"With All Your Might"

Notes for another sermon that I preached at a small church fellowship:

"With All Your Might"
Text: Ecclesiastes 9:10-18

Introduction: This world is a complicated place to live in. God told Adam and Eve to have dominion over the earth; but since the Fall, the serpent and the earth often seem to have dominion over mankind. Instead of man mastering his work and the circumstances of his life, work and circumstances threaten to master him.

The Preacher (a.k.a. Solomon "son of David, king in Jerusalem"), in his dry and level-headed way, analyzes the situation with all of its ironies...and points the way to a solution.

I. Work while you still can! (v. 10)

"Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with your might; for there is no work or device or knowledge or wisdom in Sheol, where you are going."

Might is strength, power, ability, efficiency, capability to produce. Pour yourself and your strength into your work, whatever that may be!--a job, school, marriage, remodeling your home, discipling a younger believer, drawing near to God through worship and Scripture and prayer.

Pour out your energy on what comes to your hand, not what is out of your grasp. It is foolish and useless to spend your time and strength dreaming about what is not yours to have. If it is good, and you have a chance at it, go for it! But if you know that it is unattainable, don't waste time daydreaming about it. Work and speak and think for the glory of God, right there in the position where He has placed you, making the forward progress that is possible from that position. 1 Cor. 7:20-24. It is better to be free than to be a slave; but wherever you are, you are God's, and you ought to act like it!

Proverbs 23:6-8--"as he thinks in his heart, so is he." You will become like whatever you dwell on. If your mind is directed by the Spirit of God, your ways will come to resemble the ways of God. (What are those ways? Love; creativity; service; sacrifice; mission.) If you dwell on what you cannot have, you will become bitter and unfruitful. Phil. 4:8-9. Find out who in your life is like Christ, is worthy of imitation, and then follow the good you see in them! Then do, with all your might, whatever your hand can reach. The caves in Hannibal, Missouri, and the true story behind Tom Sawyer: Injun John gave up trying to get out, and died within feet of the open air. Do not give up, but keep working at whatever task is already within your grasp; if you persevere, you will soon break through to the freedom that you long for.

Work your hardest on whatever you can, as long as you still have opportunity. There is a long sleep ahead of you between your death and the resurrection of the body. Phil. 1:21-26. Even Paul, torn between ministry on earth and being with the Lord in heaven, chose to be on earth a while longer for the sake of those Christians whom he could not help any longer if he was taken into heaven. John 9:1-5. As long as you are in the world, you too are the light of the world as disciples of Jesus (Matt. 5:14-16). Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with your might!

II. The goodness of wisdom in the midst of futility (vv. 11-15)

When you "turn" and take a good look at the world "under the sun," this is what you see: excellence often doesn't pay. Under the sun, it's often true that nice guys finish last. The fast runners lose, the great warriors die, the wise starve, the intelligent are poor, and even those who are in the know don't get the good breaks (v. 11). Under the sun, the death of man (who is made in God's image) looks just as senseless as the death of animals (v. 12). Because of Adam and his sin, we all have been laboring under a curse (quite literally) ever since that bad beginning (Genesis 3:17-19). In spite of the sun’s brightness, the world it looks down on is a very dark one.

Worse, it can look like even wisdom does no good (vv. 13-15). The poor wise man rescued the town from destruction--bravo! But once the thrill of victory passed, no one remembered him. "Under the sun," wisdom itself can look as worthless and vain as all the rest of the world's tiresome activities.

We are tempted to say, "Well, that's just reality! Deal with it." But this life "under the sun" is not the whole story, as Solomon (the author of Ecclesiastes) himself tells us. Proverbs 4:18--The path of the righteous is like the sunrise, becoming brighter and brighter, until the sun itself will disappear and only righteousness will remain; that will be the true daylight, and not just this temporary life "under the sun." Proverbs 15:24--For the wise, the way of life winds upward, ultimately taking him right out of the reach of Sheol (the grave/hell).

The key is to look higher than the sun, to Him who will shine as brightly as ever when the need for the sun’s light has disappeared forever (Revelation 21:22-27). He alone makes wisdom worthwhile, and work, and strength, and intelligence, and all good things. Without Him, these things are dust and ashes. But if you are in Him, you will outlive both prosperity and ruin and come at last into a kingdom that has no end, beyond the reach of all pains and sorrows and disillusionments.

In that place, even that poor but wise man whom no one remembered will have his just reward—not a bit too little, and not a moment too late.

III. A clear-eyed hymn of praise to wisdom (vv. 16-18)

Wisdom is better than strength. Wisdom saved the city when strength could not--
even though the poor man is despised and no longer listened to. (Cf. Winston Churchill's defeat in the British elections of July 1945--and yet his courageous leadership in the war was still worth the cost!)

The quiet words of the wise are better than the shouts of those who rule over fools--
even though the wise often find few to listen to them! (But those few wise disciples are more powerful than all the fools in the world who oppose them. Just think of the victory that the twelve apostles of Christ and their followers won over all the political, military, and religious power in the world!)

Wisdom is better than the weapons of battle--
even though one sinner can wreck many good beginnings! (If wisdom is necessary for victory in open battle, it is even more necessary when your friends betray you.)

Conclusion: In Solomon's words, Ecclesiastes 12:13-14...God's coming judgment of every work and every secret thing, both good and evil, will cause all things in heaven and on earth to come out right. "Though the mills of God grind slowly, yet they grind exceeding small" (Friedrich von Logau, trans. by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow).

John 21:15-22. In the joys and in the moral outrages of life, the Lord Jesus tests and purifies your love for Him, and through it all He calls you to follow Him. So what if your wisdom leads to dishonor in the eyes of the world? So what if your faithfulness ends in frustration and persecution? So what if you die young, and your brother stays alive until Jesus' return? That is not your concern. Your call is to follow Him. Your task is to seek wisdom and live by it, no matter what the consequences, because at the end of all things you will see that the results are truly "very good." And whatever your hand finds to do, do it with your might.