Title The Hebrew title is Qoheleth, which means “one
who convenes and speaks at an assembly,” or “an ecclesiastic” or “preacher.”
The Greek equivalent, ecclesiastes, also means “preacher”
and is derived from the word “assembly.”
Authorship Though not specified
as Solomon, the author identifies himself as “the son of David, king in Jerusalem”
(1:1). References in the book to the author’s unrivaled wisdom (1:16), unequalled wealth (2:7), opportunities
for pleasure (2:3), and extensive building activities (2:4-6) all point to
Solomon, since no other descendant of David measured up to such specifications.
Jewish tradition explicitly stated that Solomon was the author.
Message The message of the book
may be stated in the form of three propositions:
(1) When you look at life with its seemingly aimless cycles (1:4ff.) and
inexplicable paradoxes (4:1; 7:15;
8:8), you might conclude that all is futile, since it is impossible to discern
any purpose in the ordering of events;
(2) Life is to be enjoyed to the fullest, realizing that it is the gift of
God (3:12-13; 3:22; 5:18-19;
8:15; 9:7-9);
(3) The wise man will live his life in obedience to God, recognizing that
God will eventually judge all men (3:16-17;
12:14).
Verses frequently quoted from the book include:
(Eccl 1:2 KJV) Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of
vanities; all is vanity.
(Eccl 3:1 KJV) To every thing there is a season, and a time to
every purpose under the heaven:
(Eccl 4:12b KJV) …and a threefold cord is not quickly broken.
(Eccl 11:1 KJV) Cast thy bread upon the waters: for thou shalt find
it after many days.
(Eccl 12:1 KJV) Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth,
while the evil days come not, nor the years draw nigh, when thou shalt say, I
have no pleasure in them;
(Eccl 12:13 KJV) Let us hear the conclusion of the
whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty
of man.
:1-3 All is Futile
:1 The words of the Preacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem.
Preacher – qoheleth– collector (of sentences), preacher,
public speaker, speaker in an assembly, Qoheleth
In Hebrew, this is the title of the book.
:2 Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities; all is
vanity.
vanity – hebel– vapour, breath; vanity (fig.)
Without God, life is a waste.
(John 10:10 KJV)The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I
am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.
:3 What profit hath a man of all his labour which he taketh under the sun?
There’s no guarantee that if you work hard you will succeed and “get
ahead”.
In his Unfolding Message of the Bible, G. Campbell Morgan perfectly
summarizes Solomon’s outlook: “This man had been living through all these
experiences under the sun, concerned with nothing above the sun...until there
came a moment in which he had seen the whole of life. And there was something
over the sun. It is only as a man takes account of that which is over the sun
as well as that which is under the sun that things under the sun are seen in
their true light” (Fleming H. Revell Company, 1961,
p. 229).[1]
:4-11 Futility of cycles of life
:8 All things are full of labour
full of labour – everything is hard work.
:9 The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is
done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun.
This doesn’t mean that there will never be any new “stuff”
Illustration
In the last century, Lord Kelvin, a physicist and president of Britain’s
prestigious Royal Society, stated that “radio has no future”.He also contended that “heavier-than-air
flying machines are impossible” and that “X-rays will prove to be a hoax.”
About the same time, a British parliamentary committee dismissed Thomas
Edison’s incandescent lamp as “unworthy of attention of practical or scientific
men”.
In 1889 the director of the United States Patent Office urged President
William McKinley to close down the office because “everything that can be
invented has been invented.”
Though we come up with new ways of doing things and new gadgets, life’s
lessons are still the same.
We’re all looking for the “new” thing. But there’s a sense in which nothing
is “new”.
:11 There is no remembrance of former things; neither shall there be any
remembrance of things that are to come with those that shall come after.
Why do anything special? Everything is eventually forgotten. Past things
are forgotten. Things that haven’t happened yet will be forgotten one day.
:12-18 Futility of human wisdom
:13 this sore travail hath God given to the sons of man
sore travail – oppressive task, “evil job”
:14 I have seen all the works that are done under the sun; and, behold, all
is vanity and vexation of spirit.
vexation of spirit – lit., “striving
after the wind”; i.e., futile activity
:15 That which is crooked cannot be made straight: and that which is
wanting cannot be numbered.
