WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:07.000 Please turn back to Ecclesiastes 3 that was read for us earlier, page 554 in the Black Church. 00:00:07.000 --> 00:00:21.000 ! A life of wisdom, a wise life must by definition be a life that understands the world the way it really is. 00:00:21.000 --> 00:00:29.000 And wisdom is therefore desirable in part because it means that the person who possesses it, the wise man or the wise man, 00:00:29.000 --> 00:00:42.000 or the wise woman, knows what to expect and isn't derailed by things happening that they are thrown off course by, 00:00:42.000 --> 00:00:48.000 but actually just the things that happen in the course of life in the world the way it is. 00:00:48.000 --> 00:00:53.000 A couple of weeks ago I used the example of a child building their first sandcastle. 00:00:53.000 --> 00:01:02.000 That moment when their great pride and sense of satisfaction, what they've managed to achieve, turns to sadness and horror 00:01:02.000 --> 00:01:07.000 when the tide comes in and washes their work away. And I said their parent isn't bothered in the least. 00:01:07.000 --> 00:01:11.000 And the reason they're not bothered in the least is because they know what to expect. 00:01:11.000 --> 00:01:18.000 It has always been thus. The tide comes in, washes away the sandcastle. That is how it is. 00:01:18.000 --> 00:01:25.000 The parent is mature. They know that that is how the world works. 00:01:25.000 --> 00:01:34.000 This book of Ecclesiastes is wisdom literature. That is, it is given to us to make us like the parent and not the child. 00:01:34.000 --> 00:01:39.000 It is given to grow us up in God's wisdom, to understand how things work in God's world, 00:01:39.000 --> 00:01:43.000 so that we can navigate the world as well as possible. 00:01:43.000 --> 00:01:51.000 So that we're not thrown off course by things that happen just as they always have in the regular course of life. 00:01:51.000 --> 00:01:59.000 If you were here, Solomon started the book by reminding us of the unstoppable cycles of nature and the generations. 00:01:59.000 --> 00:02:04.000 People come and people go. Life is a vapor. That's just how it is. 00:02:04.000 --> 00:02:10.000 And last week we saw him take us through his research into every single aspect of life under the sun 00:02:10.000 --> 00:02:23.000 in order to show us that there is no gain to be had. There is no personal profit to be extracted, as it were, from wisdom or pleasure or productivity or prestige. 00:02:23.000 --> 00:02:34.000 They too are vapor. And that explains, doesn't it, the epidemic of dissatisfaction that seems to characterize Western culture in our day. 00:02:34.000 --> 00:02:45.000 Those things, wisdom, pleasure, productivity or prestige, those are the things that we have been told to pursue in order to gain in life, in order to profit from life in this world. 00:02:45.000 --> 00:02:52.000 And actually, they're not able to do that because they are just handfuls of mist. 00:02:52.000 --> 00:02:56.000 Wisdom dictates that we grasp this. 00:02:56.000 --> 00:03:07.000 And because the narrative of Western culture is going completely in the opposite direction, what Solomon is saying to us in this book is incredibly countercultural. 00:03:07.000 --> 00:03:22.000 And this evening, Solomon adds another category to our understanding as he explains how reality, the world as it really is, reality requires us to accept that we are limited and finite and that God is not. 00:03:22.000 --> 00:03:27.000 That's really the point of our section this evening. 00:03:27.000 --> 00:03:32.000 The wise man, the wise woman will accept that God holds the whole world in his hands. 00:03:32.000 --> 00:03:34.000 He is sovereign. 00:03:34.000 --> 00:03:37.000 And everything that happens is beyond human control. 00:03:37.000 --> 00:03:41.000 God is God and we are not. 00:03:41.000 --> 00:03:44.000 Now, this goes against all of our instincts. 00:03:44.000 --> 00:03:47.000 We prefer the doctrine of Henley's poem, don't we? 00:03:47.000 --> 00:03:48.000 Invictus. 00:03:48.000 --> 00:03:54.000 In the fell clutch of circumstance, I have not winced or cried aloud under the bludgeons of chance. 00:03:54.000 --> 00:03:58.000 My head is bloody but unbowed. 