 So here we are Ecclesiastes chapter 8 verse 1 Solomon asked the question who is like a wise man and who knows the interpretation of a thing Man's wisdom makes his face shine the sternness of his face is changed and so because man is Fallen the question would have to be asked and if man is fallen who can comprehend the meaning of life There are few wise men and there are few who are wise enough to speak concerning the word and the works of God We need to remember that even as we begin our study that without God's revelation. No one can fathom life's meaning Life's purpose in life's meaning is something that is revealed to us by the Lord in Luke 10 21 Jesus said it like that it says in that hour Jesus rejoiced in the Spirit saying I thank you father Lord of heaven and earth That you have hidden these things from the wise and prudent Reveal them to babes even so father for so it seemed good in your sight You've hidden it from those who are wise and prudent in the ways of the world and have revealed it to those who are innocent And who will believe what you have to say So when someone has proper wisdom There's going to be a dramatic result It's interesting how he says this in the second portion of verse one He says a man's wisdom makes his face shine and the sternness of his face is changed and So even his appearance may change Sometimes for the better, you know when you I'll let you think about that for a moment I'll tell you when everybody was wearing masks everybody was cute You've even golem had pretty eyes so People under stress Show the strain in their face you've seen that when people are under stress You can pick it up So when a person's ways are pleasing to the Lord and God is providing answers in life Even his appearance may change He says his face will shine and the sternness of his face will be changed When it says his face will shine that speaks of his demeanor. It speaks of his outer appearance His face will shine in other words joy will brighten his face In in Proverbs 15 13 a merry heart makes a cheerful countenance But by sorrow of the heart the spirit is broken And so when somebody is rejoicing and somebody is being blessed and all the point he's making is if God Reveals to you and gives you wisdom and you have the wisdom he gives to you that even the sternness of your face will be changed to an Appearance of joy because you now have an understanding of the meaning of life He says in verse 2 I say keep the king's commandment for the sake of your oath to God Do not be hasty to go from his presence Do not take your stand for an evil thing for he does whatever pleases him and So he begins to give counsel here. I counsel you to keep the king's command So he's speaking concerning our relationship to governmental authority of the king Obviously would be a symbol of governmental authority So he's speaking to us concerning our relationship to governmental authority And so he's saying that you have options when when commands are given When a command is given by a government official will say bringing it up to the 21st century When we who live under the form of government that we live under are given a command we can make some choices we make decisions We can first we can disobey the orders, but we'll ultimately pay a price for doing so We need to remember that When somebody gives to us an order when the government gives to us and we as believers in the church will say Receive orders from the government that goes against our conscience Then we have to make some choices We've seen this. Let me give you some things. You're all familiar with We'll say that you own a bakery and you're asked to make a wedding cake for a same-sex couple How are you gonna respond? You have a conscience and so how are you gonna respond the government has told you you need to do that But your conscience has said that you can't approve of something that God doesn't prove up So how do you respond when the government says you need to bake that cake or you're a teacher And you've been ordered to teach young children LGBTQ plus every other letter of the alphabet curricula What do you do as a teacher you have been mandated you have been commanded you have been ordered To teach that subject, but it goes against everything within you. You've been told or commanded to have an inoculation This happened not that long ago, and if you don't receive it and you're in the military you'll be discharged or If you have a particular job that is saying you're required to do that you may be fired What do you do the government has ordered you to take this particular? Inoculation or your pastor like myself you're told not to congregate You're told that the church is not to gather together and and if you do you have to have a separation And you can't sing praises to God So what do you do? Well in some churches the people sing so bad. That's really a joy tonight But what do you do? We've had this we had somebody in our fellowship who was working at a school school in the area and They had their Bible on the desk, and they were ordered to take their Bible off the desk What do you do? Do you remove the Bible because somebody said it's offensive and yet in the library they can have all kinds of filth What do you do? You see those are questions you have to ask yourself in matters of conscience We have to make decisions and our decisions are to be Based on our faith in Christ now we've been going through the book of Acts You'll remember this if you've been with us There was