How to Put Death to Shame

Would you stand for the reading of God's Word? Hear now the Word of God from Psalm 16. Preserve me, O God, for in you I take refuge. I say to the Lord, You are my Lord, I have no good apart from you. As for the saints in the land, they are the excellent ones, in whom is all my delight. The sorrows of those who run after another God shall multiply.

Their drink offerings of blood I will not pour out or take their names on my lips. The Lord is my chosen portion and my cup. You hold my lot. The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places. Indeed, I have a beautiful inheritance. I bless the Lord who gives me counsel.

In the night also my heart instructs me. I have set the Lord always before me. because he is at my right hand, I shall not be shaken. Therefore my heart is glad, and my whole being rejoices. My flesh also dwells secure, for you will not abandon my soul to Sheol, or let your Holy One see corruption. You make known to me the path of life. In your presence there is fullness of joy.

At your right hand are pleasures forevermore. You may be seated. All right, just one giveaway this session, and that is, is there anybody who is in the process of ACBC certification? You know your pastor is the guru at ACBC. so all right then next question I suppose anybody need help with their emotions yeah you don't want this one huh oh you do oh okay all right so this is for michael though right yeah all right got it yes well it's just an absolute delight the your um your warmth and hospitality and receptivity have been just a huge blessing.

And for our last session today, I'd like you to turn to Ecclesiastes chapter 9. Ecclesiastes chapter 9. And tomorrow what we'll do is we will actually do chapter 12 on remember your Creator in the days of your youth before you get old and decrepit and life stinks. This is my favorite passage in Ecclesiastes. Chapter 9. For I've taken all this to my heart and explained it that righteous men, wise men, and their deeds are in the hand of God.

Man does not know whether it will be love or hatred anything awaits him it's the same for all there's one fate for the righteous and for the wicked for the good for the clean and for the unclean for the man who offers a sacrifice and for the one who does not sacrifice as a good man is so is the sinner as the swearer is so is the one who's afraid to swear there is an evil in all that is done under the sun and there's one fate for all men furthermore the hearts of the sons of men are full of evil and insanity is in their hearts throughout their lives. Afterwards, they go to the dead. For whoever is joined with all the living, there is hope.

Surely, a live dog is better than a dead lion. For the living know they will die, but the dead do not know anything, nor have they any longer a reward for their memory is forgotten. Indeed, their love, their hate, and their zeal have already perished, and they will no longer have a share in all that is done under the sun. Go then. Eat your bread in happiness.

Drink your wine with a cheerful heart for God has already approved your works. Let your clothes be white all the time and let not oil be lacking on your head. Enjoy life with the woman whom you love all the days of your fleeting life. You see that word fleeting? That's the word hevel. Fleeting life which He has given you under the sun, for this is your reward in life and in your toil in which you have labored under the sun.

Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might, for there is no activity or planning or knowledge or wisdom and shield where you're going. Let's pray. Father, we do thank You that even though our hearts are prone to wander, You're the God who faithfully preserves Your people we thank you that you not only preserve us but by your grace you cause us to persevere and Father we pray that in this time together as we look at this remarkable passage that your spirit would come and help us and give us insight and illumination Lord and not just that but we pray for grace and power to not only be hearers of the word but doers also So, in Jesus' name, Amen.

So we all know and understand that God created the world and He made it good That the recurring refrain of the first six days of creation culminating with the sixth day and God saw that it was very good. And to be sure, this good world that God has created has been stained by sin. And because this world has been stained by sin, in a sense it's obscured God's glory in it, and it has often spoiled his good gifts.

And to be sure, there's a sense in which the devil has twisted this life and he's twisted the things of earth that are meant to be good gifts so that we worship what we ought to simply enjoy and then we destroy it in the process. now the church has often in a sense responded to the reality of this fallen world with sort of a disdain for it I love the Puritans as much as anybody read the Puritans regularly but every once in a while you get this little strain for instance exhibited by Isaac Watts in a hymn that we never sing at our church how vain are all the things here below And he says this, How vain are all things here below! How false, and yet how fair! Each pleasure has its poison too, every sweet a snare.

