This week, meeting at church 11 am Sunday for a worship service, 5:30 pm Tuesday for Food Pantry, and 6:00 pm Wednesday for Bible Study (studying Exodus). And reminder to everyone to be careful with masks and social distancing. Here’s the message for this week, for those joining from home.
Call to Worship; Ecclesiastes 2:1-11
2 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. 2 “Laughter,” I said, “is madness. And what does pleasure accomplish?” 3 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.
4 I undertook great projects: I built houses for myself and planted vineyards. 5 I made gardens and parks and planted all kinds of fruit trees in them. 6 I made reservoirs to water groves of flourishing trees. 7 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. 8 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. 9 I became greater by far than anyone in Jerusalem before me. In all this my wisdom stayed with me.
10 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.
11 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.
Opening Invitation, Prayer Concerns, and Offering; Father in Heaven, Thank you for all that we have and all that we are. All that we possess, came from you. Lord we pray that you would fill us with your Spirit as we seek to understand your word, and lead us in paths of your righteousness. Today Father, we ask that you accept our offering of our very selves in service to you and your kingdom. Amen!
Message Reading; Luke: 18: 18-23
18 A certain ruler asked him, “Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”
19 “Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good – except God alone. 20 You know the commandments: ‘You shall not commit adultery, you shall not murder, you shall not steal, you shall not give false testimony, honor your father and mother.”
21 “All these I have kept since I was a boy,” he said.
22 When Jesus heard this, he said to him, “You still lack one thing. Sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”
23 When he heard this, he became very sad, because he was very wealthy.
Message; “Chasing the Wind”
There was a man of royal blood. Totally a Blueblood who did everything right. He just seemed to know the right thing to say and do based on the situation and requirement. He prayed and he studied, and walked with the Lord. Everyone wanted to be around this guy because he had a magnetic personality. Instead of repelling people away, they drew like Honey.
You know, there are just some people you meet in this life that lighten the room when they enter. Actually the room doesn’t change one bit, but the people who feel the difference are in tune with the person making an entrance and they react accordingly. That’s what it was like for our blue blooded friend. Well, until he started to believe his own press.
After a while, the story about him changed, and instead of marveling at what God had gifted this person, a yarn developed that it was his own doing all along. The story went, that it was he that made himself great. His Dad came from common stock and that he had no need to rely on outside aid in his quest for greatness. A prodigy for sure. And you would be hard pressed to argue with his success. Even a Queen from a far-away land came just to have his child. Three thousand years later, rock stars would be emulating his flash in the pan greatness.
Yes Solomon, was a wonder, and could have been even greater if he could only have remained humbly in his faithwalk with the Lord. By listening to the Spirit of the Sovereign Lord and His Prophets, and by reading and heading his own words, that we have in today’s Call to Worship from Ecclesiastes 2:1-3a, & 11
1I said to myself, “Come now, I will test you with pleasure to find out what is good.” But that also proved to be meaningless. 2 “Laughter,” I said, “is madness. And what does pleasure accomplish?” 3 I tried cheering myself with wine, and embracing …
…11 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.
These words of Solomon are indeed wisdom to heed. They reflect the lessons learned from experience and the appropriate judgement that a life of self service, selfishness, and focusing to satisfy inward cravings is folly. That Solomon’s self-test itself was unwise to begin with. So why didn’t he follow his own conclusions? Somewhere along the way Solomon lost his way. The man of impeccable wisdom, actually became a wayward indigent intellectually when he trusted himself, placed desires, over the Lord.
This example by the way is not happenstance. God is using Solomon’s example to teach us today thousands of years later. Solomon, the son of the man after God’s own heart (David) shows us that all of us can lose our way when we trust in our own navigation over God’s. This can happen in any family to any person and it has nothing to do with who your parents are or where you live. In fact, if you want to look at a messed up parent, just look at David. He is a walking train-wreck of a human being, and yet God continues to directly forgive and bring him back into the fold. Pointing directly to our access to God now.
Today, our Lord takes out the middle man stuff and is our High Priest. We have direct access to God, which is why paying attention to His direction instead of our own is so important. Working on our relationship with God is more important than chasing wealth, fame, and personal gratification as Solomon did.
To give you an example of the consistency of God, The Lord’s own Prophet Isaiah (and possibly a later family member of Solomon) hundreds of years after Solomon will provide us these words of wisdom from Isaiah 55:1-3
“Come, all you who are thirsty,
come to the waters)
and you who have no money,
come, buy and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk
without money and without cost.
2 Why spend money on what is not bread,
and your labor on what does not satisfy?
Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good,
and you will delight in the richest of fare.
3 Give ear and come to me;
listen, that you may live.
I will make an everlasting covenant with you,
my faithful love promised to David.
Why do I continue to chase after the stuff that does not satisfy? Why do we automatically chase the shiny thing in the room? And the shiny thing is always the thing that I don’t possess. Then when I do have possession of something, I no longer am as interested as I once was as a general rule. Going back to Ecclesiasts 2 verses 3-9, and Solomon giving his testimony on what he did:
3 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.
4 I undertook great projects: I built houses for myself and planted vineyards. 5 I made gardens and parks and planted all kinds of fruit trees in them. 6 I made reservoirs to water groves of flourishing trees. 7 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. 8 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. 9 I became greater by far than anyone in Jerusalem before me. In all this my wisdom stayed with me.
10 I denied myself nothing my eyes desired;
I refused my heart no pleasure.
I, I, and I. A whole lot of me stuff, and not a lot of room for anyone else to include the Lord. Solomon says in verse 9, “In all this my wisdom stayed with me”. The problem being, it appears that God’s wisdom was placed on the back burner.
