"I Think I Finally Get It!"

In my last blog post I was thinking out loud about why Solomon seems to write much of his Ecclesiastes with a sort of resentment towards God. He may have written the entire book over a long period of time because his words seem to echo the sentiments we all experience as we journey from young to middle to mature adulthood. Once we get to the point of actually being cognizant of the end of life, that stark prospect breeds a whole new perspective.

Much of Ecclesiastes is repetitive of the "meaningless" way life can seem when viewed through the lens of its end. So, I have wondered why the one we call the wise man was so morbid, even angry, that his life was ending and he could do nothing except lament the reality.

Yesterday, it dawned on me - Solomon was a romantic at heart, very obviously a ladies man, and his life had been devoted to seeking meaning in pleasure, among other things. He even says quite boldly in the book that he tried it all without restraint. But, as he saw his life coming to an end, his seeming resentment of death may have been, at least partly, because he could also now see the end of that life of pleasure and power. So, what's to look forward to?

Long after Solomon had written Ecclesiastes, the prophet Isaiah made a more profound statement at 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. You come to the help of those who gladly do right, who remember your ways."

Many more centuries passed and the Apostle Paul put an eternal spin on Isaiah's words at I Corinthians 2:9 - "As it is written, no eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him, but God has revealed it to us by His Spirit." Paul refers to it as God's "secret wisdom" that he kept hidden from the ancients but it is now revealed to us in Jesus Christ.

Now, I confess that I certainly can't know for sure why Solomon wrote all those depressing words about life and death. But being one given to speculation in the face of a dilemma, and imagining myself in Solomon's robes, leaving behind all those beautiful women and the exotic pleasures they undoubtedly showered upon him would tend to make an old man somewhat bitter. At a deeper level however, maybe Solomon finally saw that in the FINAL analysis, all that pleasure was truly "meaningless".

For me, I am thankful to my Father and his Holy Spirit that although I have enjoyed my share of pleasure in this world, none it can even begin to compare with what is just ahead. I am grateful to be able to sense it, feel it in my spirit, and finally know that nothing I have EVER experienced in this life will stack up beside what my Father has in store for me. I wish Solomon had known that too.