There are lots of difficult things that can’t be fixed.
wanting – checrown– the thing lacking, defect,
deficiency; You can’t count the number of things that aren’t
:16 …and have gotten more wisdom than all they that have been before me in Jerusalem
all they that have been before me in Jerusalem
– perhaps including his father David, Melchizedek, Adoni-zedek,
other great men who lived in Jerusalem.
:18 For in much wisdom is much grief: and he that increaseth knowledge
increaseth sorrow.
Wisdom doesn’t eliminate life’s problems.
It just helps you see how many problems there are.
I often think if I just knew the right thing to do, I could solve any
problem.
That’s not correct. Some things aren’t going to be solved. Some problems
you have with people aren’t going to be resolved just because you do everything
that is correct. The other person still has to respond correctly.
Ecclesiastes 2
:1-11 Futility of pleasure and wealth
:1 I said in mine heart, Go to now, I will prove thee with mirth, therefore
enjoy pleasure: and, behold, this also is vanity.
prove – nacah– to test, try, prove, tempt, assay,
put to the proof or test
mirth – simchah– joy, mirth, gladness; pleasure
pleasure – towb– a good thing, benefit, welfare; moral
good; prosperity, happiness
He thought he’d try the “American Dream”, the pursuit of happiness.He found it to be empty.
:3 I sought in mine heart to give myself unto wine
Like the fellow who tries alcohol or drugs.
:7 possessions of great and small cattle
great and small cattle – oxen, sheep, and goats
:8 I gat me men singers and women singers, and the delights of the sons of
men, as musical instruments, and that of all sorts.
men singers and women singers – the latest in home entertainment
musical instruments, and that of all sorts – some of the newer
translations have, “ladies (i.e.,
concubines) very many”
(Eccl 2:8 NLT) …and had many beautiful concubines. I had everything
a man could desire!
Solomon had 700 wives and 300 concubines (1Ki. 11:3)
He tried to fill his life with sex.
:11 Then I looked on all the works that my hands had wrought, and on the
labour that I had laboured to do: and, behold, all was vanity and vexation of
spirit, and there was no profit under the sun.
Illustration
A company in Las Vegas called “Thrillseekers Unlimited” specializes in what it calls an “Adrenalin
vacation.” Owner Rick Hopkins enthusiastically promotes a week of skydiving,
bungee jumping, firewalking, paragliding, and rock
climbing for the not-so- faint-of-heart.
Illustration
America is
said to have the highest per capita boredom of any spot on earth! We know that
because we have the greatest number of artificial amusements of any country.
People have become so empty that they can’t even entertain themselves. They
have to pay other people to amuse them, to make them laugh, to try to make them
feel warm and happy and comfortable for a few minutes, to try to lose that
awful, frightening, hollow feeling; that terrible, dreaded feeling of being
lost and alone.
-- Billy Graham,
:12-17 Futility of wisdom
:12 for what can the man do that cometh after the king? even that which
hath been already done.
Whoever follows the “king” (who ever follows Solomon) isn’t going to be
able to do any better than he’s done. They’ll come to the same conclusion.
Lesson
Don’t go there.
Why go down the same road? Why not just learn from Solomon?
Some of you have been down some of these roads.Others haven’t.If you haven’t, it’s okay to learn from
Solomon and not go down these roads yourself.
:13 Then I saw that wisdom excelleth folly, as far as light excelleth
darkness.
Wise is better than foolish.
Illustration
Under the category: “Too Stupid,” here is a true story out of San
Francisco.It
seems a man, wanting to rob a downtown Bank of America, walked into the branch
and wrote “This iz a stikkup.Put all your muny
in this bag.”While standing in line,
waiting to give his note to the teller, he began to worry that someone had seen
him write the note and might call the police before he reached the teller
window.So he left the Bank of America
and crossed the street to Wells Fargo.After waiting a few minutes in line, he handed his note to the Wells
Fargo teller.She read it and, surmising
from his spelling errors that he was not the brightest light in the harbor,
told him that she could not accept his stick up note because it was written on
a Bank of America deposit slip and that he would either have to fill out a
Wells Fargo deposit slip or go back to Bank of America.Looking some what defeated, the man said “OK”
and left the Wells Fargo.The Wells
Fargo teller then called the police who arrested the man a few minutes later,
as he was waiting in line back at the Bank of America.
-- AP 11-14-97.
:14 I myself perceived also that one event happeneth to them all.
It’s better to be wise than a fool.
Yet both will die.
