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Preacher: Ross Macdonald
Scripture: Ecclesiastes 3:18-22
Well, this morning we conclude Chapter 3 here in Ecclesiastes, and as we make our way to Chapter 4, as you'll be reminded, we're looking at this sort of three-part series, largely because I really want to hold together the end of Chapter 3 with the beginning of Chapter 4.
As I said last week, we tend to turn the page, turn the chapter, and think we've entered into entirely new territory, and we forget what's behind and press on to what's ahead. But in most of Scripture, and especially when it comes to wisdom literature, we really need to hold things together and keep in mind that woven themes and repetition is a really important part of understanding the book rightly.
And so we've titled this three parts, The Dust of Death, and that'll perhaps become a little more clear this morning. It'll certainly become clear next week why that's our title and how that holds together the end of Chapter 3 with the beginning of Chapter 4.
This is Part 2, and as we come to the conclusion of Chapter 3, let me give you a very brief reminder of the important things we've seen along the way. First, we began this chapter with a focus on time.
Verse 1, to everything there is a season, a time for every purpose under heaven. So the focus of the first two chapters was this despairing lament about the conditions of life under the sun as the king in Jerusalem sought to find gain in all of his toil, answering the perplexing question of Chapter 1, Verse 3.
And as he watched everything crumble away, everything slip through his fingers, he comes to the wisdom that we began to see in Chapter 3. His attention shifts from the work that he was doing, from the things that he was seeking, to now what God is doing, the work that God carries out and the things that God pursues.
And so we have this focus on time. He recognizes that the purpose which stands under heaven cannot be his nor any human being's. It must belong to God and to God alone. And of course this introduces a tension because our time under the sun occurs with what God has put in our hearts.
Verse 11, he has made everything beautiful in its time. He has put eternity in their hearts. So we saw the importance of Verse 11, this tension between our mortality under the sun and the eternity that surges within our life.
No one can find out the work that God does from beginning to end. We're not around to see it. We're only here for a moment. Our lives are like a vapor. But that eternity within our heart is resonating to the way that we were made, meant to be image-bearers of God and dwell with Him forever.
Then we came to the second so-called carpe diem statement. We saw that at the end of Chapter 2. There's six total in the book of Ecclesiastes. As we said, that seize the day is not the sentiment at all.
So rather than carpe diem, I like to say accipe diem, receive the day. We saw that in Verse 12 and 13. I know that nothing is better for them than to rejoice and to do good in their lives and also that every man should eat and drink and enjoy the good of all his labor.
This is the gift of God. Then last week, as we turned our attention to a new theme that will carry through this book, this theme of injustice, this theme that will span the rest of Chapter 3 into the beginning of Chapter 4, we read Verses 16 and 17.
Moreover, I saw under the sun in the place of judgment, wickedness was there. In the place of righteousness, iniquity was there. I said in my heart, God shall judge the righteous and the wicked, for there is a time there for every purpose and for every work.
So we return full circle at the end of Verse 17 to Verse 1. We've looked at time and the purpose of God and what stands at the end of time, indeed the end of history and the end of our vapor of life, God's judgment.
God shall judge the righteous and the wicked. Now this morning we're beginning at Verse 18. You'll notice that it begins with a repetition of, I said in my heart, just as we see in Verse 17. I said in my heart.
And also this holds together Chapters 1 and 2 and the theme of injustice and as we'll see this morning, Chapter 3 ends with a glimmer of another Akkapediam statement, another nothing is better statement and we want to understand why.
Well Verse 18 and following, I said in my heart, concerning the condition of the sons of men, God tests them, that they may see that they themselves are like animals. For what happens to the sons of men also happens to animals.
One thing befalls them. As one dies, so dies the other. Surely they all have one breath. Man has no advantage over animals, for all is vanity. All go to one place. All are from the dust and all return to dust.
Who knows the spirit of the sons of men which goes upward and the spirit of the animal which goes down to the earth? So I perceived. Nothing is better than that a man should rejoice in his own works, for that is his heritage.
For who can bring him to see what will happen after him? Let's just walk through these verses and we'll draw out some conclusion toward the end. Verse 18, I said in my heart, concerning the condition of the sons of men.
Yeah, and that's been his focus from the very beginning of chapter one. How can I make sense of human experience? How can I make sense of the gain that can be sought from all the toil with which I toil under the sun?
