Doctor William Brick, former professor of the Old Testament at the Masters seminary, said the smell of death, the crackling of thorns in a fire, nostalgia for yesteryear, something bent that cannot be straightened, the whispering of servants and the hardened hearts of fallen mankind, these are some of the images summoned by Solomon in Ecclesiastes chapter 7. In chapter 7, King Solomon wants to remind us that life is transitory. It is fleeting or vanity in our vain attempts to be satisfied in this life. We have to be governed by godly wisdom and not worldly foolishness in order to live in this very complicated and hard to understand life with care, as we just saw in the year 2020.
Who can really understand what has taken place, right? But from all of Solomon's investigations and conclusions, even though he didn't find all the answers to his questions, The end result is that in order to have a fulfilled life, you must recognize that God is in control and give Him the glory. David Gibson agrees and says this about living with godly wisdom from the book that we are studying, Living Life Backwards. He says, learn to live wisely in God's world in the midst of all the brokenness.
The wisest thing you can do is to realize is that not even being wise will tell you everything you want to know. As we look briefly at some of the verses from Ecclesiastes chapter 7, verses 1 to 25, we'll see that it sounds like we are reading from the wisdom book of Proverbs. Let's read Ecclesiastes chapter 7 verses 1 to 14. Ecclesiastes chapter 7, starting with verse 1 says a good name is better than a good ointment, and the day of one's death is better than the day of one's birth.
It is better to go to a house of mourning than to go to a house of feasting, because that is the end of every man, and the living takes it to heart. Sorrow is better than laughter, for when a face is sad, a heart may be happy. Verse 4 says the mind of the wise is in the house of mourning while the mind of fools is in the house of pleasure. Verse 5 says it is better to listen to the rebuke of a wise man than for one to listen to the song of fools....