a miracle that had taken place in the early early chapters of Acts and and Peter and John had been at the gate called beautiful and while they were there there was a crippled man remember that and As they were entering in during the hour of prayer as they were walking in The crippled band looks up to them. He'd been there for a long time people knew this man and As they were about to walk in Peter and John are walking in and you remember the story the man looks up to them because Peter looks down And says look upon us so he calls Peter calls man's attention to himself Look at us and and scripture says very clearly and the man looked up expecting to receive something So when he looks up, he's expecting to receive annals He's expecting to receive a charitable contribution a gift to financial help for this man And you remember what Peter said is that silver and gold have I none But such as I have give I thee in the name of Jesus Christ I say unto rise to your feet and walk and the Bible says the man stood he began to walk you ban the leap and he began to praise God and so This caused the the religious authorities to get upset in all and so they spoke to them and In Acts 4 18 through 20 it says they called them commanded them not to speak at all nor teach in the name of Jesus Peter and John answered and said to them whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you more than to God you judge For we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard See you decide whether or not for yourself obeying God is necessary, but as for ourselves We will obey God. That's the whole point. So under ordinary circumstances We are obligated to submit to proper authority That's because we're believers and we really realize that our allegiance and and our obedience to these particular mandates or commands that are not violating our conscience are are really representing our allegiance to our God Because when you speaks here and and he says in verse 2 keep the commandment for the sake of your oath to God your vow to God We we realize that what he's saying here It's it's a way of revealing our true allegiance our allegiance and our true allegiance is not necessarily to human government Our true allegiance is to the God who establishes it in Colossians 3 23 Whatever you do do it heartily as to the Lord and not to men He says in verse 3 Do not be hasty to go from his presence Do not take your stand for an evil thing for he does whatever pleases him He's speaking here of the king doing what pleases him So don't be hasty to go from his presence. Don't withdraw yourself from the king's service out of discontent or frustration Do not persist in doing something wrong obscenately rejecting his orders and So how does that work? Well in a practical way Disregard disregarding orders in a practical way You have a problem that the decision with a decision that your boss has made He has made or she has made a decision that you just have a real difficult time So you leave the room and people begin to gather together and They begin to complain and they begin to grumble while he's he would be saying in a practical way instead of joining them Remember he's your boss or she's your boss. Just do your job Very often by the way your boss Your overseer may have information. You don't have There are times that they have information that you're not privy to that you don't have They have it you don't and they make decisions based on what they know what not what I want and So there are times that I may have disagreed With what my employer was wanting me to do it wasn't against my conscience. It just wasn't something I I thought was the right thing So what do I do? I just follow the order and I don't I don't judge him He says in verse 4 Where the power of a king is where the word of a king is there's power Who may say to him? What are you doing? Picture yourself saying that to to the king? Hey, what are you doing? I don't think you'd get away with that He's saying listen. He says he has authority and there's nothing you can do anyway His word is going to carry more weight than your word and if you're a servant who's going to listen to you They're going to listen to the king so practically he who keeps Practically we just keep his his word and all of that because it's the wise thing to do Because where the word of a king is there's power and who may say to him? What are you doing? He has information. He has authority and you don't have to write to question those things that he has that you don't have or don't know He says in verse 5 he who keeps his command will experience nothing harmful a wise man heart is there wise man's heart discerns both time and Judgment by following his orders. You're preserving your job. You're also avoiding problems You're being wise. There's a real beautiful proverb. You might want to note this one Proverbs 13 3 He who guards his mouth preserves his life But he who opens wide his lips shall have destruction So this this Psalm here Psalm 141 3 I have it on I've had it on my on my computer on my screen Psalm 141 3 beautiful Psalm set a guard over my mouth Lord keep watch over the door of my lips. Help me to keep my mouth shut Help me not to speak without thinking You see in verse 5 a wise man's heart discerns both time and judgment that means that we need discernment Instead of of me acting on my emotion a wise person will wait until the proper time to act Again Proverbs 14 29 he who is slow to wrath has great understanding, but he who