Concerning this fallen, mortal, vapor-like condition, he says, God tests them. Now you may have a different translation in front of you. This is a very difficult word to translate conceptually, this Hebrew word barar.
Some translations have the idea of a purification. He purifies them. Or the idea is that perhaps God demonstrates to them or clearly shows them. And perhaps that's the safest idea is God is revealing to them or making known to them.
He's showing them the way that they are like animals. And so testing certainly can work. It might be an interpretation rather than a sort of baseline translation. And the question is, what is this connection with verse 17?
Verses 16 and 17 introduced the theme of injustice. And then all of a sudden, we seem to turn to something entirely different in verse 18. It's the mortality of man who dies like the animal. What does it have to do with injustice that was introduced in verse 16?
And we'll continue in chapter 4, the first few verses. I think the idea is that the beastly behavior of mankind is largely what makes up injustice. That in that sense, there's an infinite distance between God, our creator, and the way that we are to image him and the things that actually exist in terms of human experience.
The way that we are treated and the way that we treat others. We're far more like animals, red in tooth and claw in that sense. Of course, in that mortal expression, we're not like the creator. We're like any other creature whose life is entirely dependent upon God.
And as the king will go on to say, we all have one breath, one spirit, one ruach, one reception of life from him who sustains and governs all of life. As one commentator said, what this verse is doing is establishing the creatureliness of humanity.
What makes us to differ? On the one hand, all sorts of things make us to differ. We won't spend too much time exhausting that point. But the point the king seeks to make in light of the end of death is the creatureliness of humanity.
This passage, by the way, since Augustine, and there's famous passages in his letters or in City of the God or in his little treatise on the soul and its origin or other important figures like Gregory.
This has been a discussion about the existence of animal life in terms of returning to God or in terms of even the afterlife, the resurrection. I started to wade a little bit into that this week and I abandoned.
I'm not getting lost in these weeds. If that's of interest to you, I can point you to some interesting references. But the idea that somehow there's an animalistic spirit that still has a place in the afterlife.
And this is something that some of the church fathers began to wrestle with. What we would call the ontology of animalia, the form of being or the existence of animal life. Am I going to see Ralphie again in glory?
I don't know. These things are too wonderful for me to know. More local to home, some of you have heard of Anne Hutchinson of Massachusetts Bay Colony in the 1630s. And she had some rather interesting takes that got her into some boiling water as a result of this passage here in Ecclesiastes 3.
Her minister, the famed John Cotton, whose works have recently been reprinted. If anyone's wondering what kind of gifts they can send my way, it'd be the five-volume set of John Cotton. And in fact, our Bolton Conference speaker, one of them, Stephen Ewell, who's the editor of that works, he'll have a session about John Cotton this year at the Bolton.
Well, John Cotton was the pastor of the Congregational Church in Boston. And he was called in to examine Anne Hutchinson because she had these home Bible studies and was teaching things contrary to sound doctrine.
And largely it had to do with understanding the mortality of the soul. She had this view that it was only at the new birth, only at regeneration, that man actually received a soul that was immortal, that was fit then for an everlasting life with God.
That as such, only the regenerate were immortal, but all other human beings that were unregenerate were simply made mortal like the animals. And her proof text was here in Ecclesiastes 3. In fact, this is a loose sketch of the transcript between John Cotton and Anne Hutchinson.
Mr. Cotton, your first opinion laid to your charge is that the souls of all men by nature are mortal and die like beasts, and that you allege this from Ecclesiastes 3, 18 through 21. Anne Hutchinson, I desire that place would be answered.
The spirit that God gives returns to him. She's saying both man and beast alike somehow return to God. John Cotton says, the place that speaks of the spirit ascending upward is answered by Ecclesiastes 12, verse 7.
And we're not there yet, but here's a place where at the end of Ecclesiastes, he says, when man returns to dust, his soul ascends upward. His soul returns to God. So though there is corruption and decay in the ground, the soul is actually able to inhabit life with God.
Man's spirit, Cotton says, doth not return to dust as man's body, but rather to God. The soul of man is immortal, Anne Hutchinson. Every man consists of soul and body. So then the spirit that God gives man returns to God indeed, but the soul dies.