00:03:58.000 --> 00:04:02.000 It matters not how straight the gate, how charged with punishments the scroll. 00:04:02.000 --> 00:04:04.000 I am the master of my fate. 00:04:04.000 --> 00:04:07.000 I am the captain of my soul. 00:04:07.000 --> 00:04:11.000 That's the wish of every human heart. 00:04:11.000 --> 00:04:15.000 That's the instinct that rises up naturally in all of us. 00:04:15.000 --> 00:04:18.000 We want to live independently in the world. 00:04:18.000 --> 00:04:19.000 We don't want to need anyone. 00:04:19.000 --> 00:04:23.000 We want to be able to stand against whatever comes our way and stand. 00:04:23.000 --> 00:04:24.000 We want to stand. 00:04:24.000 --> 00:04:31.000 The reality, however, is that that's not the case. 00:04:31.000 --> 00:04:36.000 And deep down, actually, we all know that we can't live that way. 00:04:36.000 --> 00:04:44.000 And this evening, I want us to see that Solomon gives us a poem of his own to explain why that's the case. 00:04:44.000 --> 00:04:45.000 So, here's our first point. 00:04:45.000 --> 00:04:46.000 It's simply this. 00:04:46.000 --> 00:04:48.000 God's sovereignty. 00:04:48.000 --> 00:04:49.000 God's sovereignty. 00:04:49.000 --> 00:04:52.000 That's the first thing that Solomon tells us. 00:04:52.000 --> 00:04:53.000 Verses 1 to 8. 00:04:53.000 --> 00:04:58.000 For everything, 3 verse 1, there is a season. 00:04:58.000 --> 00:05:02.000 And a time for every matter under heaven. 00:05:02.000 --> 00:05:09.000 If you're anything like me, you can't read this chapter without the birds song from the 60s coming into your head. 00:05:09.000 --> 00:05:12.000 There is a time for everything. 00:05:12.000 --> 00:05:13.000 There is a season. 00:05:13.000 --> 00:05:14.000 Turn, turn, turn. 00:05:14.000 --> 00:05:18.000 But this isn't a sentimental tune about the passing of time. 00:05:18.000 --> 00:05:23.000 It is a poetic description of how God is Lord over the times. 00:05:23.000 --> 00:05:26.000 For everything, there is a season. 00:05:26.000 --> 00:05:30.000 And a time for every matter under heaven. 00:05:30.000 --> 00:05:42.000 And Solomon then develops, verse 1 as it were, through 2 through verse 8 by using a literary technique which places opposites side by side as a way of saying these and everything in between. 00:05:42.000 --> 00:05:45.000 So, a time to be born and a time to die. 00:05:45.000 --> 00:05:52.000 Putting those two together is a way of describing the whole of life from conception to the moment the heart stops beating. 00:05:52.000 --> 00:06:01.000 Every activity, every emotion, every experience, every matter under heaven is determined by God. 00:06:01.000 --> 00:06:07.000 And these verses are often taught to focus on human activity. 00:06:07.000 --> 00:06:10.000 There is an appropriate time for you to act. 00:06:10.000 --> 00:06:12.000 That's the way it's taught. 00:06:12.000 --> 00:06:13.000 Sometimes you'll do this. 00:06:13.000 --> 00:06:15.000 Sometimes you'll do that. 00:06:15.000 --> 00:06:17.000 And there is an appropriate time to do that. 00:06:17.000 --> 00:06:21.000 And the most sentimental versions of that kind of teaching appeal to verse 11. 00:06:21.000 --> 00:06:26.000 If you look down to verse 11, he's made everything beautiful in his own time. 00:06:26.000 --> 00:06:34.000 To suggest that even our bad behavior like killing, verse 3, or hatred, verse 8, is somehow beautiful in its own way. 00:06:34.000 --> 00:06:38.000 But this poem isn't about human activity. 00:06:38.000 --> 00:06:39.000 It's about God's activity. 00:06:39.000 --> 00:06:48.000 It's describing God's appointment of all things and how he is absolutely sovereign over absolutely everything. 00:06:48.000 --> 00:06:58.000 His plan, his timing, his rule extends to birth and death, to sickness and health, destruction and repair, love and hate, war and peace. 00:06:58.000 --> 00:07:05.000 The entirety of human life, which even extends to those things that appear to be in our hands. 00:07:05.000 --> 00:07:06.000 Do you notice that? 00:07:06.000 --> 00:07:08.000 Verse 3, a time to kill and a time to heal. 00:07:08.000 --> 00:07:11.000 A time to break down and a time to build up. 00:07:11.000 --> 00:07:14.000 Those feel like decisions that we make as humans. 