the only one that truly knows the explanation of things is God. But then he stats right away talking about obeying the king? Now the next verse is a little odd, the today’s new international version says it like this:

Ecclesiastes 8:2
Obey the king’s command, I say, because you took an oath before God.

Where as the English standard version says it like this:

Ecclesiastes 8:2 (ESV)
I say: Keep the king’s command, because of God’s oath to him.

So we have one translation that has a little more looser saying you are to obey the king because of your oath to the king while the more literal word for word translation says you are to obey the king because of God’s oath to him. What translation is more correct here? Well they both are completely correct in what they are saying. Because God appointed the king with an oath that means that we are to obey the king because he has an oath from God. But it’s easy to say that we don’t have to pay attention to this verse. We don’t have a God appointed King anymore but a elected president, elected by the people, and with how this country is going, God has less and less of a role in American politics. Or I will say that people allow God to make that choice for them less and less nowadays, and I’ve been just as guilty of that as well. But do we really just completely dismiss this verse altogether? Well do we really not have a king anymore? Isn’t there still a king that gives us commands just like how Solomon gave His people commands? Have a look Acts 17:

Acts 17:5-7
But other Jews were jealous; so they rounded up some bad characters from the marketplace, formed a mob and started a riot in the city. They rushed to Jason’s house in search of Paul and Silas in order to bring them out to the crowd. But when they did not find them, they dragged Jason and some other believers before the city officials, shouting: “These men who have caused trouble all over the world have now come here, and Jason has welcomed them into his house. They are all defying Caesar’s decrees, saying that there is another king, one called Jesus.”

So Acts does tell us that we do have a king right now and it’s not one that’s tied to any of the political governments of this world. Our King is higher than any of the politics in this world and it’s no tied to any particular party or group. Jesus is king over it all and that’s also the very reason why early Christians were being killed. Caesar didn’t care one bit about cults in his empire, they had thousands of them! But he did care about people defying his decrees and saying there’s a better king than him. Caesar’s the one who’s suppose to have all the answers and be giving the orders. But these people weren’t taking orders from Caesar but from Jesus. So now Jesus for us is the king that Solomon is telling us to obey because of our oaths to God and because God has an oath to Jesus. So Solomon Goes further in telling us this:

Ecclesiastes 8:5-8
Whoever obeys his command will come to no harm,
and the wise heart will know the proper time and procedure.

For there is a proper time and procedure for every matter,
though a person may be weighed down by misery.

Since no one knows the future,
who can say what is to come?

As no one has power over the wind to contain it,
so no one has power over the time of their death.
As no one is discharged in time of war,
so wickedness will not release those who practice it.

But is that really true that all thous that practice wickedness can not get out of it? Don’t we have another way out? Well he still gives us the answer in the verse before it: there is a proper procedure to getting yourself out of wickedness. You can see that in Isaiah 53:

Isaiah 53:10-12
Yet it was the LORD’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer,
and though the LORD makes his life an offering for sin,
he will see his offspring and prolong his days,
and the will of the LORD will prosper in his hand.

After he has suffered,
he will see the light of life and be satisfied;
by his knowledge my righteous servant will justify many,
and he will bear their iniquities.

Therefore I will give him a portion among the great,
and he will divide the spoils with the strong,
because he poured out his life unto death,
and was numbered with the transgressors.
For he bore the sin of many,
and made intercession for the transgressors.

So we have the sort of king that brings us out of sin and makes us right with him. We have the sort of king that forgives all debts if you’ll only give them to him. Solomon is big on us not knowing what exactly God is doing in our lives and what his grand plans are:

Ecclesiastes 8:17
then I saw all that God has done. No one can comprehend what goes on under the sun. People toil to search it out, but no one can discover its meaning. Even if the wise claim they know, they cannot really comprehend it.

But even Solomon has to admit that we are in Gods hands:

Ecclesiastes 9:1
So I reflected on all this and concluded that the righteous and the wise and what they do are in God’s hands, but no one knows whether love or hate awaits them.

And he keeps on going over and over again that we all have the same fate:

Ecclesiastes 9:2
All share a common destiny—the righteous and the wicked, the good and the bad, the clean and the unclean, those who offer sacrifices and those who do not.
As it is with the good,
so with the sinful;
as it is with those who take oaths,
so with those who are afraid to take them.

And again he goes back to what he see as the ultimate solution for our lives here:

Ecclesiastes 9:7-10
Go, eat your food with gladness, and drink your wine with a joyful heart, for God has already approved what you do. Always be clothed in white, and always anoint your head with oil. Enjoy life with your wife, whom you love, all the days of this meaningless life that God has given you under the sun—all your meaningless days. For this is your lot in life and in your toilsome labor under the sun. Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might, for in the realm of the dead, where you are going, there is neither working nor planning nor knowledge nor wisdom.

So just go enjoying our lives because we’re just going to die someday, Right? And everyone is going to get the same fate so what’s the use of trying to make things better here. But isn’t there still something to hope for? Well our blessed hope is in our King!

Isaiah 65:17-25
“See, I will create
new heavens and a new earth.
The former things will not be remembered,
nor will they come to mind.

But be glad and rejoice forever
in what I will create,
for I will create Jerusalem to be a delight
and its people a joy.

I will rejoice over Jerusalem
and take delight in my people;
the sound of weeping and of crying
will be heard in it no more.

“Never again will there be in it
infants who live but a few days,
or older people who do not live out their years;
those who die at a hundred
will be thought mere youths;
those who fail to reach a hundred
will be considered accursed.

They will build houses and dwell in them;
they will plant vineyards and eat their fruit.

No longer will they build houses and others live in them,
or plant and others eat.
For as the days of a tree,
so will be the days of my people;
my chosen ones will long enjoy
the work of their hands.

They will not labor in vain,
nor will they bear children doomed to misfortune;
for they will be a people blessed by the LORD,
they and their descendants with them.

Before they call I will answer;
while they are still speaking I will hear.

The wolf and the lamb will feed together,
and the lion will eat straw like the ox,
but dust will be the serpent’s food.
They will neither harm nor destroy
on all my holy mountain,”
says the LORD.

So just as Solomon said: there is a proper procedure for everything. So our proper procedure is to keep working and praying for God to bring His perfect justice to this world and while we are doing that– we keep listening to God and keep giving our lives to Him and enjoying it while we can.

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Ecclesiastes series- Part four: Chapters six and seven, Seek first the kingdom

Posted on June 22nd, 2009 by Darth B'strad.
Categories: Reviews, Books, Philosophy, Religon, Christianity, Cultural.

These two chapters are mostly about death and women and that makes sense because they are two things that go hand in hand, Right? Just have a look at chapter 7:

Ecclesiastes 7:28
I found one [upright] man among a thousand,
but not one [upright] woman among them all.

