MONDAY January 15
The Pleasure Principle
Solomon, finding wisdom a vain endeavor, goes after pleasure instead. The constant search for pleasure is called hedonism. Most people who are pleasure seekers are just looking for a good time. Some people, however, truly believe that pleasure is the sum of all good, and whatever is pleasurable is, therefore, also good.
Put yourself in the mind of someone who does not believe in God. According to their thinking, if this life is all there is, if there is nothing beyond it, if there is no moral law that we all are answerable to, then why not just kick back and enjoy yourself in any way you please, even at the expense of others? What answer do you have for someone like this?
Compare what Solomon wrote in Ecclesiastes 2:1-3 with what he wrote in Proverbs 6:23-29, 7:6-27, 20:1, 23:1-6. How is he, here in Ecclesiastes, expressing the same sentiments that he wrote out years earlier?
There's something incredibly tricky about seeking pleasure just for pleasure's sake. For some reason, when we get it and even enjoy it, sooner or later it doesn't satisfy. Sooner or later the pleasure loses something, or we need more and more of it to reach the same level of immediate satisfaction. Sooner or later we realize that there's much more to life than just pleasure and that pleasure alone leaves us hollow, empty, dissatisfied. This is a lesson that Solomon learned for himself the hard way.
Solomon is a man who, though once warning people about lust, ended up with "seven hundred wives, princesses, and three hundred concubines" (1 Kings 11:3); a guy who, though warning against gluttony, eventually would feast like a pig (1 Kings 4:22, 23). How easy it is to fall! What lessons can you take away from this fall that should serve as a warning to you?
TUESDAY January 16
"All That My Eyes Desired"
One of the most famous, and successful, businessmen in American history was Lee Iacocca, who ran the giant Chrysler Corporation for many years. Toward the end of his life, he once said, "Here I am in the twilight years of my life, still wondering what it's all about. . . . I can tell you this, fame and fortune is for the birds."
Read Ecclesiastes 2:4-11. What's the basic point of his message here?
Solomon gained a certain satisfaction from his material prosperity (Eccles. 2:10) but, in the end, the satisfaction did not last, did not fulfill the most basic longings of his soul (vs. 11). If material possessions could bring happiness, Solomon should have been the happiest person in the world. As you read Ecclesiastes, you can see that these are not the words of a happy man.
Read again Ecclesiastes 2:4-11. What things did Solomon acquire? See also 1 Kings 7 and 1 Kings 10:10-29.
Why, though, with so much, was he still not happy?
All that Solomon had were physical things; all his physical desires were satiated. Yet, as human beings, we are more than the sum of our organs and flesh. There's a spiritual, moral component to us that all the physical things in the world cannot satisfy. Solomon was proof of that. It's interesting, too, that even in the so-called "developed" world, in which people have wealth and material prosperity, the levels of unhappiness and dissatisfaction with life are sometimes even higher than nations in which the people have less.
Read Matthew 6:33. How could this great truth have solved Solomon's problem? What does the text say to you amid your own temptations?
WEDNESDAY January 17
The Fate of a Fool
"Then I thought in my heart, 'The fate of the fool will overtake me also. What then do I gain by being wise?' I said in my heart, `This too is meaningless'" (Eccles. 2:15, NIV).
Solomon is having a hard time. All his wisdom, he believed, did him no good. He then sought after pleasure and mirth and found it empty. And then, even being perhaps the richest man in all antiquity didn't satisfy the innermost needs of his soul. He found it all "vanity and striving after wind" (vs. 11, NASB).
As if all these weren't bad enough, it gets worse.
Read Ecclesiastes 2:12-17. What is he complaining about now? How valid are his complaints? How can you, as a Christian, answer him?
Jesus said something that in a close way relates to what Solomon is saying here. Talking about the Father, Jesus said, "He maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust" (Matt. 5:45). In another place, after talking about some Galileans whose "blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices" (Luke 13:1), Jesus then said: " 'Do you suppose that these Galileans were worse sinners than all other Galileans, because they suffered such things? I tell you, no; but unless you repent you will all likewise perish' " (Luke 13:2, 3, NKJV; see also verses 4, 5). In both these places Jesus is talking about what seems obvious to all of us: that pain and suffering aren't just the lot of the wicked. The good suffer as well. The difference is that Solomon, seeing this fact, believes that everything we do is useless because we all, the fool and the wise, wind up dead. Jesus, though, comes to a different conclusion: " 'Unless you repent you will all likewise perish' " (NKJV). Jesus was pointing them to something beyond the immediate fate of either the wicked or the just.
How does your faith in God help you deal with the nondiscriminatory reach of death? What Bible promises offer you the greatest hope in the context of the inevitability of the grave?