I would like to share with you all of the times my wisdom has stayed with me through the various events, gatherings, and happenings in my life. Because it was my wisdom, these activities were more like, bedlam, anarchy, and mayhem. Because it was me at the helm, the ship was lost time and again. To ego, fear, the past, hurt feelings, betrayal, and misunderstandings, just to name a few. Yeah, I would love to share with you these screw-ups and more, but modesty (OK shame) and a lack of time do not afford my opining on the subject of me at length.
Suffice to say, me and Solomon, and whole lot of other people have spent a whole lot of time “Chasing the Wind” instead of walking with the Lord. Either before or after we discovered the Lord and were transformed by Him in our lives.
In other words “Chasing the Wind” is an activity we all have participated in at various times in our lives. Leaving us hollow, empty, and sometimes bankrupt in faith. I am reminded of what the Lord had to say about all of this from last week’s Message Reading from Matthew 12:43-45;
43 “When an impure spirit comes out of a person, it goes through arid places seeking rest and does not find it. 44 Then it says, ‘I will return to the house I left.’ When it arrives, it finds the house unoccupied, swept clean and put in order. 45 Then it goes and takes with it seven other spirits more wicked than itself, and they go in and live there. And the final condition of that person is worse than the first. That is how it will be with this wicked generation.”
I remember last week we talked about when the Lord has helped you with your house cleaning (your heart), it is important to replace the void with something wholesome and healthy, and not as Isaiah would say, on the things that do not satisfy!
And yes “Chasing the Wind” can happen at any time in your life and be equally unproductive. What about the person who has made a space for the Lord in his heart and life, has followed the laws of Love, has followed rules and is ready for abracadabra. You know, whatever God does so that you are in and you don’t have to think about, or be concerned about anything from now on. You know membership with a platinum card, because membership has its privileges.
We have our friend for a reference in today’s ‘Message Reading” from Luke 18:18-23;
18 A certain ruler asked him, “Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”
19 “Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good—except God alone. 20 You know the commandments: ‘You shall not commit adultery, you shall not murder, you shall not steal, you shall not give false testimony, honor your father and mother.’”
21 “All these I have kept since I was a boy,” he said.
22 When Jesus heard this, he said to him, “You still lack one thing. Sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”
23 When he heard this, he became very sad, because he was very wealthy.
Jesus starts out with explaining that only God is good. Again He is teaching and living by example. In this realm only God can be said to be good, perfect, majestic. Our Lord lowered Himself, separated Himself from Himself (the Godhead), to walk this earth, to save your eternal life. Now glorified he sits at the Right Hand and will judge the quick and the dead.
Next I want to be clear, I am not asking anyone to sell all they have to follow Jesus. First off, only the Lord can ask that of you; and I aint Him! The Lord has an individual plan for each of you and no two of you are exactly the same. What I think the Lord is saying here is that your search for the Lord and service to others needs to be a priority to you, as much and more than of all those things you have lusted over. Stuff that would not satisfy you at the end of the day. Pick your poison!
The Rich Ruler’s issues were not that he had wealth, but that his wealth became who he was instead of one of many tools we use in this life to bring greater meaning. In other words, am I loving others with the wealth that I have, or am I loving my wealth. There is a very big difference.
If you have extra in this life that you can share, God gave it to you for a reason, and it probably doesn’t center around self-gratification and excess to excess. Not my call though. These are the hard things in life that you have to do the heavy lifting by praying, self-reflecting, and listening to the Lord and not to someone who wants to speak for you. You are equipped to do this sole searching without any human command. That’s the Good News of the Gospel, and it’s not “Chasing the Wind”!
Last week we heard during Prayer Concerns and Praises from Suzy a story about a man who became wealthy enough that he could live off of ten percent of his earning and tithe the rest (90%) to God. He by the way probably did not want to make a big deal about his generosity, because to do so would be to worship yet another false god, popularity. By the way, a tithe is between you and God. The two of you decide what is right for you to give, and you don’t need me to tell you what is right for you by trusting in God over outside distractions.
Which might just be why our rich ruler didn’t want to part with his wealth fearing that his popularity and respect he enjoyed would end with the giving of his wealth. Jesus continued to instruct us in Luke 18, with verses 24-27
24 Jesus looked at him and said, “How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God! 25 Indeed, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.”
26 Those who heard this asked, “Who then can be saved?”
27 Jesus replied, “What is impossible with man is possible with God.”
The last verse is key to all of our hope! It’s why we boast in the hope of the Glory of God! And hope does not put us to shame because God’s love has been poured in our hearts by the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us. If that sounded familiar it should. Yes, that was part of last week’s Benediction in Romans 5.
If you have been “Chasing the Wind”, and trying to feed the beast with an endless appetite (you), and not liking what you see; … there is hope for you. As the Lord said, “What is impossible with man is possible with God.”God indeed makes all things on His agenda possible and downright doable. Your free will gives you the choice of participating and thriving, or not and passing with the wind.
My prayer and hope for you this week and that as you find yourself in this walk of yours, that you take heart, and;
Rejoice at the beauty,
Dance in the beauty,
And bask in the beauty;
That is your life!
Nothing has happened that you and your Lord cannot work on to make better. Nothing has existed that God will not forgive. Nothing is worth sacrificing to Chase the Wind of empty promises. The Devil and our egos have plenty of those! Yes my prayer is that you let Him anchor you today in the purest of love for ever.
Amen!
Benediction; Based on 23 Psalm.