is impulsive exalts folly In James 1 19 and 20, so then my beloved brethren let every man be swift to hear slow to speak slow to wrath For the wrath of man does not produce the righteousness of God That's one of the things we need to remember because and there have been things done and it has we've had quite a number of things Done recently that that have caused me great frustration I've had to pray that the Lord would help me to guard the door of my mouth and I've I've asked the Lord to help me And not to become so angry that I infect the church with anger It's easy for a pastor to be upset at how things are going to the degree that in his messages He constantly complains about those things and What happens is instead of encouraging the church to have faith to do the best thing to pray look for opportunities to share You can change the world through the gospel things like that We just get mad at everybody and mad at the government. There's hardly anything less Attractive than angry Christians That that's true. There's hardly anything less attractive than bitter angry complaining Christians Because the world has a chance to look at you and say I thought you had the joy of the Lord I thought the joy of the Lord is your strength And you say yeah, I enjoy hitting you in the head, you know, I mean I enjoy complaining We have to be careful. There are quite a number of things I won't go into this but there are quite a number of things that I see that I Really am affected by and that they really do they do Frustrate me and they do anger me quite a number of things I mean I watch the news and I see things and I get upset over them But if I bring that anger and upsetness into this pulpit, I'm just gonna have an angry church Instead of a church that learns to pray to evangelize the share to change You can change this world by being changed yourself By having faith in God to know that he's in control things of that nature and so I really believe that we have to be very careful about those kinds of things He says in verse 6 he says for every matter there is a time in judgment Though the misery of man increases greatly So discernment is used to it is exercising It gives us wisdom as we make our our decisions and and this is interesting when he's saying he's saying things can get worse before we know what to do Things can progress and even get worse to the point where we always become hopeless. So refuse to act impulsively Why well verse 7 for he does not know what will happen So who can tell him when it will occur? You don't know what the Lord is planning to do So instead of getting ahead of him and making decisions that he may not be in You learn to wait on the Lord In the Old Testament, there's a book called the book of Nehemiah. It was written around 445 years before Christ and Nehemiah Contains an example of of one who refused to act impulsively When you read the book of Nehemiah Nehemiah was an officer in the court of the Persian king a man by the name of Artic Xerxes and He had received a report that the Jews in Jerusalem were in distress and and were in reproach The wall of Jerusalem had been broken down the gates had been burned with fire Now this is something that tore into his heart But instead of acting impulsively the scripture tells us for many days He wept he mourned he fasted and he prayed and Ultimately Nehemiah stands before the king the king says that there's a sadness in your heart He says and he's and Nehemiah says and I was greatly afraid why because never before had I been sad in the presence of the king Well, what does that matter? He's a man. You're a man. You have a right to the times you feel bad No, if you stood before the king as Nehemiah was and you had sadness or grief in your heart The king would take it personally and would have you killed and that's why he says I had great fear Because the king said this is nothing but sorrow of heart what's your problem and So he says and so I prayed He sought the Lord and he gave his answer. Why wouldn't I be upset? I've received word about my home country. It's in disarray and that's when the king gave him permission to go back and work on that city and So had he acted impulsively It wouldn't have turned out that way good example wait on the Lord God will open the doors. He gives to you provokes you He gives you that moment to speak. He'll give you the words. He'll give you the wisdom to know what to do This is all basic Christianity But instead of being impulsive learn to wait In Psalm 27 14 wait on the Lord be of good courage. He shall strengthen your heart wait I say on the Lord Well verse 8 No one has power over the spirit to retain the spirit No one has power in the day of death. There's no release from that war and Wickedness will not deliver those who are given to it Ultimately saying this is very cherry Everybody's gonna die Let's let that sink in and then go home happy. No, I everybody's gonna die We all know that the older you get the more aware of it you are When you're very young, you're never gonna die, right? But when you begin to accumulate days months and years you begin to realize you've lived a long time And ultimately the day of death is before you and you know that so everybody's gonna die and Everybody stands before God in judgment And at that time all of our decisions will be judged by the righteous and the fair judge It has been said death is the great equalizer because all die And all deeds are examined So Solomon is making it clear death is the