That's Isaac Watts. Solomon, so I commend pleasure. So which one is it? Is everything here below, every pleasure, every sweet thing, simply a poison and a snare, or is joy really good? And in fact, required. The message of the Bible, I would say, not the message in the sense of the only message, the preeminent message, but the message of the Bible is that enjoying God's good gifts in this short, vaporous life glorifies God.

I can demonstrate this to you easily. So, if you're married, do you glorify God more by enjoying life with your spouse or being a bitter, miserable, nasty person? All in the name of being a good Calvinist. Enjoying, not worshipping, the things of earth, I would argue, helps us to worship God. David Gibson, again, he says, God takes pleasure in your pleasure.

He's given it to you. And so this section of Ecclesiastes 9, 1-10, I would actually say gives us Ecclesiastes in a nutshell, and gives us perspective on life and God and joy and teaches us something profound. And that is, it teaches us how to put death to shame. Or, to put it a different way, how to really live before you die. Now, the first six verses is the providence of God over life and death.

And verse 1, I'll just go through this part quickly. verse 1, everything is in the hand of God. So Solomon has reaffirmed the sovereignty of God over and over in the book, and he also has affirmed that things don't always work out the way that we expect them to work out, especially with the righteous and the wicked. There's sort of a conventional wisdom that goes something like this, things will go well for the righteous and things will go poorly for the wicked, And the fact is that we know that the Bible often wrestles with the reality that just the reverse happens.

Sometimes, oftentimes, frequently, it's the righteous who suffer and the wicked who prosper. That's what Psalm 73 is all about. Wrestling with this obvious dilemma in God's universe. But when you come to chapter 9 and verse 1, Solomon says that whether you're a righteous man a wise man your deeds are in the hands of God and man doesn't know whether it will be love or hatred anything awaits him and so the righteous and the wise have no guarantees that their righteousness or their wisdom will produce a smiling providence although those things are in the hands of a sovereign God Solomon says this either love or hate awaits them.

And the idea of love or hate, love would be speaking of God's graciousness, the blessing. Hate would be representing a future that's to be feared. And the key is that anything awaits. And so here's the thing, is that there are no formulas in life that are actually ironclad and always work. Woe to the Christian who actually just lives by the idea that if I just do the parenting just right and put just the right ingredients in the right order, I'll have the right outcome.

Solomon says there's no guarantee. No matter how wise you are, no matter how righteous you are, there are no guarantees in terms of how things are going to turn out. Solomon could say it like this, so who are the friends of God? Well, you can't tell by who's blessed and who's not. Who's loved by God? You can't tell by God's treatment of them.

Another famous reformed theologian Mark Twain Mark Twain said God would have more friends if he treated the ones that he had a little better Sometimes, sometimes, oftentimes, you cannot tell who the friends of God are simply by the circumstances of their life. And so, Solomon's already told us that prosperity is not always a blessing and adversity is not always a curse and we should be catching on now that there's no formula that interprets life for us and there's no formula for the outcomes that we want to produce. And here's the big bummer for Solomon and that is that death ends up being an indiscriminate killer.

So verse 2 is that you're going to die no matter how you live. You do know that, right? You're going to die no matter how you live. And so, again, David Gibson, he says, if you expect good people to get a fair deal from the grim reaper, then you've got a pretty bitter pill to swallow. This is not the way the world is at all. In fact, here's Solomon's dilemma that doesn't actually make sense to him, and that is that death, this terrible event, death, this cruel intruder, death, is actually something that happens to the good, to the bad, to the religious, the irreligious, the one who makes oaths, the one who was afraid to make an oath, those who shun living for God, those who live for God.

Death happens to everybody. Solomon says it's an evil done under the sun. That same event. By the way, the Bible never romanticizes death. Ever. The Bible doesn't talk about death the way that sometimes we try to talk about death.

Solomon says this, even knowing that, even knowing that you're going to die, verse 3, man still lives a life full of evil. Now, by the way, that actually assumes the reality that we're going to give an account to God. So here we are. We know that we're going to die and death is an absolute certainty. But here's the reality is that most humanity, and this goes back to chapter 3, most humanity is barely above the beasts. that is his passions like a beast make him a spiritually insane animal who doesn't operate according to truth he doesn't operate according to logic he doesn't operate according to reality he operates simply on the basis of his heart wants what it wants and therefore he's going to get it and this is his pattern throughout life and then that pattern comes to a screeching halt when his heart beats for the last time and then he goes to the place of the dead.