And that is the spirit which Ecclesiastes speaks of, not the soul. And so they continued and they went back and forth, scripture for scripture. And towards the end, Anne Hutchinson made this fatal mistake of claiming that she received her understanding by special revelation.
And that was enough for the ministers in Boston to say, it's time to get out. In fact, they said in the name of Christ Jesus and of this church as a leper, withdraw yourself from the congregation. Don't you miss those days?
So this verse has a lot of interesting history in interpretation. How are we to make sense of the spirit of animals? How are we to make sense of the soul of man? How are we to understand the way that man is nothing like the beast in terms of God's creation and human destiny?
But here in Ecclesiastes 3, man is no different than the beast. A number of interesting twists here. Well, let's play out looking at the next verses, how we can make some sense of these questions. Verses 19 and 20.
What happens to the sons of men also happens to animals. If you remember that ambiguous way of saying the event that happens to them all from chapter one, what happens to the sons of men? He's not talking about some general experience.
He's talking about death. The thing that happens under the sun, the one thing that's inescapable, what happens to the sons of man also happens to animals. One thing befalls them. And what is that one thing?
He tells us, as one dies, so dies the other. Surely they all have one breath. And in this way, man has no advantage over animals, for all is vanity. Now, there's some wordplay going on here. Man has no gain over the animal.
All is vanity. All is heavil, right? And notice what he says ahead of that. They all have one breath, one ruach. So there's a lot of wordplay going on. We have two different breaths, as it were, one life-giving, one vain and corrupting.
There's no gain, which is the thing the king has been seeking. All go to one place. So notice, as one dies, so dies the other. They all have one breath. They all go to one place. He's spelling out the way that death makes us no different than the animals under the sun.
Now, remember the king in chapters one and two. The king who did everything that his heart desired. If I wanted to do something, I did it. If I wanted to build something, I built it. If I wanted to expand my territory, I did it.
If I wanted to have a harem full of wives or coffers full of treasure, I had more than anyone before me. Nothing was withheld from me. He was living like a demigod on the earth. What's the conclusion of the wise king here in chapter three, as he's considered the work of God?
And he's looked at all of these things he's built and sought slip away through his fingers. He recognizes what makes me to differ from the beast. If the conclusion of chapter two was the wise man dies like the fool.
So what point was there in being wise? Here in chapter three is like the man dies like the beast. He's showing that again, the prospect of death flattens out all distinctions under the sun. Everything decays.
Everything is corruptible. This is life under the sun. This is life in the fallen condition, the present form of the world. Passing away as all mortal life must pass away, as human beings must return to the dust from which they came.
And that's verse 20. All go to one place. All are from the dust and all return to dust. What have we said from the beginning? Ecclesiastes is a running commentary on Genesis, on the creation account. If you're readers of Genesis, verse 20 ought to ring some bells.
From dust to dust. This idea of returning to the place of dust, returning to death, returning to the grave, returning to one place is going to be repeated in Ecclesiastes chapter six. Even if other men may live a thousand years twice over and enjoy good things, do they not all go to one place?
And that place being the grave, being Sheol. Ecclesiastes 9, verse 10, whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might. For there is no activity or planning or knowledge or wisdom in the place you are going, which is Sheol, one place.
All go to the same place. Again, the idea here is not speaking of the resurrection of Ralphie necessarily, or chipmunks and squirrels and the thing he ran over when you were rushing to church this morning.
The same place here is the grave. That becomes clear in chapter six and chapter nine, because the point is the same thing happens to them all. Under the sun, the same event occurs, the same place. They return to dust.
That's what we're looking at. So we shouldn't speculate about the immortal dimensions of Animalia. Rather, the point is the grave, death swallowing up all life under the sun. As Walt Kaiser put it, death is no respecter of persons, not even of animals.
Isn't that clear? Now, Ecclesiastes chapter three, when you get to verse 21, perhaps the most difficult part, sometimes how it's translated is the spirit of man rises upward and the spirit of the animal goes down into the earth.
I think that's right. But some translations translate the article as an interrogative particle. Now, if that's all Hebrew to you, that is Hebrew. And the idea then, it's a rhetorical question. Who knows if the spirit of man rises upward and the spirit of the animal goes into the earth?