one thing that's inevitable No one escapes it Psalm 8948 What can what man can live and not see death? Can he deliver his life from the power of the grave? Job 14 4 and 5 who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean? No one since his days are determined The number of his months is with you you have appointed his limits so that he cannot pass So what do you say? And it's no matter how powerful that person may be He ultimately dies. That's the one thing we all have in common Is it a point? It is appointed and demanded I once and after this the judgment I've lived long enough to see quite a number of people many of them who had a lot of authority or a lot of renown and They like everybody else they get to the point where they simply die I've seen rulers who have died been alive during time of presidents dying and in Russians who were Premiers die and Chinese chairman die I've seen a lot of powerful and I've seen a lot of influential die The older I get the more of more of them I see dying people that actually wrote into the What would you be in the the musical score of my life? Every one of us by the way I here we go. I'm gonna wax eloquent on something you don't care about but it's true And I'll say it briefly Marie and I talk about this my wife and I talk about this every once in a while We all have a musical score. I don't know what your musical score is You know who knows I Know what mine is and so there are certain bands or people in groups that influenced me And I've seen them die You know John Lennon die George Harrison die and David Boy die You know that's so many and over time you begin to see one thing that everybody dies And even if they made an influence in your life, they die. We'll see this in a moment and very often are soon forgotten So no matter how powerful a person may be He ultimately dies now in chapter 2 Solomon had already said this in chapter 2 verse 16 He said there's no remembrance of the wise man There's no more remembrance of the wise than of the fool forever Since all that now is will be forgotten in the days to come and how does a wise man die as a fool? Well when he's saying this and I'm gonna make a little Point when he says in verse 8 again. I want you to see this He says no one has power over the spirit to retain the spirit No one has power in the day of death Well, no one except one Jesus Jesus is the one who retained his spirit and it's Jesus who relinquished his spirit to God in Matthew 2750 it says Jesus cried out again with a loud voice and yielded up the word yielded means he sent He yielded up. He sent away his spirit Jesus is the one who had the power to retain his life and yet he didn't he yielded it up He sent he dismissed his spirit. He said to a spirit go and he did that to win salvation for us Because his words preceding the words Father I yield unto my spirit his words were it is finished So everyone dies and everyone will stand before the judge of the whole earth So it's utmost importance that we stand before him clothed in the righteousness of God We need to make sure where we stand with him because we all stand before him and Paul said it very clearly. He said we all shall give an account of ourselves to God So ultimately there is going to be a day of reckoning and so it's very important for us to have our lives Our sins cleansed by the power of the blood of Jesus Christ in verse 9 He says all this I have seen and applied my heart to every work that is done into the Sun There is a time in which one man rules over another to his own hurt All this everything I've been speaking about These are the things I've observed. I've learned from them. I've applied the lessons. I don't want to miss the meaning of my life I have I observed things you know, I really believe that it's important for us to not casually go through life But to be an observer of our lives To keep an eye on things around us to learn from the things we go through and so how we treat others results in repercussions You see the scripture teaches from from the one who has much from him much will be required So we reap what we've sown either here or when we stand Before the judge because he said in verse 9 there's a time in which one man rules over another to his own hurt And so we give an account of these things before the Lord And then he says verse 10 and I'm going to build on this for a little while in a moment I saw the wicked buried Who had come and gone from the place of holiness? They were forgotten in the city where they had so done This also is vanity. I want to talk to you for a moment get get kind of basic and kind of real I saw the wicked buried When we'd come and gone Solomon is reflecting on a funeral that he attended Remember in chapter 7 verse 2 he had said it's better to go to the house of mourning than to go to the house of feasting For that is the end of all men. The living will take it to heart It's better to go to a funeral than a party We looked at that recently Let me share a couple of thoughts about that once again because When he says I saw the wicked buried who had come and gone from the place of holiness and they were forgotten Now I was 12 years old. I had a cousin His name was Richie. I might have mentioned this recently somewhere. Maybe it was even to you recently. I Don't remember. I talked so much He was very close to me. He was My cousin through my mom's sister my aunt tilly my aunt tilly Had had Several children and many of them from different men And Richie Was her only