00:07:14.000 --> 00:07:27.000 But Solomon puts them alongside laughing and weeping, verse 4, to show that actually, although those are activities that we execute, God is the one who stands behind them. 00:07:27.000 --> 00:07:30.000 He is the one who decides when those things happen. 00:07:30.000 --> 00:07:34.000 None of us choose when we laugh or when we weep. 00:07:34.000 --> 00:07:40.000 At the most basic and inane level, try stopping when you get a fit of the giggles when you shouldn't. 00:07:40.000 --> 00:07:42.000 You can't. 00:07:42.000 --> 00:07:49.000 More seriously, it would be absurd to suggest that you can plan how long you will take to grieve the death of a loved one. 00:07:49.000 --> 00:07:55.000 The idea that you might schedule in your diary grief, it'll start at this time and finish at this time. 00:07:55.000 --> 00:07:57.000 You can't do that. 00:07:57.000 --> 00:08:01.000 Solomon is telling us that God decides these things. 00:08:01.000 --> 00:08:04.000 Even the tragedies and injustices of life. 00:08:04.000 --> 00:08:05.000 Even the chaos. 00:08:05.000 --> 00:08:07.000 Indeed, the way the poem is constructed. 00:08:07.000 --> 00:08:08.000 Did you notice this? 00:08:08.000 --> 00:08:10.000 It is designed to make precisely that point. 00:08:10.000 --> 00:08:13.000 There is no pattern and no order to it. 00:08:13.000 --> 00:08:15.000 Casting away possessions, verse 6. 00:08:15.000 --> 00:08:17.000 Tearing a garment, verse 7. 00:08:17.000 --> 00:08:19.000 Keeping silent, verse 7. 00:08:19.000 --> 00:08:20.000 It's deliberately random. 00:08:20.000 --> 00:08:21.000 Why? 00:08:21.000 --> 00:08:24.000 Because that is often how life feels. 00:08:24.000 --> 00:08:26.000 One moment you're mourning a loss. 00:08:26.000 --> 00:08:28.000 The next you're embracing a friend. 00:08:28.000 --> 00:08:31.000 The next you're dancing with your spouse all the while. 00:08:31.000 --> 00:08:35.000 You feel hatred at injustices that go on all around you. 00:08:35.000 --> 00:08:38.000 And war rumbles on in Ukraine. 00:08:38.000 --> 00:08:46.000 Now, to be clear, where there is sin and where we make sinful decisions, God is not the author of that. 00:08:46.000 --> 00:08:50.000 Sin is the responsibility of the one who sins. 00:08:50.000 --> 00:08:57.000 But this does not remove God's complete sovereign superintending of all things. 00:08:57.000 --> 00:09:00.000 So, can you see? 00:09:00.000 --> 00:09:04.000 There is a time to be promoted and a time to be fired. 00:09:05.000 --> 00:09:09.000 A time to be criticized and a time to be praised. 00:09:09.000 --> 00:09:14.000 A time to receive the cancer diagnosis and a time to get the all clear. 00:09:14.000 --> 00:09:18.000 To conceive and to miscarry. 00:09:18.000 --> 00:09:21.000 To be betrayed and to be shown loyalty. 00:09:21.000 --> 00:09:25.000 To be honored by your children and to be dishonored. 00:09:25.000 --> 00:09:29.000 To be loved and to be rejected. 00:09:29.000 --> 00:09:34.000 God has set the times of them all. 00:09:34.000 --> 00:09:38.000 He has given you these things from His hand. 00:09:38.000 --> 00:09:43.000 You are not the master of your fate. 00:09:43.000 --> 00:09:50.000 And I wonder if this is the cause of so much of our anxiety and distress. 00:09:50.000 --> 00:09:59.000 I reckon many of us, if we are honest, could draw a straight line from our grumbling and our dissatisfaction in life to the fact that we are not actually in control. 00:09:59.000 --> 00:10:14.000 And yet, Solomon's point is that trying to control these times, trying to control the seasons, trying to manage your life in such a way that it will be okay, that you will be able to navigate it alright. 00:10:14.000 --> 00:10:22.000 Perhaps even trying to understand why God does what He does in your life. 00:10:22.000 --> 00:10:30.000 Well, to do that is too great and too marvelous a thing for anyone but Him. 00:10:30.000 --> 00:10:35.000 Isn't that what the Psalmist resolved in Psalm 131 when he said, 00:10:35.000 --> 00:10:45.000 He said, 00:10:45.000 --> 00:10:49.000 He is talking about the inscrutability of what God is doing in His life. 00:10:49.000 --> 00:10:52.000 Our attempts to control our lives. 