So all the women in the world are just trash! Well, no. Again we have to consider who’s writing this book and this is a man who had a thousand women as wives and concubines and they weren’t moral women. So of course his opinion is being swayed by his personal experience and Solomon didn’t pick good women to be his wives. They were women of royal birth that worshiped other gods and they had agendas that conflicted with the will of God and Solomon allowed that to turn his heart away from God. So now he’s looking back and making the conclusion that there isn’t an “upright” woman. He also had a lot of his friends betray him at the end because he had been turning his heart away from God and that why he doesn’t have a very high view of humanity. But he is still correct in keeping a low view of humanity because we do evil and vile things in this world. Just as we talked about last time with all of the oppressions that go on in this world we are very sinful and harmful people. As Solomon says:

Ecclesiastes 7:20 (ESV)
Surely there is not a righteous man on earth who does good and never sins.

So we are all equally worthy of the judgment of hell but yet again we have grace now because we trust in Jesus that He paid the price for our sins. Just as Paul tells us:

Romans 6:14
For sin shall no longer be your master, because you are not under the law, but under grace.

So we don’t have to live sinful lives anymore and we can become greater than what Solomon says the whole human existence is doomed to because Jesus has given us that grace. But as we have seen in Solomon’s life he rejected that grace that God has given him! And that’s why he’s writing this sorrowful book hoping that someone will not repeat the same mistakes. Just as Jonah’s prayer tells us:

Jonah 2:8 (NIV)
“Those who cling to worthless idols
forfeit the grace that could be theirs.

So Solomon did forfeit the grace that could have been his if he hadn’t placed the women that he married as more important than God. So how are some of the ways in that we actually start to place something else as higher than God? How do we make idols that are more important to us? We can also see another thing Solomon had idolized more than God:

Ecclesiastes 7:23-24
All this I tested by wisdom and I said,
“I am determined to be wise”—
but this was beyond me.
Whatever exists is far off and most profound—
who can discover it?

So actually wisdom was another thing he valued more than God. That’s actually quite funny because only God has wisdom– that is seeing things the way God sees is and that’s something that is far beyond us. So what does he do:

Ecclesiastes 7:25
So I turned my mind to understand,
to investigate and to search out wisdom and the scheme of things
and to understand the stupidity of wickedness
and the madness of folly.

He tries to understand things with human knowledge but you can never find full understanding from a human prospective is very limited. As we see in the proverbs:

Proverbs 3:4-6
Trust in the LORD with all your heart
and lean not on your own understanding;

in all your ways submit to him,
and he will make your paths straight.

So how are some of the ways that we trust in our own understanding? How about when we think that if we just do the right things then God will give us what we want. But Solomon warns us about that:

Ecclesiastes 7:13-14
Consider what God has done:
Who can straighten
what he has made crooked?

When times are good, be happy;
but when times are bad, consider:
God has made the one
as well as the other.
Therefore, you cannot discover
anything about your future.

So we can’t ever know what the future hold for us! To keep on trying to dig in deep and figure everything out and know were this world is going to go is pointless. God will bring about the end the way He has set the end and we need to be trusting in His promises not letting anything get between us and God. And we are to wait patiently for it.

Ecclesiastes 7:8
The end of a matter is better than its beginning,
and patience is better than pride.

You see God doesn’t separate out from the good and the bad but rather the humble and the proud. No matter how good or how bad we are we all still end up with the same fate that none of us can change: we all die someday. So it is best to just give our lives to God and enjoy it while we can.

Ecclesiastes 6:3-6
A man may have a hundred children and live many years; yet no matter how long he lives, if he cannot enjoy his prosperity and does not receive proper burial, I say that a stillborn child is better off than he. It comes without meaning, it departs in darkness, and in darkness its name is shrouded. Though it never saw the sun or knew anything, it has more rest than does that man— even if he lives a thousand years twice over but fails to enjoy his prosperity. Do not all go to the same place?

So why should we be grasping for things that we can not have? No we need to be grateful for the thing that God has given us and enjoy it while we give up our lives to God and let Him be the guide of it. And there are many thing that try to get us out of that and ensnare us. This world is all about what’s going to happen in the future and how we can make things right– but we can’t do that! Only God can make things right in this world and we have to keep living in the present for that’s where God has placed us. For Solomon, his trap was women. As he says:

Ecclesiastes 7:26
I find more bitter than death
the woman who is a snare,
whose heart is a trap
and whose hands are chains.
The man who pleases God will escape her,
but the sinner she will ensnare.

We have to say in constant prayer ask that God will guide us out of the traps of this world. That He’s keep us focused on the things He wants us to do today and not keep chasing after tomorrow. Just as Jesus tells us:

Matthew 6:25-34
“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life ?

“And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

And that makes it nice that Jesus mentioned Solomon here, the flowers of the field were more richly clothed than him. And that is dew to the fact that Solomon spent his days worrying about being the right ruler and wise and didn’t give that trust up to God. And everything he worried about happening did happen because he didn’t place his trust in God. But We who do place our trust in God will get His eternal life.

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Ecclesiastes series- part three: Chapters four an Five, giving it all to God in prayer

Posted on June 16th, 2009 by Darth B'strad.
Categories: Reviews, Books, Philosophy, Religon, Christianity, Cultural.

So in chapters four and five Solomon brings up a lot of things that he sees wrong with the human condition. The first thing being people that are oppressed:

Ecclesiastes 4:1
Again I looked and saw all the oppression that was taking place under the sun:
I saw the tears of the oppressed—
and they have no comforter;
power was on the side of their oppressors—
and they have no comforter.

So what are some of the things that we know of around the world that are great injustices? What can we really do about it? Coming up in the next the next verses Solomon tells us this:

Ecclesiastes 4:2-3
And I declared that the dead,
who had already died,
are happier than the living,
who are still alive.

But better than both
is the one who has not yet been,
who has not seen the evil
that is done under the sun.

So he’s telling us that in thous circumstances then it’s better to be dead than living in oppression and for us that are out of the oppression then it’s better to be ignorant of it than aware of it. But is that really they way we are to treat great injustices in this world? Let’s have a look at Psalm 82:

Psalm 82:1-5
God presides in the great assembly;
he gives judgment among the “gods”:

“How long will you defend the unjust
and show partiality to the wicked?

Defend the weak and the fatherless;
uphold the cause of the poor and the oppressed.

Rescue the weak and the needy;
deliver them from the hand of the wicked.

“The ‘gods’ know nothing, they understand nothing.
They walk about in darkness;
all the foundations of the earth are shaken.

So that is a Psalm of Asaph and instead of ignoring the suffering that he saw around the world like Solomon is saying, he deiced to bring it before God and ask Him to act. However, if we skip to chapter 5 in Ecclesiastes Solomon also says this:

Ecclesiastes 5:8-11
If you see the poor oppressed in a district, and justice and rights denied, do not be surprised at such things; for one official is eyed by a higher one, and over them both are others higher still. The increase from the land is taken by all; the king himself profits from the fields.

Those who love money never have enough;
those who love wealth are never satisfied with their income.
This too is meaningless.

As goods increase,
so do those who consume them.
And what benefit are they to the owners
except to feast their eyes on them?