son I think my aunt and she was my favorite aunt. I loved her with all my heart my aunt tilly Richie, uh Richie was the only son He was about five or six years older than me. I don't remember anymore But I do remember that my mom was greatly concerned for my cousin Richie So much so that she actually had him living with us for a little while my parents did because Richie was from a rough area in venice, you know, sometimes when people think of venice today They may not know that there were sections of venice perhaps still are That were they were pretty rough venice could be rough, you know culver city people look at it as being a Nice place and all and I guess in many ways it is. There's some pretty rough areas in culver city some old gangs And in venice there were some old gangs and my my cousin Richie Richie became a gang banger And he got in a fight and somebody took a two by four and split his head open with it And mama told me she says your son she goes From that day Richie changed I still remember Richie because he would shave his head he were he wore the garb At that time, you know, he shaved his head and he had a scar Probably six seven inch scar on his crown Well one day my mom told me Richie died Richie had become addicted to heroin He and my other cousin his sister my cousin linda They had both gotten addicted to heroin and he overdosed in a field And had been there for several days nobody knew And they found him And when they found Richie his face had been consumed by ants You know He was very dear to us very dear to me And he had a his funeral Was closed casket they couldn't repair his face And I was 12 years old the first time I saw real sorrow When I saw my aunt till he laying on top of his caskets screaming his name and my uncles Who had to come and take her away from the casket And it left an impression on this 12 year old But not that great But I never forgot it Then later on as I was growing older And the hippie movement was beginning drugs were becoming Something everybody uses I started losing friends I was Taking drugs too like everybody I knew I started losing friends. I had a friend named Dave Smith Dave and I used to hitchhike to the beach together before we had licenses Then one day Dave decided to take some reds Drink some wine and drop some acid Climbed on his motorcycle And drove headfirst into a parked pickup truck His face went against the corrugated bumper And it was a closed casket once again I had other friends that this started happening and a friend of mine who had been stabbed He healed but He was at a tasty freeze by Santa Fe Springs High School Santa Fe Got into us some guy The guy stabbed him And my friend's last words were oh, no not again And he died It's about 18 years old I knew another guy by the name of freddy reyes when I was about 19 and freddy Overdosed on of our bituits and Wine he drowned in his own vomit I used to deliver flowers when I was 18 For Whittier florist And I went to rose hills And I used to have to take the funeral wreath and place them on the casket And I read the card The name of the person receiving the wreath And I recognized it and I said, oh, but that can't be my friend. He's only 18 years old You can't imagine how I felt when I dropped this wreath on that on that casket and looked into the face of a friend of mine That I'd been partying with just two weeks before And then my friend Ray Casada I grew up with him we used to call monkey Because he was ugly like a little monkey Everybody has nicknames and he was jungle ray was a good friend of mine from kindergarten But he took a bad turn He had one time I'd tried to be a surfer now he became cholo He's becoming a gangster And he had a running problem with another guy named pete There was going to be a party across the street from my house and My mom said to me son, I have a bad feeling she used to use that phrase I have a bad feeling. Please don't go to the party Normally I would ignore her But I I obeyed her I went to somebody else's house and to visit a friend My mama called me there She said ray got shot in the head tonight. He got into it again with this guy named pete And a friend of mine named mike When he saw there was going to be a problem When a couple of blocks from where the party was who was house picked up his gun And when ray and pete went into the back to fight Ray was one of these guys the way he fought was he wasn't a boxer. He was a wrestler. So he'd take you he'd take you down So he was about to take pete down from what I was told When mike fired his weapon and shot him in the head It was like 18 years old My friend bill and my friend jimmy and a couple of us went to studebaker hospital there in norwalk And he was in an icu unit and We looked into the window and we saw our friend all hooked up on these these tubes and a few days later It tended his funeral We had a friend we used to like I said, we used to give everybody nicknames Called him froggy Because it was ugly And I'll never forget him kneeling in the front of the church loaded With his hands on the casket crying for his best friend ray Funerals have a way of Awakening you even at the age of 18 17 19 To the brevity of life tomorrow was promised to no one it began to awaken me to that One day I was at a pastors conference in south bay Young man walked up to me and says to me may I ask you a question? And I said of course he goes Did you grow up in norwalk? Because he knew me as a pastor from here I said, yeah, of course. I