00:10:52.000 --> 00:10:54.000 It is to lift our eyes. 00:10:54.000 --> 00:10:59.000 That is an idiom for us acting proudly, assuming a position that we shouldn't take. 00:10:59.000 --> 00:11:03.000 It is to occupy ourselves with things that actually aren't our business. 00:11:03.000 --> 00:11:06.000 We can't predict how things will go. 00:11:06.000 --> 00:11:09.000 We can't leverage things for our own gain. 00:11:09.000 --> 00:11:14.000 We are quite simply caught up in an adventure and we don't have the map. 00:11:17.000 --> 00:11:22.000 Faithful, wise living acknowledges that God is sovereign and we are not. 00:11:25.000 --> 00:11:29.000 Now that doesn't play well with an Invictus spirit, does it? 00:11:29.000 --> 00:11:30.000 One author has said, 00:11:30.000 --> 00:11:35.000 This doctrine has a hard edge and more than one person has cut himself on it. 00:11:35.000 --> 00:11:40.000 Plus, as we said, being part of an adventure without a map can make us anxious. 00:11:40.000 --> 00:11:51.000 So, with this very clear and shocking statement of God's sovereignty in verses 1-8, 00:11:51.000 --> 00:11:55.000 it is really important that we recognize that what follows is there. 00:11:55.000 --> 00:11:57.000 Solomon didn't stop at verse 8. 00:11:57.000 --> 00:12:03.000 In fact, he goes on to explain and develop in what follows a bit more. 00:12:03.000 --> 00:12:04.000 Flesh it out. 00:12:04.000 --> 00:12:05.000 So, Solomon goes on to say, 00:12:05.000 --> 00:12:07.000 Point number one is God's sovereignty. 00:12:07.000 --> 00:12:10.000 Point number two is God's sovereignty is fitting. 00:12:10.000 --> 00:12:12.000 We need to see that God's sovereignty is fitting. 00:12:12.000 --> 00:12:14.000 That is verses 9-11. 00:12:14.000 --> 00:12:16.000 What gain has the worker from his toil? 00:12:16.000 --> 00:12:20.000 I have seen the business that God has given to the children of man to be busy with. 00:12:20.000 --> 00:12:23.000 He has made everything beautiful in its time. 00:12:23.000 --> 00:12:26.000 Solomon reintroduces our toil. 00:12:26.000 --> 00:12:28.000 That was his topic in chapter 2, you remember. 00:12:28.000 --> 00:12:29.000 And what gain is there? 00:12:29.000 --> 00:12:31.000 What gain has the worker from his toil? 00:12:31.000 --> 00:12:32.000 None. 00:12:32.000 --> 00:12:35.000 It is all vapor, a striving after the wind. 00:12:35.000 --> 00:12:36.000 That is what we discovered. 00:12:36.000 --> 00:12:40.000 But he mentions it again here in chapter 3 for contrast. 00:12:40.000 --> 00:12:44.000 Because while yes, our work and our plans, 00:12:44.000 --> 00:12:47.000 that is the business that God has given to the children of man, 00:12:47.000 --> 00:12:50.000 while our work and our plan is vapor, 00:12:50.000 --> 00:12:53.000 God has made everything beautiful in its time. 00:12:53.000 --> 00:12:55.000 And look down again, verse 14, he goes on, 00:12:55.000 --> 00:12:57.000 Whatever God does endures forever. 00:12:57.000 --> 00:13:01.000 Nothing can be added to it, nor anything taken from it. 00:13:01.000 --> 00:13:05.000 God's labor is not vapor. 00:13:05.000 --> 00:13:11.000 God can shepherd the wind. 00:13:11.000 --> 00:13:13.000 Remember I said last week his phrase, 00:13:13.000 --> 00:13:16.000 striving after the wind, is actually sort of a description of somebody, 00:13:16.000 --> 00:13:20.000 like a traffic warden, trying to direct the wind in a particular way. 00:13:20.000 --> 00:13:21.000 That is why it is foolish. 00:13:21.000 --> 00:13:23.000 But God can do that. 00:13:24.000 --> 00:13:27.000 And all his plans, Solomon says, are beautiful. 00:13:27.000 --> 00:13:29.000 Now this isn't actually the best translation, 00:13:29.000 --> 00:13:32.000 because Solomon isn't making an aesthetic judgment. 00:13:32.000 --> 00:13:36.000 He is describing how God's plans fit together perfectly. 00:13:36.000 --> 00:13:38.000 That is a thing of beauty, 00:13:38.000 --> 00:13:40.000 but what he is describing is how they fit together. 00:13:40.000 --> 00:13:42.000 God's sovereignty is fitting. 00:13:42.000 --> 00:13:46.000 Our lives might be beyond our control, 00:13:46.000 --> 00:13:48.000 but they are not beyond God's. 00:13:48.000 --> 00:13:52.000 And all the seasons and circumstances actually fit together perfectly. 