He’s telling us that greed and oppression is always going to be with us in this world. As long as we are still and sinful race then we’re always going to have some from of this oppression in this world and we can’t ever change that. But is that really how we are to deal with things? Lets have a look at what David says in Psalm 33:

Psalm 33:16-19
No king is saved by the size of his army;
no warrior escapes by his great strength.

A horse is a vain hope for deliverance;
despite all its great strength it cannot save.

But the eyes of the LORD are on those who fear him,
on those whose hope is in his unfailing love,

to deliver them from death
and keep them alive in famine.

So David is seemingly agreeing that nothing can save people from oppressions and pains that this world gives us except for God. But we can even get to a smaller scale that’s more personal that all over this world:

Ecclesiastes 4:4-6
And I saw that all toil and all achievement spring from one person’s envy of another. This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind.

Fools fold their hands
and ruin themselves.

Better one handful with tranquillity
than two handfuls with toil
and chasing after the wind.

And he takes it further to the people who are so driven that only accomplishment will do:

Ecclesiastes 4:8 (NASB)
There was a certain man without a dependent, having neither a son nor a brother, yet there was no end to all his labor. Indeed, his eyes were not satisfied with riches and he never asked, “And for whom am I laboring and depriving myself of pleasure?” This too is vanity and it is a grievous task.

So that’s someone that goes of by themselves trying to grab the world by the horns and get it all by themselves with no one there to share with them what they have gained in this life. Do you know anyone that like this? What can we do about that? We actually see that today being created by our own parents in this society. You know the parents that tell their kids they have to make it into collage and they have to succeed in this society. But what exactly is that all for if you isolate yourself from everyone that loves you. How often do you really hear a happy story out of Hollywood? But these are the pushed, driven and successful people that are all alone. They marry and divorce all the time and the tabloids just feed off that all the time giving us our next little voyeuristic pursuit. That’s also why he tells us:

Ecclesiastes 4:13-16
Better a poor but wise youth than an old but foolish king who no longer knows how to heed a warning. The youth may have come from prison to the kingship, or he may have been born in poverty within his kingdom. I saw that all who lived and walked under the sun followed the youth, the king’s successor. There was no end to all the people who were before them. But those who came later were not pleased with the successor. This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind.

So if you’re poor and young then you always have a chance to rise to the top but then again isn’t that still just feeding into the same old system that we’ve always had? So we all see this world that we have here and it is full of lust, greed, hate, envy and all the rest of the evil things. But what really can we do about it? He keeps telling us that we can’t do anything:

Ecclesiastes 5:15-16
Everyone comes naked from their mother’s womb,
and as everyone comes, so they depart.
They take nothing from their toil
that they can carry in their hands.

This too is a grievous evil:
As everyone comes, so they depart,
and what do they gain,
since they toil for the wind?

So we can’t really do anything about the condition of this world right now? There is actually something that we can do about the condition of the world that we’re in, we can pray about it. That’s why I’ve been using Psalms to explain the things Solomon tells us we can do nothing about However we can pray about these things. So How should we pray? Well Jesus tells us in Luke:

Luke 11:5-13
Then Jesus said to them, “Suppose you have a friend, and you go to him at midnight and say, ‘Friend, lend me three loaves of bread; a friend of mine on a journey has come to me, and I have nothing to set before him.’ And suppose the one inside answers, ‘Don’t bother me. The door is already locked, and my children and I are in bed. I can’t get up and give you anything.’ I tell you, even though he will not get up and give you the bread because of friendship, yet because of your shameless audacity he will surely get up and give you as much as you need.

“So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; those who seek find; and to those who knock, the door will be opened.

“Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”

We can pray about these things and give them all up to God and allow Him to correct what is wrong in this world. In fact Jesus is telling us that we need to be extremely persistent when we are praying and not stop. when we have things that are wrong in our lives we need to hand them up in prayer because we can’t change the situation. We can’t make anything right in this world Solomon keeps saying “what is made crooked can’t be made straight,” well it’s not by our power that it can be made straight but by God’s power that it is made straight and we see that in the Psalm that Solomon wrote:

Psalm 127
Unless the LORD builds the house,
the builders labor in vain.
Unless the LORD watches over the city,
the guards stand watch in vain.

In vain you rise early
and stay up late,
toiling for food to eat—
for he grants sleep to those he loves.

Children are a heritage from the LORD,
offspring a reward from him.

Like arrows in the hands of a warrior
are children born in one’s youth.

Blessed is the man
whose quiver is full of them.
They will not be put to shame
when they contend with their opponents in court.

So How are we to approach God with the things that are troubling us? What do we really ask for? Solomon gives us some guidelines to how we are to approach God.

Ecclesiastes 5:1-2
Guard your steps when you go to the house of God. Go near to listen rather than to offer the sacrifice of fools, who do not know that they do wrong.

Do not be quick with your mouth,
do not be hasty in your heart
to utter anything before God.
God is in heaven
and you are on earth,
so let your words be few.

So how do we end up offering the sacrifice of fools to God? How do we end up using our words to God too quickly? It’s when we tell God what we want Him to do is when we offer up a sacrifice of fool and when we throw around many things to God and tell Him what we expect Him to do is when we are not right with God. Solomon goes on to tell us this:

Ecclesiastes 5:3-7
A dream comes when there are many cares,
and many words mark the speech of a fool.

When you make a vow to God, do not delay to fulfill it. He has no pleasure in fools; fulfill your vow. It is better not to make a vow than to make one and not fulfill it. Do not let your mouth lead you into sin. And do not protest to the [temple] messenger, “My vow was a mistake.” Why should God be angry at what you say and destroy the work of your hands? Much dreaming and many words are meaningless. Therefore fear God.

So the sort of person that keep demanding things of God and continually tells Him what to do is one that has dreams that are meaningless. So what is the right way to give God our dreams? Well David tells us in Psalm 51:

Psalm 51:16-19 (NLT)
You do not desire a sacrifice, or I would offer one.
You do not want a burnt offering.
The sacrifice you desire is a broken spirit.
You will not reject a broken and repentant heart, O God.
Look with favor on Zion and help her;
rebuild the walls of Jerusalem.
Then you will be pleased with sacrifices offered in the right spirit—
with burnt offerings and whole burnt offerings.
Then bulls will again be sacrificed on your altar.

So that is what God what’s from us. He wants us to continually be giving up to Him everything that hurts us in this world and be constantly handing Him our pains but we do it in a place of asking Him to be the one that corrects it. God want’s us to come to Him with our problems and troubles and we should keep on asking Him but it’s done in a place of letting Him correct it for us because nothing that we can do can solve any of these problems. If we don’t believe that God can take care of our problems then we should follow the words of Ecclesiastes to the letter. That’s the perfect why that you can just ignore God and keep living a life that’s alright but it’s not a life that pleases God. Keeping out of as many troubles as possible is not living a life that is pleasing to God but handing God a broken spirit and allowing Him to move in your life is pleasing to God. Then that is when we can live a life that Solomon says is Good:

Ecclesiastes 5:18-20
This is what I have observed to be good: that it is appropriate for people to eat, to drink and to find satisfaction in their toilsome labor under the sun during the few days of life God has given them—for this is their lot. Moreover, when God gives people wealth and possessions, and the ability to enjoy them, to accept their lot and be happy in their toil—this is a gift of God. They seldom reflect on the days of their lives, because God keeps them occupied with gladness of heart.