:18-23 Futility of hard work
:18 Yea, I hated all my labour which I had taken under the sun: because I
should leave it unto the man that shall be after me.
How much does a wealthy man leave behind? All of it.
:21 …yet to a man that hath not laboured therein shall he leave it for his
portion
You work hard and accumulate a fortune to leave it all behind for someone
who may not know what to do with it or deserve it.
:23 For all his days are sorrows, and his travail grief
Illustration
Businessmen say lives ‘empty’:A
study of 4,126 male business executives reveals widespread dissatisfaction with
the corporate experience.Forty-eight
percent of all middle managers said that despite years spent striving to
achieve their professional goals, their lives seemed “empty and
meaningless.”68% of senior executives
said that they had neglected their family lives to pursue professional goals,
and half said they would spend less time working and more time with their wives
and children if they could start over again.The question that men are asking today is:“What am I doing all this for?”Before, the payoff was security and long-term
employment.But corporations don’t
return loyalty as they used to, and men today are saying they don’t see the
investment as being worth it.So says
Jan Halper of the Palo AltoConsultingCenter
who conducted the survey.
-- San Francisco Chronicle, 1989
:24-26 Enjoy what you have
:24-26 There is nothing better for a man, than that he should eat and
drink, and that he should make his soul enjoy good in his labour. This also I
saw, that it was from the hand of God.
Lesson
Enjoy God’s blessings.
The Epicurean philosophy is:
(1 Cor15:32 KJV) …let us eat and
drink; for to morrow we die.
But this philosophy is based on thinking that this life is all there is, so
you better get as much of it as you can, no matter whether it’s good or evil.
Solomon’s philosophy is different because his philosophy is based on the
truth that there is a God, we will be judged by Him, and so we enjoy what we
have under God’s guidance.
We need to learn to enjoy what we have.
I think that sometimes I feel a bit too guilty for some reason to really
enjoy it when I’ve been blessed. And I have been blessed.
If you’re married, enjoy your spouse:
(Prov5:18 KJV) Let thy fountain
be blessed: and rejoice with the wife of thy youth.
If you’ve got kids, enjoy your kids:
(Psa 127:3 KJV) Lo, children are an heritage of the LORD: and the
fruit of the womb is his reward.
Whatever God has blessed you with, learn to be thankful and enjoy it:
(Phil 4:11-13 NLT) Not that I was ever in need, for I have learned
how to get along happily whether I have much or little. {12} I know how to live
on almost nothing or with everything. I have learned the secret of living in
every situation, whether it is with a full stomach or empty, with plenty or
little. {13} For I can do everything with the help of Christ who gives me the
strength I need.
Illustration
The Rich Family in Our Church
by Eddie Ogan
I'll never forget Easter, 1946. I was 14, my little sister Ocy 12, and my older sister Darlene 16. We lived at home
with our mother, and the four of us knew what it was to do without many things.
My dad had died 5 years before, leaving Mom with seven school kids to raise and
no money. By 1946 my older sisters were married, and my brothers had left home.
A month before Easter, the pastor of our church announced that a special
Easter offering would be taken to help a poor family. He asked everyone to save
and give sacrificially. When we got home, we talked about what we could do. We
decided to buy 50 pounds of potatoes and live on them for a month. This would
allow us to save $20 of our grocery money for the offering.
When we thought that if we kept our electric lights turned out as much as
possible and didn’t listen to the radio, we’d save money on that month’s
electric bill. Darlene got as many house and yard cleaning jobs as possible,
and both of us babysat for everyone we could. For 15 cents, we could buy enough
cotton loops to make three pot holders to sell for $1. We made $20 on pot
holders.
That month was one of the best of our lives. Every day we counted the money
to see how much we had saved. At night we’d sit in the dark and talk about how
the poor family was going to enjoy having the money the church would give them.
We had about 80 people in church, so we figured that whatever amount of money
we had to give, the offering would surely be 20 times that much. After all,
every Sunday the pastor had reminded everyone to save for the sacrificial
offering.
The day before Easter, Ocy and I walked to the
grocery store and got the manager to give us three crisp $20 bills and one $10
bill for all our change. We ran all the way home to show Mom and Darlene. We
had never had so much money be fore. That night we were so excited we could
hardly sleep. We didn’t care that we wouldn’t have new clothes for Easter; we
had $70 for the sacrificial offering. We could hardly wait to get to church!