Now Solomon is absolutely dedicated to living. So there is this advantage to being alive. Verses 4-6 Whoever is joined with all the living, there is hope. Surely a live dog is better than a dead lion. Now this is not saying, and this is a different study, but Solomon's view of the afterlife, although not fully developed as in New Testament terms, it is still a view that the Spirit actually returns to God who gave it.

We'll see that tomorrow. But the idea is that when death comes, from the perspective of this side of the grave, there's no more hope. And by the way, a lot of times in the Old Testament, when they talk about death, they're talking about death from the standpoint of the living. And so they look at it, and life is to be preferred over death. Hope in this life is actually the hope of being able to continue to enjoy the good gifts.

And when death comes, that opportunity is no more. And so he says, surely a live dog is better than a dead lion. And so I would just remind all of us this morning that no Israelite in their right mind would have ever had a domesticated pet that actually brought them their slippers and the Jerusalem Times. Dogs were held in contempt. Now, we had a golden retriever.

She was perfect. And she lived in the house and was treated like a human being. But besides her, dogs were held in contempt in ancient Israel. In fact, the term dog was used as a derogatory term for unclean Gentiles. But the lion, oh, the lion. Now there's a beast to be admired.

Fierce, regal, royal, mighty, right? And so Solomon is so committed to breathing, he says being a live dog is better than being a dead king of the beasts, right? And so being just committed to breathing. So in 2016, I got diagnosed with a brain tumor and a lady sent me a card and she said, Pastor Borgman, I'm praying for a smooth home going. I wrote her back and said, stop praying.

Stop praying. Here's the reality. While you're alive, guess what? you know that you're going to die and that gives you opportunity to reckon with your own death. There's an opportunity while you're living to start to learn it to live it backwards. Then he says, in a sense, death brings an end to all of the opportunities that you have in this life. He says the dead know nothing, no more reward, their memory is forgotten.

And again, he's talking about life from this perspective, from this side of the grave perspective. No more chances, in a sense, to learn wisdom. No more ability to enjoy the good things of life. And death that enemy causes our memory to fade Verse 6 actually underscores this very vividly So when somebody dies there no longer opportunity for the living to hug them There's no more opportunity to be able to speak to them about past memories, let alone the ability to make new ones. death is an enemy that robs us of life which is in fact a good gift Herman Bovink a little Dutch theologian says death breaks the varied and wonderful bonds of life relations in this world in comparison with life this side of the grave death results in non-being the disturbing negation of the rich and joyful experience of life on earth and so again Solomon never romanticizes death.

He's pained by the fact that what makes life a breath, that what makes it end so quickly is that death is going to come to all of us. And so, in light of the first six verses, the real question then becomes this. How in the world do you live knowing that you're going to die? That is the big question. By the way, the people that never reckon with the fact that they're going to die will never be able to truly live while they live.

And so the question that the first six verses just press upon us is, how are you going to live knowing that one of these days you in fact will breathe your last? And so for Solomon, this is of preeminence importance. Why? Because Solomon is so committed to life as a gift from God, he's not going to let death rob him of God's gift by swindling him out of the joy of this brief life.

And so you could say it this way, Solomon is going to teach us, as it were, how to kick death in the teeth by really living while we live. Pulling the fangs, as it were, out of death by embracing life as a gift and living it with joy. So here's now, how to live before you die. Are you interested in this part? You could have kept the first six verses to yourself.

Thank you very much. Let's get to the last part. Well, the last part is not going to make any sense until you embrace the first part. And so this is Solomon's inspired counsel on how to live before you die. and it's not going to be just some sort of, well, life is meaningless, so just have all the pleasure you can get. What He's going to do in these four verses is He's going to call us to a full-orbed, God-centered sanctification by showing us God's will for our lives.

And so God commands us, He commands us to enjoy this life in the havel, in the mist, in the mystery, in the sadness, and now He's going to give us a four-fold prescription for joy. In other words, how do you put death to shame? How do you live before you die? Number one, you ready? There's four prescriptions. They'll change your life.