It is because we have given our troubles up to God that we can be occupied with gladness of heart. It is when we give all of the situations that we can’t control that God can work with us and give us the right direction for us to follow. Prayer is something that we need to continually be living out in our lives. Prayer actually feeds our spirit and keeps our soul close to God so that we don’t act on what our hearts tell us to do. When we have people that cause problems in our lives we should be praying for good things to happen to them. Repay what harmful things that people do to us with blessings to them. In every situation, hand it up to God and pray over it and God will bless you.

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Ecclesiastes series- part two: Chapters two and three, accepting the role God gives us.

Posted on June 8th, 2009 by Darth B'strad.
Categories: Reviews, Books, Philosophy, Religon, Christianity, Cultural.

Let’s just start off by reading through chapter two:

Ecclesiastes 2:1-23
I said to myself, “Come now, I will test you with pleasure to find out what is good.” But that also proved to be meaningless. “Laughter,” I said, “is madness. And what does pleasure accomplish?” I tried cheering myself with wine, and embracing folly—my mind still guiding me with wisdom. I wanted to see what was good for people to do under the heavens during the few days of their lives.

I undertook great projects: I built houses for myself and planted vineyards. I made gardens and parks and planted all kinds of fruit trees in them. I made reservoirs to water groves of flourishing trees. I bought male and female slaves and had other slaves who were born in my house. I also owned more herds and flocks than anyone in Jerusalem before me. I amassed silver and gold for myself, and the treasure of kings and provinces. I acquired male and female singers, and a harem as well—the delights of a man’s heart. I became greater by far than anyone in Jerusalem before me. In all this my wisdom stayed with me.

I denied myself nothing my eyes desired;
I refused my heart no pleasure.
My heart took delight in all my labor,
and this was the reward for all my toil.

Yet when I surveyed all that my hands had done
and what I had toiled to achieve,
everything was meaningless, a chasing after the wind;
nothing was gained under the sun.

Then I turned my thoughts to consider wisdom,
and also madness and folly.
What more can the king’s successor do
than what has already been done?

I saw that wisdom is better than folly,
just as light is better than darkness.

The wise have eyes in their heads,
while fools walk in the darkness;
but I came to realize
that the same fate overtakes them both.

Then I said to myself,
“The fate of the fool will overtake me also.
What then do I gain by being wise?”
I said to myself,
“This too is meaningless.”

For the wise, like the fool, will not be long remembered;
the days have already come when both have been forgotten.
Like the fool, the wise too must die!

So I hated life, because the work that is done under the sun was grievous to me. All of it is meaningless, a chasing after the wind. I hated all the things I had toiled for under the sun, because I must leave them to the one who comes after me. And who knows whether that person will be wise or foolish? Yet they will have control over all the toil into which I have poured my effort and skill under the sun. This too is meaningless. So my heart began to despair over all my toilsome labor under the sun. For people may labor with wisdom, knowledge and skill, and then they must leave all they own to others who have not toiled for it. This too is meaningless and a great misfortune. What do people get for all the toil and anxious striving with which they labor under the sun? All their days their work is grief and pain; even at night their minds do not rest. This too is meaningless.

So here we do see Solomon’s anger is starting to come out and this all makes good sense why he would be upset. In a sense he’s lamenting what he’s done. If we remember again, Solomon had just left a worse world to his son than his father left to him. He had a thousand women that he married or were his concubines and they turned his heart from God and because of that sin God is going to tear the kingdom away from his son and only leave his son two tribes of Israel. So you could also say that Solomon is getting angry at himself for leaving a worse kingdom to his son than his father left to him. He knows that all of his work is going to be wiped out and nothing will be gained by it due to his sins against God. But yet if we have a look at Isaiah we see that we’re actually not to be doing that:

Isaiah 45:9-10
“Woe to those who quarrel with their Maker,
those who are nothing but potsherds
among the potsherds on the ground.
Does the clay say to the potter,
‘What are you making?’
Does your work say,
‘The potter has no hands’?

Woe to those who say to their father,
‘What have you begotten?’
or to their mother,
‘What have you brought to birth?’

Paul puts it even better when he says:

Romans 9:19-24
One of you will say to me: “Then why does God still blame us? For who is able to resist his will?” But who are you, a mere human being, to talk back to God? “Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’ ” Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for noble purposes and some for disposal of refuse?

What if God, although choosing to show his wrath and make his power known, bore with great patience the objects of his wrath—prepared for destruction? What if he did this to make the riches of his glory known to the objects of his mercy, whom he prepared in advance for glory— even us, whom he also called, not only from the Jews but also from the Gentiles?

So Paul is telling us that even the things that God has prepared for destruction can still show his grace and patience by holding back his full power from us. And we do see that in the life of Solomon, God had shown him grace by allowing two tribes to be given to his son and a chance to rebuild it but they still didn’t turn their ways around. But Solomon is asking, how can we know if the next generation will do as well as we did or correct what we did wrong? Well there is no answer to that question because we can’t know what the future holds for us. So Solomon gives us this answer:

Ecclesiastes 2:24-26
People can do nothing better than to eat and drink and find satisfaction in their toil. This too, I see, is from the hand of God, for without him, who can eat or find enjoyment? To the person who pleases him, God gives wisdom, knowledge and happiness, but to the sinner he gives the task of gathering and storing up wealth to hand it over to the one who pleases God. This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind.

So is that all we’re suppose to do in this life? Just eat drink and be marry, enjoy your work and just leave the rest up to God? Well, yes. Starting off in the next chapter Solomon tells us everything in this life has it’s place:

Ecclesiastes 3:1-14
There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under the heavens:

a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,

a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build,

a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,

a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain,

a time to search and a time to give up,
a time to keep and a time to throw away,

a time to tear and a time to mend,
a time to be silent and a time to speak,

a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace.

What do workers gain from their toil? I have seen the burden God has laid on the human race. He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end. I know that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to do good while they live. That each of them may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all their toil—this is the gift of God. I know that everything God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it. God does it so that people will fear him.

So now we are seeing a change in Solomon’s attitude. In stead of saying that it’s all meaningless, he starts to point out that God has put a sense of eternity in us. In fact you could say that time itself is actually one of the enemies that we fight. So while we are living in time we need to make the most of what God gives us to do.

Ecclesiastes 3:15
Whatever is has already been,
and what will be has been before;
and God will call the past to account.

God will be the only judge when everything is said and done

Ecclesiastes 3:16
And I saw something else under the sun:
In the place of judgment—wickedness was there,
in the place of justice—wickedness was there.