00:13:52.000 --> 00:13:56.000 Everything that God has done is in keeping with the sovereign plan. 00:13:56.000 --> 00:13:58.000 Everything. Everything. 00:13:58.000 --> 00:14:02.000 The embracing, verse 5, when that person needed your care. 00:14:02.000 --> 00:14:06.000 The refraining from embracing when it would have been inappropriate. 00:14:06.000 --> 00:14:08.000 And the consequences of both. 00:14:08.000 --> 00:14:11.000 The time you held your tongue, verse 7. 00:14:11.000 --> 00:14:13.000 The time you spoke up and the consequences of both. 00:14:13.000 --> 00:14:19.000 The time that war was declared and the time that peace prevailed. 00:14:19.000 --> 00:14:21.000 And the consequences of both. 00:14:21.000 --> 00:14:27.000 Somehow, it all fits together in God's plan. 00:14:29.000 --> 00:14:33.000 Now what we need to see is that when Solomon says this, 00:14:33.000 --> 00:14:35.000 he is making a confession of faith. 00:14:35.000 --> 00:14:39.000 And this is necessary. We'll say more on this in a moment. 00:14:39.000 --> 00:14:43.000 But it's necessary because of what the poem has just made clear. 00:14:43.000 --> 00:14:47.000 We can't see from God's perspective. 00:14:47.000 --> 00:14:55.000 For us, life is like a tapestry that we can only see from the backside. 00:14:55.000 --> 00:14:57.000 With all the knots and the twists. 00:14:57.000 --> 00:14:58.000 It looks like a mess. 00:14:58.000 --> 00:15:00.000 It's got bits sticking out. 00:15:00.000 --> 00:15:02.000 There's no pattern. There's no order. 00:15:02.000 --> 00:15:04.000 But if we could see it from the other side, 00:15:04.000 --> 00:15:09.000 we would see a beautiful picture being weaved together with no mistakes. 00:15:09.000 --> 00:15:12.000 Fitting and perfect all according to the master's plan. 00:15:14.000 --> 00:15:16.000 But we don't have that access. 00:15:16.000 --> 00:15:25.000 And for now, the reality is fitting or not, those knots and bumps are real. 00:15:25.000 --> 00:15:28.000 The mess is real. 00:15:28.000 --> 00:15:31.000 The confusion is real. 00:15:31.000 --> 00:15:34.000 And so Solomon, what he says next is even more important. 00:15:34.000 --> 00:15:37.000 Verse 11, if God's sovereignty, point number two, is fitting, 00:15:37.000 --> 00:15:39.000 point number three, God's sovereignty is frustrating. 00:15:39.000 --> 00:15:41.000 It's frustrating. 00:15:41.000 --> 00:15:49.000 Also, he has put eternity into man's heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end. 00:15:49.000 --> 00:15:53.000 God has put eternity into our hearts. 00:15:53.000 --> 00:15:59.000 He has placed in us an awareness of and a longing for the transcendent. 00:15:59.000 --> 00:16:03.000 That is, he has given us a yearning to know the end from the beginning. 00:16:03.000 --> 00:16:12.000 If you think about it, life would actually be easier if we could forget the fact that there is a divine plan being worked out in our lives and in our world. 00:16:12.000 --> 00:16:15.000 But God won't let us forget that. 00:16:15.000 --> 00:16:20.000 That is why, in fact, I think we pursue the distractions that Solomon tried in chapter two. 00:16:20.000 --> 00:16:23.000 The pleasure, the busyness, the attempts of greatness. 00:16:23.000 --> 00:16:28.000 We know that God is. 00:16:28.000 --> 00:16:32.000 He made us in his image and gave us a sense of the divine. 00:16:32.000 --> 00:16:38.000 We also know in our subconscious that he's working out his plans in the world for good. 00:16:38.000 --> 00:16:43.000 But because we don't have access to that information, we don't like this. 00:16:43.000 --> 00:16:48.000 What he's actually doing in every circumstance, we don't like this. 00:16:48.000 --> 00:16:52.000 And we especially don't like not being able to know like him. 00:16:52.000 --> 00:16:55.000 And so we try and shut it out. 00:16:55.000 --> 00:17:01.000 If we pause in the silence, if we take a break from busyness and distraction, 00:17:01.000 --> 00:17:09.000 one of the things that we'll realize is that we are very finite and that we are at the mercy of God in the world. 00:17:11.000 --> 00:17:13.000 We don't like that. 00:17:13.000 --> 00:17:20.000 We'll also recognize that we have a great sense within us of the transcendent, of the existence of God in the world 00:17:20.000 --> 00:17:27.000 and the fact that we don't simply just think that he's there, but we know that he is. 00:17:27.000 --> 00:17:31.000 And we suppress that truth. 