Ready? Number one, enjoy your food. You say, you came all the way from Nevada? No, it's Nevada. you came all the way from there to tell me to enjoy my food? And the answer is, yes. Now that may seem, oh my goodness, that doesn't sound very spiritual, but food is actually a good gift from God.

And eating good food and enjoying good food is glorifying God. God takes delight when we enjoy His good gifts. and so you want to actually really live before you die, enjoy the food you eat. You go, that seems so, so like earthy. Yeah, that's kind of the point. Is that the earthy stuff glorifies God. So, now there are some exceptions to enjoying your food.

Brussels sprouts, for instance. I have textual evidence from the Masoretic text that Brussels sprouts came about after the fall, and so we can talk about that. But when you enjoy a good meal with thanksgiving, you're actually enjoying this life that he's given you. And so I would say light up the barbecue, or as you would say, probably grill, right? Or do you say barbecue?

Grill. Smoker. Yeah, okay. Light up whatever you cook meat on. Marinate some ribeyes. Bake a potato.

Don't forget the butter and sour cream, to the glory of God. and have a little salad for conscience sake. And as the food delights the taste buds, give thanks. Don't overeat, don't abuse God's gifts, but enjoy the food that He's given. It honors Him. The next imperative actually causes a little anxiety among some Baptists. Drink your wine with a cheerful heart. so we'll just adapt drink your Welch's grape juice with a cheerful heart by the way wine in the Bible is not seen from a prohibitionist perspective it's actually seen, Psalm 104, as a celebratory gift from God.

And so in connection with God's blessing, it's a celebration, and that connection is unmistakable. And Solomon, again, he's not talking about abusing the good gifts of God, but using God's gifts for His glory and our enjoyment. And then Solomon says something interesting in verse 6. He says, the reason that you can enjoy your food and drink your wine with gladness is because God has accepted your works.

By the way, this is a statement of absolute liberation. Our works are in God's hands, 9-1. If we live by sort of the standard formulas of acceptance with God, then we'll never really know whether we're accepted with God or not. But if we live by divine revelation, knowing that He's accepted us and our works, and we're no longer living on the performance track, but on the already accepted by grace track, then actually that enhances our capacity to enjoy the good gifts of God and the assurance is that God's already accepted me.

By the way, if you live life on the I need to get acceptance from God track, you will never ever be able to really enjoy life to the full. What do I mean by that? you will always be second guessing yourself wondering whether do I love my husband too much he of course says no and do I love my kids too much am I pouring too much energy into this or that and always second guessing did I overeat should I have checked my blood sugar before I ate the baked potato I mean all of these things right and when you know that God actually has already accepted you and it is not on the basis of your own works that He has accepted you. You actually are free in Christ in a way knowing that you've already been accepted by the Father.

You are His child and He has bestowed upon you good gifts in this life to be enjoyed, not to nag your conscience, but to glorify Him. and so the next one is be a joyful person you want to live before you die enjoy your food and be a joyful person so where do you get that let your clothes be white all the time that's not go out and get white dress slacks and white shirt and make sure that you only wear white. That would be really weird, even in Ohio. Okay?

The idea is that it's the opposite of sackcloth. It's the opposite of the apparel of grief. There's something about the white clothing that is celebratory. And so he's not saying, hey, get cool clothes and a cool haircut. but he is saying, don't walk around like the sky is falling all the time. Some of you honestly have to stop watching some of these YouTube videos.

You know who you are. We have them in our church. Some big conspiracy, going to overthrow the world, undermine everything and you know what I say maybe right well pastor what are we going to do about it I'm going to go home and eat a ribeye and be happy you don't understand you're not staying up on bitcoin and Russia and Ukraine and all of this and I'm like, I stay up on it as much as I need to.

Well, what are you going to do about it? We need to preach about these things. Okay, here's my sermon. Go eat a steak and be a happy person. Okay. I mean, let's face it, whether the world ends tomorrow or it ends a thousand years from now, whether Jesus comes back today or comes back a thousand years from now.