And he will judge what is evil

Ecclesiastes 3:17-22
I said to myself,
“God will bring into judgment
both the righteous and the wicked,
for there will be a time for every activity,
a time to judge every deed.”

I also said to myself, “As for human beings, God tests them so that they may see that they are like the animals. Surely the fate of human beings is like that of the animals; the same fate awaits them both: As one dies, so dies the other. All have the same breath; humans have no advantage over animals. Everything is meaningless. All go to the same place; all come from dust, and to dust all return. Who knows if the human spirit rises upward and if the spirit of the animal goes down into the earth?”

So I saw that there is nothing better for people than to enjoy their work, because that is their lot. For who can bring them to see what will happen after them?

So to tie this all together, Jesus explains all this in one of his parables:

Luke 19:11-26
While they were listening to this, he went on to tell them a parable, because he was near Jerusalem and the people thought that the kingdom of God was going to appear at once. He said: “A man of noble birth went to a distant country to have himself appointed king and then to return. So he called ten of his servants and gave them ten minas. ‘Put this money to work,’ he said, ‘until I come back.’

“But his subjects hated him and sent a delegation after him to say, ‘We don’t want this man to be our king.’

“He was made king, however, and returned home. Then he sent for the servants to whom he had given the money, in order to find out what they had gained with it.

“The first one came and said, ‘Sir, your mina has earned ten more.’

” ‘Well done, my good servant!’ his master replied. ‘Because you have been trustworthy in a very small matter, take charge of ten cities.’

“The second came and said, ‘Sir, your mina has earned five more.’

“His master answered, ‘You take charge of five cities.’

“Then another servant came and said, ‘Sir, here is your mina; I have kept it laid away in a piece of cloth. I was afraid of you, because you are a hard man. You take out what you did not put in and reap what you did not sow.’

“His master replied, ‘I will judge you by your own words, you wicked servant! You knew, did you, that I am a hard man, taking out what I did not put in, and reaping what I did not sow? Why then didn’t you put my money on deposit, so that when I came back, I could have collected it with interest?’

“Then he said to those standing by, ‘Take his mina away from him and give it to the one who has ten minas.’

” ‘Sir,’ they said, ‘he already has ten!’

“He replied, ‘I tell you that to everyone who has, more will be given, but as for those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away.

That’s what tells us the meaning of our lives here! We can’t deiced any of the circumstances that we are given in this life, we can only work as hard as we can and give it as an offering to God. We have to remember that Jesus already bought us with a high price so our lives are not ours to control but are to be given to Him. And God has promised that anyone who does give up their lives to Him will become His children in His kingdom and we will rule together with Him. That’s a kingdom that He is out working on now working to establish, but if we hide from Him and let our lives rot then we will be judged for it. We are here to continually be giving our lives up is service to our king. So all our meaning in life is in God:

1 Corinthians 15:58
Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.

Paul just spent 57 verses in that chapter explaining the resurrection of the dead, our blessed hope in this life! And then he end that chapter by saying to always give yourselves to God. That we are always to keep on working for His will in our lives.

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Ecclesiastes series- Part one: Introduction and chapter one

Posted on June 2nd, 2009 by Darth B'strad.
Categories: Reviews, Books, Philosophy, Religon, Christianity, Cultural.

I’ve decided to take up leading my Monday night bible study group that we call the lamppost. After looking through some books to start a study on I found Ecclesiastes the most challenging and I think that will be a message that our group needs right not (well I certainly need this message right now). So here on straight outta Denver, I’ll be posting up the lessons that I’ll be giving for the lamppost. Enjoy!

Ecclesiastes is one of thous really odd books of the bible, in fact if you take out all the references to God in it you might say that an atheists wrote it up. Right at the beginning of the book the author says:

Ecclesiastes 1:2-11
“Meaningless! Meaningless!”
says the Teacher.
“Utterly meaningless!
Everything is meaningless.”

What does anyone gain from all their labors
at which they toil under the sun?

Generations come and generations go,
but the earth remains forever.

The sun rises and the sun sets,
and hurries back to where it rises.

The wind blows to the south
and turns to the north;
round and round it goes,
ever returning on its course.

All streams flow into the sea,
yet the sea is never full.
To the place the streams come from,
there they return again.

All things are wearisome,
more than one can say.
The eye never has enough of seeing,
nor the ear its fill of hearing.

What has been will be again,
what has been done will be done again;
there is nothing new under the sun.

Is there anything of which one can say,
“Look! This is something new”?
It was here already, long ago;
it was here before our time.

There is no remembrance of people of old,
and even those who are yet to come
will not be remembered
by those who follow them.

Well that really doesn’t inspire hope and faith in God like my believes tell me to. That sounds like we should just give up, why bother living this life here. That sounds in complete contradiction to what Paul told us when he says:

Romans 8:18-25
I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. The creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God.

We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.

Well that’s a very inspirational passage to me and that’s the thing that keeps me going in this life but yet the entire book of Ecclesiastes just keeps hammering me down on my hope: saying that it’s meaningless. It even goes further to say:

Ecclesiastes 1:12-15
I, the Teacher, was king over Israel in Jerusalem. I applied my mind to study and to explore by wisdom all that is done under the heavens. What a heavy burden God has laid on the human race! I have seen all the things that are done under the sun; all of them are meaningless, a chasing after the wind.

What is crooked cannot be straightened;
what is lacking cannot be counted.

Well I hold to a faith that God Himself paid the price to make what was crooked to be straight and what is lacking to be counted! Just as Jesus told us:

Matthew 5:3-10
“Blessed are the poor in spirit,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Blessed are those who mourn,
for they will be comforted.

Blessed are the meek,
for they will inherit the earth.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness,
for they will be filled.

Blessed are the merciful,
for they will be shown mercy.

Blessed are the pure in heart,
for they will see God.

Blessed are the peacemakers,
for they will be called children of God.

Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

But that doesn’t fit with:

Ecclesiastes 1:16-18
I said to myself, “Look, I have grown and increased in wisdom more than anyone who has ruled over Jerusalem before me; I have experienced much of wisdom and knowledge.” Then I applied myself to the understanding of wisdom, and also of madness and folly, but I learned that this, too, is a chasing after the wind.

For with much wisdom comes much sorrow;
the more knowledge, the more grief.

So is the book of Ecclesiastes just a fluke? Some book that made it in there just to confuse us? Well no! God had a purpose and a plan for this book just like He has a purpose and a plan for everything He does and this book like every other book of the bible also has it’s place in His story. One of the worst ways that we can treat the bible is when we make it into a look it up encyclopedia on what are the things we are to do and what we shouldn’t do. Now don’t get me wrong here, the bible has plenty to say about what is wrong and what is right but that’s not the point of the bible. The propose of the bible is for us to get into God frame of mind and to allow that to map out our lives, not for us to map out the bible and see where that fits in our lives. So Ecclesiastes is part of Gods story just as much as any other book of the bible. So let’s have a look at where in the story this book fits in.