On Sunday morning, rain was pouring. We didn’t own an umbrella, and the
church was over a mile from our home, but it didn’t seem to matter how wet we
got. Darlene had cardboard in her shoes to fill the holes. The cardboard came
apart, and her feet got wet. But we sat in church proudly. I heard some
teenagers talking about the Smith girls having on their old dresses. I looked
at them in their new clothes, and I felt so rich.
When the sacrificial offering was taken, we were sitting on the second row
from the front. Mom put in the $10 bill, and each of us girls put in a $20. As
we walked home after church, we sang all the way. At lunch Mom had a surprise
for us. She had bought a dozen eggs, and we had boiled Easter eggs with our
fried potatoes!
Late that afternoon the minister drove up in his car. Mom went to the door,
talked with him for a moment, and then came back with an envelope in her hand.
We asked what it was, but she didn’t say a word. She opened the envelope and
out fell a bunch of money. There were three crisp $20 bills, one $10 bill and
seventeen $1 bills. Mom put the money back in the envelope. We didn’t talk,
just sat and stared at the floor. We had gone from feeling like millionaires to
feeling like poor white trash.
We kids had had such a happy life that we felt sorry for anyone who didn’t
have our mom and dad for parents and a house full of brothers and sisters and
other kids visiting constantly. We thought it was fun to share silverware and
see whether we got the fork or the spoon that night. We had two knives which we
passed around to whoever needed them.
I knew we didn’t have a lot of things that other people had, but I’d never
thought we were poor. That Easter Day I found out we were. The minister had brought
us the money for the poor family, so we must be poor. I didn’t like being poor.
I looked at my dress and worn-out shoes and felt so ashamed that I didn’t want
to go back to church. Everyone there probably already knew we were poor! I
thought about school. I was in the ninth grade and at the top of my class of
over 100 students. I wondered if the kids at school knew we were poor. I
decided I could quit school since I had finished the eighth grade. That was all
the law required at that time.
We sat in silence for a long time. Then it got dark, and we went to bed.
All that week, we girls went to school and came home, and no one talked much.
Finally on Saturday, Mom asked us what we wanted to do with the money. What did
poor people do with money? We didn’t know. We’d never known we were poor.
We didn’t want to go to church on Sunday, but Mom said we had to. Although
it was a sunny day, we didn’t talk on the way. Mom started to sing, but no one
joined in and she only sang one verse. At church we had a missionary speaker.
He talked about how churches in Africa made buildings
out of sun-dried bricks, but they need money to buy roofs. He said $100 would
put a roof on a church. The minister said, “Can’t we all sacrifice to help
these poor people?”
We looked at each other and smiled for the first time in a week. Mom
reached into her purse and pulled out the envelope. She passed it to Darlene.
Darlene gave it to me, and I handed it to Ocy. Ocy put it in the offering. When the offering was counted,
the minister announced that it was a little over $100. The missionary was
excited. He hadn’t expected such a large offering from our small church. He
said, “You must have some rich people in this church.”
Suddenly it struck us! We had given $87 of that “little over $100.” We were
the rich family in the church! Hadn’t the missionary said so? From that day on
I’ve never been poor again. I’ve always remembered how rich I am because I have
Jesus.
God has blessed us.We ought to
learn to enjoy the blessings that God has given us.
:25 For who can eat, or who else can hasten hereunto, more than I?
better translation:
(Eccl 2:25 NLT)For who can eat or enjoy anything apart from him?
Ecclesiastes 3
:1-11 A time for everything
:1 To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the
heaven:
God has a purpose for everything.
Sound familiar?
I was at the dentist’s office on Monday and this song came on while I was
getting my teeth cleaned.
1965, “Turn, Turn, Turn”, written
by Pete Seeger, recorded by the Byrds.
:2 A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to
pluck up that which is planted;
God is the giver of life and death.
Human government has been given the authority to punish certain crimes by
death (Gen. 9:6; Rom.
13:4).
Yet all other taking of life ought to be in God’s hands – including
abortion and euthanasia.
:4 A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to
dance;
Illustration
The home of Paul Laurence Dunbar, noted poet, is open to the public in Dayton,
Ohio. When Dunbar
died, his mother left his room exactly as it was on the day of his death. At
the desk of this brilliant man was his final poem, handwritten on a pad.
