Ecclesiastes 7:11-20

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Ecclesiastes 7:11,12

Wisdom is good with an inheritance: and by it there is profit to them that see the sun. For wisdom is a defence, and money is a defence: but the excellency of knowledge is that wisdom gives life to them that have it.


PROSPERITY IS BENEFICIAL IF USED WISELY.

When accompanied by wisdom, prosperity can be a very good thing.

Wisdom along with an inheritance is good And an advantage to those who see the sun.

For wisdom is protection just as money is protection. But the advantage of knowledge is that wisdom preserves the lives of its possessors.

Money, prosperity, can protect us from certain categories of problem.

But only wisdom can preserve our lives in time.

THEREFORE TO HAVE ALL THE MONEY in the world with out wisdom is empty. Why do we know this? Because it is being stated by someone who lived that way for 15 years. Lots of money, no wisdom applied to self.

GOD'S SOVEREIGNTY IS IMMUTABLE AND BEYOND OUR FINITE MINDS

Ecclesiastes 7:13

Consider the work of God, For who is able to straighten what He has bent?


Can we straighten what God has bent? Of course not.

Ecclesiastes 7:14

In the day of prosperity be happy, But in the day of adversity consider-- God has made the one as well as the other So that man may not discover anything that will be after him.


We do not know what will happen after our lives are over. God does . . .

God has made both adversity and prosperity and will mingle them together in our live to bring about his perfect plan in our lives providing us with His highest and best.

The Sovereignty of God

God is the supreme being of the universe, the highest king. He is eternal, infinite, self-determining.

God has absolute Will and does whatsoever he pleases.

Some passage on God's sovereignty.

Psalm 66:7 He rules by his power forever.

I Chron 9:12 Thou reignest over all, in thine hand is power and might.

II Chron 20:6 Thou rulest over all the kingdoms of the nations.

Rev 19:16 King of Kings and Lord of Lords.

In His sovereignty he was pleased to give man FREE WILL.

God's Sovereign will and man's free will meet at the Cross.

The believer God sovereignty is what determines the path he will provide for us in both adversity and prosperity to reach the goal of knowing Him.

Is there anything God is not free to do? YES, he is not free to ignore his own perfection or perfect essence.

Taken out of the context, these next few verses could really throw us. Especially verse 16.

Do not be excessively righteous, and do not be overly wise. Why should you ruin yourself?

But remember the immediate and the larger context. The immediate context is the sovereignty of God and the larger context is how He blesses us by mingling together both adversity and prosperity and not by us hustling for blessing.

The bottom line in all this is that He is in charge and whatever He gives is good. God for His plan, good for His plan in us, bringing us to be the people He saved us to be.

Ecclesiastes 7:15

I have seen everything during my lifetime of futility; there is a righteous man who perishes in his righteousness, and there is a wicked man who prolongs his life in his wickedness.


The futility of Solomon's life seemed to last a life time and did cut his life short.

I Kings 3:14 And if you walk in My ways, keeping My statutes and commandments, as your father David walked, then I will prolong your days.

But instead he reigned only 40 years and died at the age of 60.

Psalm 90:10 As for the days of our life, they contain seventy years, Or if due to strength, eighty years.

His reversionism (backsliding) cost him about 20 years of life and cost the nation of Israel even more.

During his time he saw righteous men die young and wicked men live a long time.

First, we have to determine what he means by RIGHTEOUS.

This is not used in the NT sense of God's perfect righteousness. But rather for a man who is observably righteous, Solomon says I HAVE SEEN THIS.

We can only observe how a man lives so this righteousness is limited to actions and words.

Might it be legalism, certainly can be. We do not know but we know the good might die young and the wicked may live a long time.

The point is that righteous living is not a guarantee of long life nor is wicked living a guarantee of a short life.

There are no guarantees because it is God who is sovereign and He calls the shots on life and death.

Ecclesiastes 7:16

Do not be excessively righteous, and do not be overly wise. Why should you ruin yourself?


Being overly wise is put into context with excessive righteousness as a negative.

The question Why should you ruin yourself could better be translated Why should you surprised.

The verb RUIN is SA-MEM and usually means destroy or ruin but here it is a Hithpael imperfect and in that form which is reflexive is never means to destroy.

It means to be appalled or astonished or I would say surprised.

What is the SURPRISE? That God is not impressed with our righteousness and our wisdom. And it is not going to earn any points with God and change His sovereign will as to how long we should live.

Principle: God is never impressed with the extreme of legalism.

Is some righteousness good, YES, we reap what we sow and we live among others. Righteous living is of value in any society.

But the person here is refereed to is self righteous and depending upon self wisdom.

Ecclesiastes 7:17

The danger of rejecting legalism is to live lawlessly, so Solomon adds a warning.