This book was written by King Solomon or more likely someone was writing down what he was saying in this book. The author was old wise coming to the end of his life wondering if it was all worth it. He starts asking the question of why should we work and suffer so much in this life when everything ends the same way. It’s all chases around in circles! Wise or fool we all die in the end and we are no more capable of correcting it than anyone else. Well this all comes out of what Solomon’s fate was. He was the King of Israel at a time where Israel was the greatest and richest nation on the planet. He had inherited it from his father King David and he was the one God had chosen to build His temple and Solomon did it. All of the prophecies about the nation of Israel was finally fulfilled with King Solomon:

1 Kings 4:20-21
The people of Judah and Israel were as numerous as the sand on the seashore; they ate, they drank and they were happy. And Solomon ruled over all the kingdoms from the Euphrates River to the land of the Philistines, as far as the border of Egypt. These countries brought tribute and were Solomon’s subjects all his life.

So Solomon really did have it all but yet his rule was also the start of the downfall of the nation of Israel:

1 Kings 11:1-6
King Solomon, however, loved many foreign women besides Pharaoh’s daughter—Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, Sidonians and Hittites. They were from nations about which the LORD had told the Israelites, “You must not intermarry with them, because they will surely turn your hearts after their gods.” Nevertheless, Solomon held fast to them in love. He had seven hundred wives of royal birth and three hundred concubines, and his wives led him astray. As Solomon grew old, his wives turned his heart after other gods, and his heart was not fully devoted to the LORD his God, as the heart of David his father had been. He followed Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians, and Molek the detestable god of the Ammonites. So Solomon did evil in the eyes of the LORD; he did not follow the LORD completely, as David his father had done.

So all of the women that Solomon had is was led him astray and kept him from fully trusting in God and as a consequence God had punished him:

1 Kings 11:11-13
So the LORD said to Solomon, “Since this is your attitude and you have not kept my covenant and my decrees, which I commanded you, I will most certainly tear the kingdom away from you and give it to one of your subordinates. Nevertheless, for the sake of David your father, I will not do it during your lifetime. I will tear it out of the hand of your son. Yet I will not tear the whole kingdom from him, but will give him one tribe for the sake of David my servant and for the sake of Jerusalem, which I have chosen.”

And this is when Ecclesiastes was written: right at the end of Solomon’s rein and right at the start of when Israel started turning from God and following their own paths. Following this the Assyrians wiped through Israel taking 10 of the tribes who were never heard from again. Then after that Babylon took the last two in exile for 40 years until they were finally allowed to come home. However, even thought there isn’t much hint of hope in Ecclesiastes God has always given hope:

1 Kings 11:34-39
” ‘But I will not take the whole kingdom out of Solomon’s hand; I have made him ruler all the days of his life for the sake of David my servant, whom I chose and who obeyed my commands and decrees. I will take the kingdom from his son’s hands and give you ten tribes. I will give one tribe to his son so that David my servant may always have a lamp before me in Jerusalem, the city where I chose to put my Name. However, as for you, I will take you, and you will rule over all that your heart desires; you will be king over Israel. If you do whatever I command you and walk in obedience to me and do what is right in my eyes by obeying my decrees and commands, as David my servant did, I will be with you. I will build you a dynasty as enduring as the one I built for David and will give Israel to you. I will humble David’s descendants because of this, but not forever.’ “

And that decedent is current reigning the world right now! Jesus, our king, is ruling the world right now and we are His children. But still: why did God include this book of an old depressed man who lost everything in His bible? Theirs one thing that I want us to learn from Solomon or more correctly one thing that he is trying to break you of: the thought that we can change the world. No folks, we have to let God change us and this world and we can’t do it ourselves. We are incapable of doing anything without God’s help but yet we can do all thing through God.

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Genesis 1:3

Posted on April 9th, 2009 by invot.
Categories: Reviews, Books, Religon, Christianity.

And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. (Genesis 1:3)

This is a really amazing characteristic of God: God is able to speak “Let there be light” and then the result of His word is light. When God created the light the light must have gone outward from the point where God had directed. Light must have taken over the darkness completely. We see from pictures of the farthest objects in space of which the light from them is billions of earth years old, near the beginning of the time of creation by a few hundred thousand years. Except by now the edge of the universe has had about 13 billion more years to expand because we are seeing the light at the near beginning of time. There is a significant latency. The light of our sun when it reaches us is only about eight minutes old because light has a fixed speed. If the sun were destroyed instantly then it would take eight minutes for us to notice. If the edge of the universe was instantly destroyed it would take 13 billion or more years before we noticed. Interestingly enough we are nearly in the center of the entire universe give or take a couple of hundred thousand years. The farther we look out in space the closer we are looking at this wall of light that is actually light that is closest to moment of creation. We can only see the very edge. We cant see any closer because the wall is made up of too much matter and radiation so that it is an estimation that it took 300000 years for the wall to separate enough as to make the space transparent. We are 13.7 billion earth years away from this wall that is almost as far away as possible in all directions because the wall has encircled all of creation. As powerful as our telescopes get we will only see up to this wall that is by no means stopped, it is likely accelerating outward.

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The Irresistible Revolution by Shane Claiborne

Posted on August 30th, 2008 by Darth B'strad.
Categories: Ethics, Reviews, Books, Philosophy, Religon, Christianity, Economics.

Just by the title of the book I knew that this would not be like anything that I usually read. I’m not too much of a fan of revolutions because most of them have been horrible bloody events that made societies worse than better. However this book is not about thous kinds of revolutions but rather one that “dances” (pg. 313) as Shane Claiborne puts it and I am all for dancing. Irresistible Revolution is a book about Shane Claiborne stories and how he has developed his current theology of using “Little movements of communities of ordinary radicals are committed to doing small things with great love.” (pg. 25) I’ll have to admit that it was quite a frustrating book for me to get through due to his often simplistic theology at times and differing political views but despite all that, I do have to say that he is a great man of God striving his hardest to do His God’s will in his life. His ideals on communal interdependence and stringing the church together is something that I did initially have strong reservations against but as I have read the book I think that is something that we need in the years to come. But I am also looking forward to dashing in some good ol’ fashioned conservatism into the mix too! The idea is not so much a revolution in that we remake this society into a new society but rather to return to older ideals that governed the early church. As he says on page 20:

What I often get branded is “radical.” I’ve never really minded that, for as my urban-farming friends reminded me, the word radical itself means “root.” It’s from the Latin word radix, which, just like a rad-ish, has to do with getting to the root of things.

Well that’s what conservatism is all about! (returning to the root that is but he takes it in a different direction from actual conservatism) He uses stories in order to explain the way that Jesus wanted us to live our lives. The thesis being that we should try to make our lives simpler so that we can release and give more resources to the poor. He does have an great passion for the poor that taken him across the world, from Calcutta-helping the the poor and the lepers with Mother Teresa, to Iraq, helping out in the hospitals with the Iraqis and also in downtown Philadelphia helping set up the simple way-an outreach to the homeless in Philly. His story here is inspiring many others to do much of the same around the country and one of whom just so happens to be our fellow bolger P. muse.