00:17:31.000 --> 00:17:34.000 We don't like that either, so we try to shut it out. 00:17:35.000 --> 00:17:37.000 But we need to see. 00:17:37.000 --> 00:17:43.000 Solomon is telling us here that this inability to understand what God is doing is a feature of our humanity. 00:17:43.000 --> 00:17:46.000 It's not a bug. 00:17:46.000 --> 00:17:51.000 God has done it and he has done it deliberately. 00:17:51.000 --> 00:17:55.000 See, when we cry out, what on earth are you doing, Lord? 00:17:55.000 --> 00:17:58.000 What on earth is going on here? 00:17:58.000 --> 00:18:00.000 He has put that frustration there. 00:18:00.000 --> 00:18:07.000 Now, the details of whatever the situation is, they all fit perfectly into the bigger picture, but we can't see how. 00:18:07.000 --> 00:18:15.000 And it's not even like a one million piece jigsaw puzzle where with a bit of time and a bit of patience, you'll eventually sort it out. 00:18:15.000 --> 00:18:16.000 No. 00:18:16.000 --> 00:18:18.000 We don't have access to the map. 00:18:18.000 --> 00:18:20.000 We don't have the big picture. 00:18:20.000 --> 00:18:24.000 We don't have the blueprint because we are not God. 00:18:24.000 --> 00:18:27.000 And it's frustrating. 00:18:27.000 --> 00:18:29.000 It's frustrating. 00:18:29.000 --> 00:18:32.000 And we have to be honest about that. 00:18:32.000 --> 00:18:41.000 I want to suggest that much of our struggle in the Christian life is down to our unwillingness to accept this reality. 00:18:41.000 --> 00:18:43.000 We have an illusion of control. 00:18:43.000 --> 00:18:45.000 We make our decisions. 00:18:45.000 --> 00:18:47.000 We plan our lives. 00:18:47.000 --> 00:18:50.000 We want to optimize for excellence. 00:18:50.000 --> 00:18:52.000 It's a phrase I discovered recently. 00:18:52.000 --> 00:18:56.000 And we do whatever we can to bring our plans to pass. 00:18:56.000 --> 00:18:59.000 But then God messes with those plans. 00:18:59.000 --> 00:19:08.000 And things don't go our way because he is working according to his plans, which are actually, believe it or not, better plans than ours, even when we might think otherwise. 00:19:08.000 --> 00:19:12.000 And I want to say this. 00:19:12.000 --> 00:19:21.000 As sensitively as I can, this is especially the case when things aren't just frustrating but are painful. 00:19:21.000 --> 00:19:40.000 When our desires, our good desires, whether it be for a spouse or for children or for a job that would enable us to provide or for good health, all good things, when those good desires are frustrated, when God withholds those things from us, this is true then as well. 00:19:40.000 --> 00:19:41.000 His sovereign plan is fitting. 00:19:41.000 --> 00:19:44.000 His sovereign plan is fitting. 00:19:44.000 --> 00:19:47.000 Yes, it's frustrating but remember it is fitting. 00:19:47.000 --> 00:19:53.000 Fitting in the way it was fitting at the cross. 00:19:53.000 --> 00:20:07.000 No one looking at Jesus as he hung in shame and disgrace and suffering, no one looking would have said, this looks like a good idea. 00:20:07.000 --> 00:20:09.000 This looks like a good thing. 00:20:09.000 --> 00:20:22.000 And yet, even though it was the greatest evil in the history of the world, in the wisdom of God, he was accomplishing the greatest good the world has ever seen. 00:20:22.000 --> 00:20:24.000 Salvation of billions of people. 00:20:24.000 --> 00:20:36.000 And like, if you'd been there and looked at the cross, you would have seen suffering and death and shame and disgrace. 00:20:36.000 --> 00:20:46.000 If you had the eyes of faith, you would have said, I see salvation. 00:20:46.000 --> 00:20:49.000 I see the plan of God coming together. 00:20:49.000 --> 00:20:51.000 I see the point about what Solomon is saying. 00:20:51.000 --> 00:21:02.000 He can say that God's plans are fitting because even though to the naked eye they don't look it, he sees with the eyes of faith. 00:21:02.000 --> 00:21:08.000 So, let me suggest, if like me, you struggle with this. 00:21:08.000 --> 00:21:15.000 In the darkness of your frustration and pain, go again to the cross of Christ. 00:21:15.000 --> 00:21:16.000 And stay there. 