Do not be excessively wicked, and do not be a fool. Why should you die before your time?

This looks at a universal principle for man on earth. Excessive wickedness can result in a premature death.

YOUR TIME is the time God has established for you to exit this life.

But due to excessive wickedness this person's life is cut short.

This was true with Solomon's life. The 15 years of reversionism took their toll. He died at age 60, perhaps 20 years before his time according to God's promise to him of an extended life.

Today, people who are involved in evil, sin, a wicked life stand a much greater chance of dying then those who do not.

Drugs, alcohol abuses, venereal diseases, AIDS, violence...all these can effect a life and shorten it.

Today our law makers are very concerned with the effects of smoking and the fact that it can and does shorten life expectancy. Study shows it shortens life by anywhere from five to eight years.

But what if I told you there was a class of people whose life expectancy is shortened by fifteen to twenty years and yet this is a class that is being not only protected in their activity but promoted in their activity by the government? Know what that class is? Homosexuality...by class, homosexuals die on an average of 15 to 20 years earlier than heterosexuals. Yet our legislative body is going after Joe Camel and ignoring homosexuality as a problem.

Bottom line, wickedness can shorten life. This is not what God does directly but it is what He permits under the Sun.

GOD CAN DIRECTLY shorten life by the Sin Unto Death

WE CAN SHORTEN LIFE by wickedness, which is thus a type of self imposed sin unto death.

Ecclesiastes 7:18

It is good that you grasp one thing, and also not let go of the other; for the one who fears God comes forth with both of them.


The two things that are held is the self righteousness of verse 16 and the wickedness of verse 17.

Here man is told to hold onto both.

But it is not the excesses of these, but the moderation of these. Moderate righteousness and moderate wickedness.

The key is understanding what is meant by grasping and by not letting go.

Here the challenge to the believer is a challenge to reality.

The self righteous man lives divorced from the reality of the grace of God and his own sin.

The wicked man lives divorced from the reality of a God who is righteous and just.

We must hold onto both in the sense that we recognize that we are at times righteous and at times wicked.

AND THESE DO NOT COUNT IN GOD'S PLAN...His plan to bless us with his highest and best is based upon Him, not us.

SO HOW TO ADJUST TO GOD'S PLAN FOR US: verses 19-26

Ecclesiastes 7:19

Wisdom strengthens a wise man more than ten rulers who are in a city.


Wisdom, not from ourselves but from God, allows us to understand that our purpose in life is to know Him.

Human wisdom is sold cheaply on the market of the world. Satan's wisdom is available and presented as an alternative to the wisdom of God. Many believers will opt for wisdom that doe not come from God.

BUT THE WISDOM OF GOD is scarce.

It has only one source and that is the Word of God and it is developed only one way, and that is by learning, thinking, and applying the Word in the sphere of a personal relationship with God.

But God's Wisdom in us can do something even ten rulers in a city.

The RULERS is SHAL-LEET and referees to military commanders.

The word CITY refers to a city that is well protected and guarded by walls and a militia.

Ten rulers would lead to confusion, but ten military commanders and their troops would be considered very powerful, yet Wisdom from God is better.

Wisdom gives us greater strength.

This verse is telling us that man may seek what is visible, what is considered strong by human standards. But that God has something for us that goes beyond human thinking and ideas, His Wisdom.

And when we have that wisdom we will be strengthened:

STRENGTHEN is AW-ZAZ and is a Qal imperfect which means not only to be strong but to prevail. The imperfect tense tells us that this is a process, continue on the more and more strength because there are more and more battle to fight.

This word is first found in the book of Judges and then found often in the Psalms.

The use of this term for STRENGTH was very limited and seen only in those situation where the individual who had this strength had been called by God for a specific task, like the Judges, or in prayers, as in Psalms, where David is drawing near to the Lord in worship, praise, adoration, and prayer.

SO THE FACTORS THAT ALLOW FOR THIS type of strength are all factors that are found in a relationship with God.

Principle: The wisdom of the Word will develop strength in the believer only when that believer is also developing a relationship with God.

Ecclesiastes 7:20

Indeed, there is not a righteous man on earth who continually does good and who never sins.


Reminds us of Romans 3:23 For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God .

This verse links the value and scarcity of wisdom in verse 19 with the evaluation of righteousness in the previous verses.

EVEN THE RIGHTEOUS MAN sins. Therefore, the conclusion is that our righteousness cannot be the basis upon which God will bless us.

Here again we see the intrusions into man's systems of trying to gain significance in life. A man, and this is common for believers, may try to live a righteous life expecting God to bless him.

But then the INTRUSION of evil of which sin is a part, comes into the life.

Our sin separates us from God and should teach us that we cannot expect God to bless us just because we have be cranking out good deeds.

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