After his mother died, her friends discovered that Paul Laurence Dunbar's
last poem had been lost forever. Because his mother had made his room into a
shrine and not moved anything, the sun had bleached the ink in which the poem
was written until it was invisible. The poem was gone.
If we stay in mourning, we lose so much of life.
-- Henry Simon, Belleville, Illinois. Leadership, Vol. 19, no. 1.
There is a time to mourn, but there is also a time to move on.
dance – raqad– to skip about
1Ch 15:29And it came to
pass, [as] the ark of the covenant of the LORD came to the city of David, that Michal the daughter of Saul looking out at a window saw
king David dancing and playing: and she despised him in her heart.
Dancing in the Old Testament involved lots of whirling and jumping by an
individual or a group.It didn’t mean
couples doing a waltz.
:5 A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time
to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
gather stones – stones were gathered to clear a field so it could be
plowed and planted.One way of dealing
with an enemy was to put stones in their fields.
embrace – we can tend to think that we ought to hug everyone.It’s not always appropriate.
:7 A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to
speak;
rend – clothes were torn when a person was in mourning.
:8 A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace.
Lesson
Being flexible.
We think that some of these things we have to do all the time.Not really.
:10 I have seen the travail, which God hath given to the sons of men to be
exercised in it.
(Eccl 3:10 NLT)I have thought about this in connection with the various kinds of work
God has given people to do.
:11 He hath made every thing beautiful in his time: also he hath set the
world in their heart, so that no man can find out the work that God maketh from
the beginning to the end.
the world – ‘owlam– long
duration, antiquity, futurity, for ever, ever, everlasting, evermore,
perpetual, old, ancient, world
(Eccl 3:11 NASB) He has made everything appropriate
in its time. He has also set eternity in their heart, yet so that man will not
find out the work which God has done from the beginning even to the end.
(Eccl 3:11 NLT) …He has planted eternity in the
human heart…
All people are born with this sense of eternity in their hearts, whether or
not they choose to admit it.
God also has given all mankind a witness about who He is through the
creation around them.
(Rom 1:20
KJV)For the invisible things of him
from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things
that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without
excuse:
But God has not revealed everything about His purposes to men.
Illustration
Hundreds of years ago Tertullian stated:
It was not the pen of Moses that initiated the knowledge of the
Creator.The vast majority of mankind,
though they had never heard the name of Moses, to say nothing of his books,
knew the God of Moses nonetheless. Nature is the teacher; the soul is the
pupil.One flower of the hedgerow, one
shell from any sea you like, one feather of a moor fowl—will they speak to you
of a mean Creator? If I offer you a rose, you will not scorn its Creator.
-- Cartaginian
Theologian, Tertullian, quoted in William Barclay,
The Letter to the Romans (Louisville, KY: Westminster Press, 1975), p. 27.
The other day I was hearing a radio spot about astronomy where the gal was
talking about the origin of the word “cosmos”.She took the word back to it’s classical Greek origins, saying that it
basically meant “order”.The ancient
Greeks like Pythagoras had discovered mathematical principles that seemed to
hold all of Creation together.They saw
“order” in Creation.The gal went on to
talk about evolution … amazing that she didn’t get it.How can there be “order” without a designer?
:12-13 God’s gift of enjoying what you have
:12 I know that there is no good in them, but for a man to rejoice, and to
do good in his life.
:13 And also that every man should eat and drink, and enjoy the good of all
his labour, it is the gift of God.
(Eccl 3:12-13 NASB)I know
that there is nothing better for them than to rejoice and to do good in one's
lifetime; {13} moreover, that every man who eats and drinks sees good in all
his labor-- it is the gift of God.
Though we cannot understand all of God’s plans for us, there is nothing
better (“no good in them”) than for a person to make up his mind to rejoice and
enjoy what God has given him and to do the things that are right, that are
“good”.
Illustration
The comedy film Cool Runnings is about the first
Jamaican bobsled team to go to the Olympics. John Candy plays a former American
gold medalist who becomes a coach to the Jamaican team. The players grow to
like the American coach and affectionately dub him “Sled-god.”
Later in the story, the coach’s dark history comes out. In an Olympics
following his gold medal performance, he broke the rules by weighting the U.S.
sled, bringing disgrace on himself and his team. One of the Jamaican
bobsledders could not understand why anyone who had already won a gold medal
would cheat.
Finally he nervously asked Candy to explain.“I had to win,” said the coach. “I learned
something. If you are not happy without a gold medal, you won’t be happy with
it.”