So this is a book of stories. The things that transform us, especially us “postmoderns,” are people and experiences. Political ideologies and religious doctrines just aren’t very compelling, even if they’re true. And stories disarm us. They make us laugh and cry. It’s hard to disagree with a story, much less split a church or kill people over one. And certainly no one hurts others with the passion of those who do it in the name of God, and it’s usually over ideologies and doctrines, not stories- stories about ordinary first-century Mediterranean life, stories of widows and orphans, debts and wages, workers and landlords, courts and banquets. [pg. 28]

It’s kind of funny that he said that because that is exactly the same thing that I have been starting to get a passion for in telling stories of mine that help relate the truth of God’s word. However I do feel it necessary to urge some caution here for while his book has plunty of drive and zeal for God (that I absolutely love), it lacks a certain amount of clarity that could possibly lead some of our fellow Christians astray. For Just as Paul said of the Jews in Romans 10:2 “I know what enthusiasm they have for God, but it is misdirected zeal” I also want to help in every way to ensure that we keep on moving forward on the path that God has laid for us and not on some idealistic purist of utopia. Shane likes to quote Isaiah 2:4 a lot where it says “They will hammer their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks.” And that is very beautiful and true but he skipped where is says “The Lord will mediate between nations and will settle international disputes.” In other words, it will require God to be here among us in order for us to have real and true world peace. And we will have to continue to go through wars for as Jesus said in Mark 13:7 “And you will hear of wars and threats of wars, but don’t panic. Yes, these things must take place, but the end won’t follow immediately.” I also know that our time of war is not over yet because Jesus said later in that chapter “In fact, unless the Lord shortens that time of calamity, not a single person will survive. but for the sake of his chosen ones he has shorted those days.” (20) We have not come anywhere near that sort of loss of life around the world and I think that this time has not yet come to pass (and I will be very happy to be wrong here). But remember also that Jesus told us not to panic! God is in control! Remember that Paul told us in Romans 7:31-32 “[…] If God is for us, who can ever be against us? since the did not spare even his own Son but gave him up for us all, won’t he also give us everything else?” I am convinced that there are some dark days ahead of us and a time of calamity that nothing is going to prevent because God himself has said so. So that you do not get mislead I am saying that this irresistible revolution is not going to change that. However I do think that knitting the church back together in a community style and getting fellow Christians from all backgrounds to stand together will be the very thing that we need in that time of calamity. So the community that P. muse and all of his friends from Eastern University is something that I want to see succeed.

The thing that concerns me most in this book is on Page 160:

Almost every time we talk with affluent folks about God’s will to end poverty, someone says, “But didn’t Jesus say, ‘the poor will always be with you’?” Many of the people who whip out this verse have grown quite insulted and distant form the poor and feel defensive. I usually ask, “Where are the poor? Are the poor among us?” The answer is usually a clear negatory. As we study the Scriptures, we see how many texts we have misread, contextualized, and exegeted to hear what we want to. Like this one about the poor being among us, which Jesus says in the home of a leaper and after a poor marginalized woman anoints his feet with perfume. The poor were all around him. Far from saying in defeat that we should not worry about the poor, since they will always be among us, Jesus is pointing the Church to her true identity-she is to live close to those who suffer. The poor will always be among us, because the empire will always produce poor people, and they will find a home in the church, a citizenship in the kingdom of God, where the “hungry are filled with the good things and the rich sent away empty.”

When you read scripture you need context! If that was not true then this man is a fool for all he does because even the Bible says “Their is no God.” But if you put it in context you get this:

Psalm 53:1 (New Living Translation)
Only fools say in their hearts,
“There is no God.”
They are corrupt, and their actions are evil;
not one of them does good!

So lets go back to the context of that passage in John 12:

1 Six days before the Passover celebration began, Jesus arrived in Bethany, the home of Lazarus—the man he had raised from the dead. 2 A dinner was prepared in Jesus’ honor. Martha served, and Lazarus was among those who ate[a] with him. 3 Then Mary took a twelve-ounce jar[b] of expensive perfume made from essence of nard, and she anointed Jesus’ feet with it, wiping his feet with her hair. The house was filled with the fragrance.

4 But Judas Iscariot, the disciple who would soon betray him, said, 5 “That perfume was worth a year’s wages.[c] It should have been sold and the money given to the poor.” 6 Not that he cared for the poor—he was a thief, and since he was in charge of the disciples’ money, he often stole some for himself.

7 Jesus replied, “Leave her alone. She did this in preparation for my burial. 8 You will always have the poor among you, but you will not always have me.”

9 When all the people[d] heard of Jesus’ arrival, they flocked to see him and also to see Lazarus, the man Jesus had raised from the dead. 10 Then the leading priests decided to kill Lazarus, too, 11 for it was because of him that many of the people had deserted them[e] and believed in Jesus.

Jesus was not among the poor when he said that he was in Lazarus’ house who had to be fairly wealthy in order to afford a perfume that was worth a years wages. This is not mean to say that we are to forget about the poor for Jesus said in Matthew 25:40 “I tell you the truth, when you did it to one of the least of these my brothers and sisters, you were doing it to me!” But it doses mean that at times we should forget about the poor for a time to do something greater. That’s something that Shane doesn’t understand because he did say on Page 135:

For everything in this world tries to pull us away from community, pushes us to choose ourselves over others, to choose independence over interdependence, to choose great things over small things, to choose going to fast alone over far together.

But as we see from this passage every once in a while one of us may need to sacrifice of our selfs for the good of the rest and do something great. However this is only on God’s detection in times of necessity but we must not lose sight of the fact that we need each other. We must be careful on how we approach other Christians on God’s service for we do not know what God is doing in a fellow Christian’s life and sometimes the Christan him or her-self doesn’t know ether. If I had read this book just two to three years ago I would have thought to myself “screw you buddy! I’m going to join the Marines because I think God is working there!” instead of that happening, my father said he didn’t think that going into the Marines was a good idea and instead encouraged me in other areas. I held off on that thought and kept working and going to school. Then last year I met a girl that God had commanded me to love. God used her to destroy my will so that he could refill me with his will. Now that that has happened I have learned far more about myself and I now know that I most likely would not have been able to handle war psychologically because of my demon (I explain that further in my A true B’strad posts). We have to take a stance of encouragement towards our fellow Christians. As Paul says in Romans 14:4 “Who are you to condemn someone else’s servants? They are responsible to the Lord, so let him judge whether they are right or wrong. And with the Lord’s help, they will do what is right and will receive his approval.” Not that I am saying that Shane has done this but with this book he is fooling with that line.