00:21:16.000 --> 00:21:28.000 Keep looking until the light begins to break through. 00:21:28.000 --> 00:21:33.000 There's an advert that I've come across for Audible. 00:21:33.000 --> 00:21:35.000 You may have seen it. 00:21:35.000 --> 00:21:38.000 There's a woman whose car breaks down. 00:21:38.000 --> 00:21:41.000 And then she drops her keys in a muddy puddle. 00:21:41.000 --> 00:21:44.000 And then an HGV drives past and takes her door off. 00:21:44.000 --> 00:21:48.000 And lightning strikes the car as it's towed on the recovery lorry. 00:21:48.000 --> 00:21:51.000 And all the way through, she's laughing. 00:21:51.000 --> 00:21:56.000 And at the end, it shows as she pulls her hair back that she's got earbuds in. 00:21:56.000 --> 00:22:06.000 And the voiceover says, whatever life throws at you, laugh through it with comedy on Audible. 00:22:06.000 --> 00:22:09.000 That sounds great, doesn't it? 00:22:09.000 --> 00:22:20.000 If only comedy on Audible could fix or bring lightness to the frustration and pain of life in the world under the sun. 00:22:20.000 --> 00:22:27.000 We need more than comedy on Audible if we're going to be able to find joy in the midst of all of this. 00:22:27.000 --> 00:22:29.000 Yes, the plan is fitting. 00:22:29.000 --> 00:22:33.000 But our experience of it often is very frustrating. 00:22:33.000 --> 00:22:36.000 We need more than comedy on Audible. 00:22:36.000 --> 00:22:39.000 And as Solomon continues, he points us in that direction. 00:22:39.000 --> 00:22:43.000 Verse 12, this is a way to actually find joy in the vapor of life. 00:22:43.000 --> 00:22:51.000 I perceive that there is nothing better for them than to be joyful and to do good as long as they live. 00:22:51.000 --> 00:22:56.000 Also, that everyone should eat and drink and take pleasure in all his toil. 00:22:56.000 --> 00:22:59.000 This is God's gift to man. 00:22:59.000 --> 00:23:02.000 Here's the fourth point. 00:23:02.000 --> 00:23:04.000 Point number one, God's sovereignty. 00:23:04.000 --> 00:23:06.000 Point number two, God's sovereignty is fitting. 00:23:06.000 --> 00:23:08.000 Point number three, God's sovereignty is frustrating. 00:23:08.000 --> 00:23:12.000 Point number four, God's sovereignty is enjoyed by faith. 00:23:12.000 --> 00:23:15.000 It is enjoyed by faith. 00:23:15.000 --> 00:23:16.000 Everything is fitting. 00:23:16.000 --> 00:23:17.000 How can Solomon say this? 00:23:17.000 --> 00:23:19.000 Whatever God does endures forever. 00:23:19.000 --> 00:23:21.000 Nothing can be added to it nor anything taken from it. 00:23:21.000 --> 00:23:23.000 How does Solomon know that? 00:23:23.000 --> 00:23:25.000 He knows it by faith. 00:23:25.000 --> 00:23:29.000 He has come to see what God's design is in keeping his plans from us. 00:23:29.000 --> 00:23:35.000 Verse 14, God has done it so that people fear before him. 00:23:35.000 --> 00:23:40.000 Why does God burden man with life on these terms? 00:23:40.000 --> 00:23:46.000 It is so that rather than seeking advantage or gain or profit from life, we should fear God. 00:23:46.000 --> 00:23:52.000 We should put our faith in him and order our lives around him. 00:23:52.000 --> 00:23:55.000 The fear of the Lord is the beginning of all true wisdom. 00:23:55.000 --> 00:23:59.000 And this is why God won't let us find satisfaction anywhere else. 00:23:59.000 --> 00:24:03.000 Why does he keep frustrating our satisfaction as we pursue it in these other things? 00:24:03.000 --> 00:24:08.000 Well, because to find it in those other things would be to sell ourselves too short. 00:24:08.000 --> 00:24:13.000 We were designed to find our joy and our satisfaction only in him. 00:24:13.000 --> 00:24:18.000 So if he was to give it to us in anything else, we would be sold short. 00:24:18.000 --> 00:24:27.000 You were created to trust the God who made you for himself and to trust him with all that you are and all that you have. 00:24:27.000 --> 00:24:33.000 And when you do that, you can leave his plan to him. 00:24:33.000 --> 00:24:37.000 And you can enjoy the gifts that he has given you. 00:24:37.000 --> 00:24:45.000 All that you have, everything that you have, comes from the hand of God. 00:24:45.000 --> 00:25:02.000 And when you stop for a moment to recognize that, the house you live in, the breath in your body, the sun in the sky, the water in the tap, the food in the cupboard, the friends or family around the table, your spouse, your children, your job, your colleagues, your salary, your every jolly thing. 