did. Yeah, why? He said I was listening to you on the radio And you spoke about A guy named ricka saga I said he was one of my best friends He goes may I introduce myself to you? And I said of course He says my name is Mike torres It's my father who shot and killed ray Mm-hmm. My father is the one who shot and killed ray ray was his best friend And I looked at mike And he said, you know what happened? I said what? He said did you ever hear anything of dad my dad? I said Not since they put him away He said my dad did a lot of years in prison pastor david He said but He said while he was away I got saved And i'm assistant pastor. He's now the pastor of a calvary chapel He says i'm assisting. He became the pastor He says and my father's out now spent 30 some years in prison And he said and he's serving the lord at my church He said and I I've heard your story. I wanted to give you the ending of it So I've been meeting with mike torres the pastor now From uh into the light ministries in lahabra calvary chapel for years See so You never know what tomorrow brings You never know And and death has a way of awakening us to the reality Of the shortness of our life and and and solemn is speaking about that and and many of us in this room I I know just by by just the chances or the odds Many of you have stories very similar to what I've given you and even worse you've seen even worse even worse but god But god broke into our lives, right But god changed things in us And and we have hope because of that But my whole my whole my whole journey began by seeing how short life is And by going to these funerals even as solemn is speaking he said I saw the wicked buried Who had come and gone from the place of holiness and they were forgotten in the city where they had so done This he said it's also vanity It's interesting as he's taking notice of the person who is being buried He says someone had come and gone notice from the place of holiness when he says that the place of holiness May be referring to a position of a judge who administered the law in the city The place of holiness would be speaking about having the authority of god when he made a judgment In deuteronomy 1917 It says the accuser and accused must appear before the lord by coming to the priests and judges in in office at that time So the place of holiness spoke of them representing god and the judgment god is bringing And this judge is described as wicked which means that he's an unrighteous judge In other words, he had been given a sacred duty, but he didn't honor the office And he had a funeral the funeral had great fanfare, but he's saying he was quickly forgotten because he was evil He was forgotten Because his life was not worthy of even being remembered Now that's something that sovers me I don't want to have a life that is so pointless and useless that nobody even remembers That I existed and he's saying I saw that he said this is vanity In verse 11 because the sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily Therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil Now that connects the thought that was just expressed it speaks of people knowing That the official was evil and and noticing that he got away with it And and it means that people can see that god delays judgment of the guilty And it can lead people to think that god doesn't deal with sin and that's a mistake Because it can cause you to become hardened in your own sin What happens is man may begin to see that god doesn't move on this. Therefore This must be something permitted by god god's grace and not In not judging them immediately is mistaken for permission Well grace is never permission for rebellion In roman 6 1 and 2 he says this paul says what shall we say then shall we continue in sin that grace may about certainly not How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it? And so this is resulting in a weakening of faith in god's warning of judgment And it results in man denying moral responsibility for what he's done Justice he's saying didn't fall immediately. So it must be permissible in reality This simply adds to the sins that he's going to be held accountable for You know people can go to church even habitually and remain Unchanged in the way they live And instead of learning and hearing and being warned and equipped They become prideful so the Basic thing is this is so important deal with sin quickly Don't let it become entrenched Someone once said this so a thought reap an action so an action reap a habit so a habit reap a character so a character reap a destiny Deal with sin quickly. Don't let it fester He's saying when people get away with crime they commit even more in verse 12 The was sinner does evil a hundred times and his days are prolonged Yet, I surely know that it will be well with those who fear god who fear before him But it will not be well with the wicked nor will he prolong his days which are a shadow Because he doesn't fear god Sometimes and this is true. Sometimes evil people live longer And they seem to get away with so much evil Isn't that true? You see you say that little scoundrel. How does he continue? Why do the good die young? Right You know, I've had that question many times myself when I perform funerals including those of those whom I love my own family Good people and yet there's this these scoundrels and you wonder how come well Don't take god's patience for granted Don't mistake it for approval or permission Why because he gives some people ample time to