Okay. What's your calling? enjoy this short life enjoy it be a cheerful person a joyful person an old Puritan Charles Bridges he says the charge of melancholy is a libel upon religion whereas John Newton writes solid joys and lasting treasures none but Zion's children know And so let me say something about being a miserable person. Because here's Solomon's remedy.

Enjoy your food. Be a joyful person. What if you're a miserable person? Well, I want to say you should consciously think about living in such a way that when you die, you'll be missed. You know what happens when miserable people die? They're not missed. live a joyful life that spreads the joy of Christ and when you die people miss you be a joyful person now I want to read something to you that's incredibly sad Dolores Aguilar 79 years old this is from Vallejo, California the California Times Herald from August 2008.

And this is her obituary submitted by her daughter. Dolores Aguilar born in 1929 in New Mexico left us on August 7th She be met in the afterlife by her husband Raymond her son Paul Jr and daughter Ruby Dolores had no hobbies, made no contribution to society, and rarely shared a kind word or thought or deed in her life. I speak for the majority of her family when I say her presence will not be missed by many.

Very few tears will be shed and there will be no lamenting over her passing. Her family will remember Dolores, and amongst ourselves we will remember her in our own way, which are mostly sad and troubling times throughout the years. We may have some fond memories of her, perhaps we will think of those times too, but I believe at the end of the day, all of us will only really miss what we never had, a good and kind mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother.

I hope she's finally at peace with herself, as for the rest of us left behind, I hope this is the beginning of a time of healing and learning to be a family again. There will be no service, no prayers, no closure for the family that she spent a lifetime tearing apart. We cannot come together end to end to see to it that her grandchildren and great-grandchildren can say their goodbyes.

So I say here for all of us, goodbye mom. you might think to yourself what a terrible thing for a daughter to write about her mother and what I want to say is what a terrible life lived that would cause a daughter to write that about her mother. If you're a miserable person and all you do is spread your misery when you die people will breathe a sigh of relief. Be a joyful person.

A person who actually just spreads the joy that's in Christ. You know, so I have, my daughter has three sons. And my other son has a daughter and a son. And I want them to think back on their grandpa. and you know what I want them to think? I want them to think, he was so fun to be around. He was always making us laugh.

Do you remember the time he said this or did that? I want them to look back and say, you know, one thing I know for sure about Grandpa is that he loved the Lord Jesus Christ. What I want them to look back and think upon are the times in which I pled with them for their souls or held them on the ground and tickled them or took them to a Giants game or did something that was just fun.

I want them to look back and I want them to have fond memories. I want them to have fond memories of me as a follower of Jesus, as a really good grandpa who loved them, as someone who passionately loved the San Francisco Giants and passionately hated the Los Angeles Dodgers. I want those principles to be woven deep into their hearts. Why? Because it's important to me that while I live, that I know that when I die, they'll miss me because I brought them joy.

Be the joyful person. If you're a miserable person that spreads misery, you need to repent and ask God to help you. If you're a Christian, you have no reason to be miserable. You have the Lord Jesus Christ as your portion and your hope and you have life to come. You have no reason to be miserable. And so be a joyful person.

If you want to kick death in the teeth while you live, be a joyful person. Laugh. Laugh. One of the things that I absolutely, I'd say this whether she was here or not. I have no filter. My wife is the most joyful, cheerful person that I know.

And God put her in my life because I'm not the most joyful, cheerful person I know. And one of the things that sweetens my life is to hear her laugh. And she does it all the time. Joyful people sweeten the lives of those around them. So enjoy your food. Be a joyful person.

Number nine. Ready? Enjoy your spouse. Solomon shows that marriage is this vital ingredient of kicking death in the teeth. Why? Because marriage is a gift from God.

It's the joining together of a man and a woman in love. Notice it's significant that Solomon says in verse 9, enjoy life with the woman whom you love all the days of your fleeting life. And so what Solomon is telling us is that marriage brings a sweetness to this short life. Marriage is, as it were, an elixir in our death row cell under the sun. It's part of our portion.

It's part of the reward of our toil. Since Solomon sees marriage as God's design, then there ought to be... Are you ready? Married people, pay attention. Those of you who aren't married yet, just come back and listen to this sermon later. Sanctified indulgence in the joys of marriage glorifies God. to love your spouse to enjoy your spouse to laugh with your spouse to enjoy the blessings of marriage is the way to glorify God Now, one of the texts that I quote at this point, I'll just appropriately quote it with children present.