00:25:02.000 --> 00:25:03.000 It's all gift. 00:25:03.000 --> 00:25:04.000 It's all gift. 00:25:04.000 --> 00:25:05.000 All of it. 00:25:05.000 --> 00:25:09.000 Every last grain of salt. 00:25:09.000 --> 00:25:18.000 And we need to learn to receive those things in that way and find satisfaction and joy in them all. 00:25:18.000 --> 00:25:20.000 They are what God has given us. 00:25:20.000 --> 00:25:25.000 And we need to find our satisfaction and joy in those things as he has given them to us. 00:25:25.000 --> 00:25:28.000 And we do it the same way that Solomon did. 00:25:28.000 --> 00:25:31.000 We do it by faith. 00:25:31.000 --> 00:25:33.000 We declare, God is the Lord of the times. 00:25:33.000 --> 00:25:35.000 It is all beyond my control. 00:25:35.000 --> 00:25:39.000 So, worrying about it is about the most pointless thing that I could do. 00:25:39.000 --> 00:25:41.000 He has made everything fitting. 00:25:41.000 --> 00:25:42.000 Thank you, Lord. 00:25:42.000 --> 00:25:44.000 Thank you, Lord. 00:25:44.000 --> 00:25:45.000 Thank you, Lord. 00:25:45.000 --> 00:25:50.000 That's where satisfaction and joy is found. 00:25:50.000 --> 00:25:52.000 In this life of vapor. 00:25:52.000 --> 00:25:56.000 In this life of frustration under the sun. 00:25:56.000 --> 00:26:03.000 And huffing and grumbling and complaining that God's providence in your life is ruled offside here. 00:26:03.000 --> 00:26:06.000 Every believer should enjoy what they've been given. 00:26:06.000 --> 00:26:09.000 Did you notice? 00:26:09.000 --> 00:26:15.000 Did you notice that it doesn't just say that God has done this so that people fear him? 00:26:15.000 --> 00:26:16.000 Do you notice that? 00:26:16.000 --> 00:26:17.000 Verse 14. 00:26:17.000 --> 00:26:19.000 Look again at verse 14. 00:26:19.000 --> 00:26:26.000 God has done this so that people fear before him. 00:26:26.000 --> 00:26:31.000 See, Solomon isn't just referring here to a life of faith in God's world. 00:26:31.000 --> 00:26:34.000 Living by faith in God's world in a generic sense. 00:26:34.000 --> 00:26:37.000 He is describing something we do before God. 00:26:37.000 --> 00:26:39.000 That is, in God's presence. 00:26:39.000 --> 00:26:41.000 He is describing worship. 00:26:41.000 --> 00:26:43.000 What we're doing now. 00:26:43.000 --> 00:26:54.000 And the reason for this is that it is here where we step aside from the cares and the confusion and in some cases the chaos of life under the sun. 00:26:54.000 --> 00:26:57.000 And we have our hearts reordered according to God's ways. 00:26:57.000 --> 00:27:02.000 Isn't that our experience? 00:27:02.000 --> 00:27:11.000 When we gather in the Lord's presence like this, he works in us by his spirit and our faith in his sovereignty over all of life grows. 00:27:12.000 --> 00:27:20.000 When we're reminded that he can do what we can't and that he does all things well, our trust in his providence grows. 00:27:21.000 --> 00:27:30.000 When we express our longings as we sing and as we pray, our confidence in his plans for us, even in our struggles, grows. 00:27:30.000 --> 00:27:33.000 And so we rejoice. 00:27:33.000 --> 00:27:43.000 The frustration of our longing to know what God is doing in the world should always drive us to worship. 00:27:43.000 --> 00:27:47.000 That's how God has designed it. 00:27:47.000 --> 00:27:52.000 We can't see the end from the beginning. 00:27:52.000 --> 00:28:08.000 And God has created that disconnect in us so that we might fear before him, so that we might gather to worship, so that we might set aside our worries and cares of the world and humble ourselves before him in worship. 00:28:08.000 --> 00:28:13.000 Because this is really above all where we learn that we are not God. 00:28:13.000 --> 00:28:24.000 And this is where we are equipped to live a life by faith in his sovereign goodness and not by our own weak side. 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.000 00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:25.599 Let's pray together.