:15 That which hath been is now; and that which is to be hath already been;
and God requireth that which is past.
(Eccl 3:15 ICB)What happens now has also happened in the past. Things that will happen
in the future have also happened before. God makes the same things happen again
and again.
:16 And moreover I saw under the sun the place of judgment, that wickedness
was there
judgment – “justice”.
Even in the place where things ought to be done correctly, there is
wickedness.Only God knows how to give
justice correctly all the time.
Illustration
Crime does pay. For the trauma of being almost choked to death the 80 year
old mugging victim got nothing. But the mugger fleeing from the crime was shot
by a policeman and left paralyzed. So the mugger gets two million dollars. Our
court system’s deference to the rights of wrong doers, being what it is, crime
pays.
-- Associated Press, 11-20-93
:19 For that which befalleth the sons of men befalleth beasts
We are all like animals in that we will all die.
Without Jesus, life can seem pretty hopeless:
Illustration
“The grave is the end.This brief
life is all that we have.” There are a lot of people who believe that
today.Let me put it in the eloquent
words of Bertrand Russell, one of the spokesmen for those who do not believe in
the resurrection of Jesus.In one of his
works, he wrote:
“The life of a man is a long march through the night, surrounded by
invisible foes, tortured by weariness and pain, toward a goal which few can
hope to reach and where none may tarry long.One by one as they march, our comrades vanish from our sight, seized by
the silent orders of omnipotent death.Brief and powerless is man’s life.On him and all his race the slow, sure doom falls, pitiless and dark.
Blind to good and evil, reckless of destruction, omnipotent matter rolls on its
relentless way.For man, condemned today
to lose his dearest, tomorrow himself to pass through the gate of darkness, it
remains only to cherish, ere yet the blow falls, the lofty thoughts that
ennoble his little day.”
:21 Who knoweth the spirit of man that goeth upward, and the spirit of the
beast that goeth downward to the earth?
Who knows what happens to a person’s spirit after they die?
Keep in mind that Solomon doesn’t know.We now know.
When a believer dies, their spirit goes immediately to be with the Lord.
(Phil 1:21 NLT)For to me, living is for Christ, and dying is even better.
(Phil 1:23 NLT)I'm torn between two desires: Sometimes I want to live, and sometimes I
long to go and be with Christ. That would be far better for me,
(2 Cor 5:8 KJV)We are confident, I say, and willing rather
to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord.
:22 Wherefore I perceive that there is nothing better, than that a man
should rejoice in his own works
Lesson
Enjoy your life.
Illustration
The American investment banker was at the pier of a small coastal Mexican
village when a small boat with just one fisherman docked. Inside the small boat
were several large yellow fin tuna. The American complimented the Mexican on
the quality of his fish and asked how long it took to catch them. The Mexican
replied, only a little while. The American then asked why didn’t he stay out
longer and catch more fish? The Mexican said he had enough to support his
family’s immediate needs. The American then asked, “but what do you do with the
rest of your time?” The Mexican fisherman said, “I sleep late, fish a little,
play with my children, take siesta with my wife, Maria, stroll into the village
each evening where I sip wine and play guitar with my amigos, I have a full and
busy life.” The American scoffed, “I am a Harvard MBA and could help you. You
should spend more time fishing and with the proceeds, buy a bigger boat with
the proceeds from the bigger boat you could buy several boats, eventually you
would have a fleet of fishing boats. Instead of selling your catch to a
middleman you would sell directly to the processor, eventually opening your own
cannery. You would control the product, processing and distribution. You would
need to leave this small coastal fishing village and move to Mexico
City, then LA and eventually NYC where you will run
your expanding enterprise.” The Mexican fisherman asked, “But, how long will
this all take?” To which the American replied, “15-20 years.” “But what then?”
The American laughed and said that’s the best part. “When the time is right you
would announce an IPO and sell your company stock to then public and become
very rich, you would make millions.” “Millions.. Then what?” The American said,
“Then you would retire. Move to a small coastal fishing village where you would
sleep late, fish a little, play with your kids, take siesta with your wife,
stroll to the village in the evenings where you could sip wine and play your
guitar with your amigos.”
Are you enjoying the blessings that God has given you?
[1]Wiersbe, W.
W. (1996, c1990). Be satisfied (Ec 1:4). Wheaton,
Ill.: Victor Books.