Solomon says, Let your fountain be blessed and rejoice in the wife of your youth as a loving hind and a graceful doe. Let her peep satisfy you at all times. Be exhilarated. Yeah, somebody knows that text. Be exhilarated in her love. You know the word exhilarated is intoxicated.

The only place in the Bible where it's okay to be intoxicated is to be intoxicated with the love of your spouse. now me just being me I'm not a carpenter I'm not very good at anything and but I dug these planters out of our house when we lived in the previous house and I dug these planters out and I decided I was going to pour concrete in right and so I mixed the concrete myself and I'm thinking yeah I'm pretty good at this and I pour it in and of course it's not level or anything but I smooth it out and I write I write I write Brian and Ariel, Proverbs 5, 18 and 19. And so it's in concrete. It's like the law of the Medes and the Persians now.

And so I told Ariel, I said, I'm done with the concrete. And I said, I put our verse on it. And she says, what? I said, the Proverbs 5 passage. She goes, is that the passage that I think it is? And I said, yep.

And she looks at me and she says, what are we going to do when we move? We're going to have to take that with us. I said, why? She says, well, the people that move in after us might go and might look that up. I said, I hope they do. I hope they look up Proverbs 5, 18 and 19, get saved and have a better marriage.

Enjoy the spouse that God has given you. Enjoy life with the woman you love. Cherish. Protect that person He's given you. Now, if you're married, don't downplay this. we're not told live with your wife in a tolerant manner we're not told if you're married put up with your wife we're told enjoy your wife so if you say well you know what she's got her stuff I got my stuff we're kind of too busy to enjoy each other right now at this stage of life and let me just say something.

You're too busy. End of story. If you don't enjoy each other, then it's likely that you're just simply trying to take from each other what neither one of you are designed to give. You know we can try to get things from our spouse that they were never intended to give and we end up losing something in the process. Enjoy life with your spouse. Now for some of you, God has not and may not give this gift.

And for those that God withholds this gift, you have to understand, marriage is not what completes you. It's actually Jesus Christ who completes you. And so if God withholds this good gift from you in His wisdom, then seek contentment in Him and look to the other gifts that He gives for you to enjoy and live your life to the full as an unmarried person.

For those of you who do enjoy this gift, I just want to remind all of us, and we're painfully reminded of this all the time, one day God will take that gift away. And when that day comes and your spouse goes to be with the Lord, the sadness and the sorrow will be there, but so will be the joy of the gift while you had it. Sometimes that's exactly what we need to do, is we need to stop and think, thank you Lord for the gift while I had it. my hero is Jonathan Edwards and a theological hero Edwards died of a smallpox inoculation 30 days after taking the presidency of Princeton and after he died his dear wife Sarah who is a remarkable woman wrote to their daughter oldest daughter Esther Esther's husband Aaron Burr Sr. had died and this is what Sarah writes to her oldest daughter upon losing her husband and Esther's father.

She says, My very dear child, what shall I say? A holy and good God has covered us with a dark cloud. Oh, that we may kiss the rod and lay our hands over our mouths. The Lord has done it. And notice this. He's made me adore His goodness that we had Him so long.

But my God lives and He has my heart. Oh, what a legacy my husband and your father has left us. we're all given to God and there I am and love to be your affectionate mother Sarah Edwards Esther would never get that letter she would die before it would arrive and then Sarah would die shortly after that so for however long you have each other enjoy the gift while you have it It the gift of God Are we supposed to get in a bomb shelter or something? Okay.

What is that? Oh, it's noon, of course. We have an alarm that goes off, but I won't tell you what it's for. It's not very appealing for the state of Nevada. But there are some of you who have the gift and you don't enjoy it. And you might say, enjoy my spouse, give me a break.

There's too much water under the bridge. And I want to say nonsense. God is the God of restoration. And He makes up for the years that the locusts have eaten. You might say, well, I don't like my gift. I opened it Christmas morning and thought it was great, but then just like the cookie monster puppet that I got when I was five, I lost interest.

