Friday, June 27th
Reading for today: Ecclesiastes 7-12
Pastor Kathy and I chuckled away our day yesterday as we shared our thoughts on Solomon's bleak outlook on the meaning and purpose of life. He certainly disqualifies himself as an optimist.
There are many curious things in todays reading that I would love to ponder (but deeper reflection isn't the intent of this reading program) For instance, why does Solomon say in Chapter 8 that he cannot find a single upright woman? I find that hard to believe. He must be trying to make a point, perhaps it's......well, I'm not going to get into THAT.
He says somewhere, maybe Chapter 9 that "the same fate awaits them all" speaking of the righteous and the unrighteous. But that clearly is a reference only to the grave, and not to eternal life, because we all know from reading the rest of the Bible that eternity will be different for the righteous. Sorrow, anguish and regret await the wicked in eternity, but peace, joy and love are the eternal fate of the righteous.
Solomon observes that "there isn't anyone who doesn't sin" which is a good thing to remember when we start to become proud of how righteous we are. In fact, he also says that even the wise cannot truly comprehend what God is doing, or has done. I agree. a quick look out the window at just a small part of all that God has created reminds me that His knowledge and skill are far beyond my understanding.
I laughed when I read "better a live dog than a dead lion". My grandfather used to tell me that sometimes, I never knew it was in Ecclesiastes!
Certainly there is far more to see.... I'll leave to you to comment on..
PR
I just have a brief comment to make on the issue of Solomon not finding one upright woman (you know I couldn't just let it go). Maybe he was simply looking in all the wrong places. I'm just sayin'. Actually, I think it points to the fact that Solomon was having a hard time finding anyone who was upright... how sad, I'll bet he would have just as hard a time in today's world of finding someone who was upright (wise and good). Gives us all a challenge to strive harder to be wise and good and upright, and to remember we can only do this with Jesus at the center of our lives while at the same time (as PR says) to remain humble.
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