repent In second peter three nine the lord is not slack concerning his promise as some count slackness But as long suffering toward us not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance And that's one of the things the lord has really taught me about that Because I I'm not kidding you, you know, because I have I have performed enough Funerals for people I love deeply and they were young My father was 74 when he died He's he died. I'm one year younger than my father when he died I considered him at that point in his life Someone who should live longer 74 74 And then you see these other guys who Who booze it up and crowds around and have all kinds of habits? And I began to wonder lord. Why why do you allow those people? And you took my father You know, I'll be real with you about that why did Why why? And it finally came to me Because god is gracious he gives people a long time to repent My father had repented served him loved him and he took him home to be with him My father wouldn't want to come back to this place Right And it finally made some sense You see even if he lives a long time His life is still just a shadow and james 4 14. What is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and vanishes away He says in verse 14 there is a vanity which occurs on earth There are just men to whom it happens according to the work of the wicked again There are wicked men to whom it happens according to the work of the righteous. I said this is vanity Wicked people sometimes get the praise that should be reserved for the good Now Sometimes it seems and this is something solemn would possibly saying, you know, sometimes life doesn't seem fair You hear that from your kid if you're a parent isn't it interesting how just they are When they're children that's not fair, you know, he got more ice cream than me. That's not fair I remember saying that one time to my mother I looked at my brother's ice cream I looked at mine in my righteous little mind. I weighed it I said that's heavier than mine And I let my mom know because she was dealing unjustly with me And so she showed me justice. She took my brother's ice cream And my ice cream and threw it down the sink And she said you're going to complain you get nothing So I learned a long time ago like god take care of these things Because sometimes it just doesn't seem fair in verse 15 I commended enjoyment Because a man has nothing better under the sun than to eat drink and be merry And this is this will remain with him in his labor all the days of his life Which god gives him under the sun when I applied my heart to know wisdom And to see the business that is done on earth even though one sees no sleep day or night I saw All the work of god that a man cannot find out the work that is done under the sun For though a man's laborers to a man laborers to discover it Yet he will not find it or over though a wise man attempts to know it He will not be able to find it And so Instead of becoming frustrated over unfairness Learned to simply enjoy life. It's been said the wheel of justice turns slowly So don't wonder why people go unpunished Learn to enjoy life for what it is Allow god To sort it out with people Again, I've often wondered why people seem to get away with so much I remind myself of What took place in the gospel of john when the lord jesus christ said to To peter when you were young and i'm paraphrasing when you were young you would dress yourself and go where you want When you're old someone will dress you and take you where you don't want to go And and then john adds to us and says he was speaking about the way he'd glorify god through his death But what is peter's response instead of saying? Oh really? He goes on to say and seeing the one whom jesus loved. He said well, what about him? And god told me a long time ago to listen to answer jesus gave because jesus said what does he got to do with you? You follow me When you learn to do that you'll be okay But when you're so busy sitting around saying how come you haven't chopped his head off yet? And why does that person seem to get away with it? How come? Well instead of worrying about this just enjoy the fruit of your of your hands and and enjoy the lord. He'll sort it all out He says in verses 16 and 17 finally I applied my heart to know wisdom as the wisest man alive. He understood lives beyond Comprehension it's been said our knowledge is a receding mirage in an expanding desert of ignorance So god doesn't expect us to know that which is unknowable There are many things that we can't expect to ever know And an awareness of my own ignorance is a step towards acquiring knowledge So wisdom is important to the one who wants to get the most out of life pursuing wisdom Should be our goal Realizing there will always be more to learn If you if I were to tell you one of the things in my own life That I've asked the lord to increase It's been wisdom Well, I don't want to have wisdom I want to have not only knowledge, but I want to know how to practically apply it to situations I want wisdom Because there are a lot of people who are educated beyond their understanding So I I don't want just information and knowledge I want to know how to rightly apply that I want to know how to do that So pursuit of wisdom is a goal There's always more to learn Proverbs 4 7 we'll close with this wisdom is the principal thing therefore get wisdom And in all you're getting Get understanding So we'll close here And we'll pick up next time in chapter 9