I heard one gospel preacher say it like this, as he really wound up and broke a sweat: “We’ve got to unite ourselves as one body. Because Jesus is coming back, and he’s coming back for a bride, not a harem.” [pg. 145]

That’s what everything that P. muse is planning to make here in Denver. The plan is to have a group of them from eastern to move into a home owned by a dear family of our church and use it to help outreach to the surrounding area. They want to do it in the way that Shane described it by saying on page 163:

Simplicity is meaningful only inasmuch as it is grounded in love, authentic relationships, and interdependence. Redistribution then springs naturally out of family that is larger than biology or nationalism

And that is absolutely critical for this to work. The thing I see that will tear this thing apart most is if certain people are getting down on others for not doing enough. That what will kill this whole plan! That’s why Paul said to Titus “If people are causing divisions among you, give a first and second warning. After that, have nothing more to do with them.” (3:10) However in this sort of set up you can’t just have nothing to do with them! They’re living in the same house! You guys might need to consider a plan to throw people out of the house (God forbid). There are Skeptics in our church about this whole idea and I want to try to settle thous concerns:

To the Skeptics
Remember that James tells us “What good is it, dear brothers and sisters, if you say you have faith but don’t show it by your actions? Can that kind of faith save anyone?” (2:14) They are moving here with God’s love to show mercy to thous that are lost. I think that God’s will is in this but we need you too! We need direction and guidance on this path so that we don’t get lead astray. Shane also said that you are important to this cause by saying on Page 354 “If you have the gift of frustration and the deep sense that the world is a mess, thank God for that; not everyone has that gift of vision. It also means that you have a responsibility to lead us in new ways recognizing that something is wrong is the first step toward changing the world.” Express your concerns to them and ask them many questions so that they will think and pray on this. They are going out there to help fulfill the word in Isaiah where is says “For they will see what they had not been told; they will understand what they had not heard about.” (52:15) I challenge you to talk to them when they are here so that they will keep the faith strong for it says “As iron sharpens iron, so a friend sharpens a friend.” (Proverbs 27:17) Help keep them on the right path!

But I also must ask questions of thous how wish to be apart of this community

To the community
Prove me right! Remember that Jesus said first “And you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind, and all your strength.” and then he said “Love your neighbor as yourself. No other commandment is greater than these.” (Mark 12:30-31) Our goal here is not to help the poor or to free the oppressed but to learn to love God! And because we love God that means that we will serve him by helping the poor and freeing the oppressed! James tells us that he will “show you my faith by my good deeds.” (2:18) Notice though that the faith comes first and it should always come first! You are showing your faith by the good acts that you do here. Remember that 1 Corinthians tells us “If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it; but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing. Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged.” (13:3-5) Without love and faith we are worthless! This work is to be done for God and no one else. Also you are going to need to keep this house pure, otherwise your just going to have another frat house. To ensure that there is no naivety, you guys will have tensions and not only the simple messy versus cleanly tensions but also sexual ones as well. As Paul said in his second letter to Timothy “If you keep yourself pure, you will be a special utensil for honorable use. Your life will be clean, and you will be ready for the Master to use you for every good work.” (2:21) Your house must be pure or your efforts are for nothing! This is not to condemn any of you for we are all sinners but this house need purity in order this to matter to everyone that enters it.

Now that I have tired my best to gain some clarity here I have some questions for thous who are working to set of this community. These questions do not need to be answered immediately (we’re still a year out on this plan) but they will have to be answered before you can start your work. Pray on these questions and talk amongst each other and even on this blog to try to find God’s answer.

Why are you doing this?

How will you keep this house pure?

How will this house be managed?

Is there going to be a leader or will it all be by democratic vote?

What is your goal of this community?

Who handles what?

Who do you take in?

How will the bills be paid?

What is God’s will here? (and that is by far the most important question here)

My God bless all that are involved here and may God show us your will in the days and years to come.

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Because they Hate: By Brigitte Gabriel

Posted on April 28th, 2007 by Darth B'strad.
Categories: Political, War, Terrorism, Reviews, Books, Philosophy, Islam, Judaism, Christianity.

Because they hate is a book by Brigitte Gabriel that illustrates the horrific terror of Islamic Fascism. As a little girl in Lebanon, she grew up during the Lebanese civil war. Before the the civil war Lebanon used to be a very peaceful country as the only middle eastern county with a majority Christian population. Through out the wars with Israel Lebanon would open up it’s arms to Muslim refuges and integrate them into their society. However after awhile the Muslims started to over populate the Christians there and when it did the Muslims did not treat the Christians the same way.

In Lebanon everyone carried a national ID card that identified not only our religion but also what sect of that religion we belonged to. It proved to be something that could mean the difference between living or dying. Incidents were being reported of Muslims setting up checkpoints and stopping cars to check IDs. Sometimes, if the Muslims saw that a car’s occupants were Christians, they would order everyone out of the car and then shoot them all. they didn’t kill us because they were Communists and we were capitalists. They killed us because we were Christians. They would shout “Allahu Akbar,” “God is Great,” as they sprayed Christians with machine-gun bullets. These became known as “identity card killings.”

In November of 1975 the fighting in the civil war started to brake out. Brigitte Gabriel in her little town was hit by motor fire and one landed right on her house. A little girl of 10 years old she had just barely survived the attack on her house that night. However it was not over then they had to live in a bomb shelter with a dirt floor, rats and shorting food rations. living there in fear that if a shell fell directly on their shelter then they would die. they would have to go out at night and crawl in ditches (in order to avoid snipers) to get food. After three years of this the Muslims were preparing to attack her little town in southern Lebanon. At 13 years old Brigitte Gabriel wanted to look pretty before she died so she dressed up before the attack. But guess who saved her? Not the US, not France, Spain or Italy but Israel did. The next day Israel entered the war and pushed back the Muslims (actually they ran from Israel). Israel was getting tired of bing shelled by Lebanon. One of the favorite tactics of the Muslims was to put artery around heavily populated Christan areas and then run like hell when Israel responded. So then they were able to kill more Christians and also have the UN blame Israel. In the years that Followed Brigitte Gabriel moved to Israel to become a news broadcaster and eventually moved here to the United States. After the history lesson and her personal story Brigitte Gabriel then moves on to the political and tell us how critical it is that we fight the Islamic extremist because their trying to do the same thing here that they did to Lebanon. This book is a must read in order to understand the real nature and threat that we face. And the reason why can be summed up in a simple phrase: It’s because they hate.

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Books

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Index for posts concerning Books

Ecclesiastes series part seven: Chapter twelve, Remembering God in all your days

Ecclesiastes series part six: Chapters ten and eleven, the proverbs

Ecclesiastes series part five: chapters eight and nine, the coming King

Ecclesiastes series- Part four: Chapters six and seven, Seek first the kingdom

Ecclesiastes series- part three: Chapters four an Five, giving it all to God in prayer

Ecclesiastes series- part two: Chapters two and three, accepting the role God gives us.

Ecclesiastes series- Part one: Introduction and chapter one

Genesis 1:3

The Irresistible Revolution by Shane Claiborne

Because they Hate: By Brigitte Gabriel