Repent. That spouse is the spouse that God has given you. Don't ruin the gift by not liking it or by wishing it were different. Repent. Grumbling and complaining is actually the heart of discontentment. And so, just remember, if you don't like the gift God gave you, is there work for him or her?

And the answer is yeah, but guess what? There's work that he's got to do in you too. And so pray for each other, pray with each other, get into the Word together, serve in church together, and start to grow because you will be held accountable if you make each other miserable in this life. The fourth is work hard. so Solomon concludes this section with the command to actually have a positive robust hearty approach to life and work there's nothing half hearted about Ecclesiastes in the least whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might that pertains to our work it pertains to our marriage it pertains to our worship it pertains to our enjoyments earnestness in what God has given us to do actually enables us to enjoy this life And then again, that last refrain of death comes back, not to scare us, but to motivate us.

So in verse 10, 4, there's no activity, planning, or knowledge, and wisdom, and shield where you're going. The idea is to live like this before you die. Enjoy the basics of life. Enjoy your food. Be a joyful person. Enjoy your spouse.

Work hard. because one of these days all of those opportunities are going to be taken away from you. I would suggest to you in closing that oftentimes we have a distorted view of worldliness that may in fact sap the pleasure out of this life that God has actually required us to enjoy. This is an original with me, but Joe Rigney, who used to be a Baptist and is not anymore wrote a couple of really fine books one was called The Things of Earth and the other was called Strangely Bright and Rigney suggests that that great hymn that we sing turn your eyes upon Jesus look full in His wonderful face and the things of earth will grow you tell me strangely dim in the light of His glory and grace.

Right? I want to say that there's truth to that. Rigney suggests, though, that we sing it differently. Turn your eyes upon Jesus. Look full in His wonderful face. And the things of earth will grow strangely bright in the light of His glory and grace. turning your eyes on Jesus sweetens your marriage turning your eyes on Jesus makes you a better spouse turning your eyes on Jesus keeps the things of earth in perspective and so there is this wonderful sense that when we enjoy God's gifts as gifts from Him we don't worship them but we enjoy them we're glorifying the God who gave them.

And so, David Gibson again, he says, in the created world, you can only truly enjoy what you do not worship. Think about this as we close. God's gifts to us, in this life, are precursor to a new heaven and a new earth. Where we will enjoy Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and all of the gifts of a new creation in a way that it will not be a mere breath, but it will last forever and ever and ever.

And in that new creation, there will no longer be the specter of death hovering over our shoulder, reminding us that one of these days these good gifts will end. But instead, without any pain of Havel, without any pain of the brevity of life, we will enjoy Christ and the new creation in a way that all of the gifts that we experience in this life will be better and brighter if Jesus Christ is ours. You say, well, what about marriage?

There won't be marriage in heaven. Oh yes, there will. there will be the marriage of the Lamb to His bride forever and then we will stand in awe as we looked at how our marriage were dim reflections of that ultimate marriage. And we will enjoy that marriage in a way that we've never been able to enjoy our marriages here on earth in a way that's better and brighter.

And so if Jesus Christ is ours, if He is ours, He is the greatest gift that we could ever have. And all other lesser gifts in this life grow strangely bright in the light of His glory and grace. And so in the life to come, all of the greatest gifts are to be enjoyed with Jesus Christ being the very fountain. And they'll be enjoyed with no more tears, no more pain, and no more death.

The first things will have passed away. Everything will be made new. and so we sing this regularly at grace we say when on that day the great I am the faithful and the true the lamb who was for sinners slain is making all things new behold our God shall live with us and be our steadfast light and we shall heir his people be Let pray Father, thank You for the sweetest gift of all, our Lord Jesus Christ. He is the fountain of all goodness and grace. and Father we thank you for these short lives that you've given us may we embrace them as a gift may we live them to the full honoring and glorifying you and Father we pray Father we pray for those Lord who may be under conviction of not being a joyful person or not enjoying their spouse or not working hard Lord pray that you would just simply show them today that by not doing the things that You've told them to do, they're robbing themselves, Lord, of a greater joy that You have for them.

And so, Father, we pray that Your Spirit would be mightily at work in us in a way that brings honor and glory to the Son of God who loved us and gave Himself for us and who one day will make everything new. Amen.