So it's leading open to speculation. Who knows which way the human goes and which way the animal goes, as if there's some doubt or aspersion about the afterlife for a human being. But that couldn't be the case here.
Think of what we just saw before in verse 11. God put eternity in man's heart. Think of what we just saw in verse 17. At the end, God will judge the righteous and the wicked. Those two verses alone speak to the afterlife of human beings, speak to that immortal state.
So he's not questioning whether man's soul goes upward. If you doubt it here, you can't doubt it in chapter 12. He says it explicitly. So the point is simply about the gravity, the gritty reality of the grave.
That's why I think it's a right translation. The spirit of man rises upward, the spirit of the animal, that life-giving breath the animal received goes down into the earth. Now, what that means in a glorified state, you can debate with Augustine and Gregory, not with me.
The point is about the gritty reality of the grave. Let's spell out that gritty reality. Eric Ortlund puts it with this picture. Imagine you come across a grisly car accident. And inside of the crumpled remains of the car, there's the body of your friend, that saintly believer who sat by and worshiped alongside you every Sunday.
And then next to him was a friend he was witnessing to, a staunch atheist. And in between them, the remains of the family dog. Is there any obvious difference to your eyesight between the three bodies that the rescuers receive?
That's exactly what he's looking at. The decay, the grave, the death. It happens to the man just like the animal. I was in Pompeii in April. And of course, you go into some of these homes and there's a very famous motif in Pompeii.
And all the ware sellers and souvenir sellers hope to hook you with it. This entryway that has the Latin inscription, caue canem, which means beware of the dog. And there's this black dog that's sort of put into the mosaic tile.
That's all over the place. Well, in one of the homes, I forget which home it is, they have the plaster casts of the owners of the house we assume, perhaps servants in the house. And then you have the plaster cast of the dog.
What makes them to differ? It's the same type of remain in the same place. They both breathe their last breath. But two things are really important to remember here. First, the king here, Ecclesiastes here, does not deny the fact that there is life beyond the sun.
That's already clear in chapter three. Certainly clear in chapter 12. Remember, this is all an under the sun perspective. Second, because his focus is on life under the sun, there's a glory and a hope to the promise of resurrection, which is a key part of the answer to a book like Ecclesiastes.
We'll be looking at that next week in great detail. It's not just the answer and the hope of the book of Ecclesiastes, it's the answer and hope of the human condition. It's the glory of the scriptures.
As Paul said, if there is no resurrection, we're to be pitied. We're fools. We're wasting our time. This is the glory of the gospel. That death is not the end. That there is something ultimately different about the destiny of image bearers who know and fear the Lord.
But in the meantime, the fact that physical death is so gritty, so senseless, that in places around the world today, men and women and children are dying just like roadkill. It's something so uncomfortable, so nauseating to think, and that's what this book is doing.
It's puncturing the way we think about death, the reality of death, the prospect of death. Ecclesiastes 12, seven says, the dust will return to the earth as it was. The spirit will return to God who gave it.
Just like chapter three here, that's drawing on the creation account. Genesis 2, seven, the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life. And so man became a living being.
We'll look at that a little bit next week through the lens of 1 Corinthians 15. Very, very fascinating imagery here. God forming man out of the dust, but that's not enough. He also forms creatures and all animal life out of the dust as well, out of the ground as well.
But there's this difference because upon man, he breathes into man's nostrils the breath of life. And then the curse comes upon fallen man in Genesis three, verse 19. And the sweat of your face, you shall eat bread till you return to the dust, to the ground, to the Adma.
For out of it, you were taken and dust you are. And so to dust, you shall return. Is that not true? Again, why is this here? One of the things that I noticed this week is where this creation theology and prospect of death and judgment occur.
It's usually in a context of injustice, of dealing with injustice, of either waiting for or longing for the judgment of God or reeling from it. But justice is waiting in the wings. The theme of injustice surrounds this language of dust.
So think of the wise words of Elihu in Job 34 and look at the context of justice. He repays man according to his work and makes man to find a reward according to his way. Surely God will never do wickedly, nor will the almighty pervert justice who gave him charge over the earth, who appointed him over the whole world.
If he should set his heart on it, if he should gather to himself his spirit and his breath, all flesh would perish together and man would return to dust. You see this theme of the justice of God, the judgment of God.
And what's the confession? If God pulled back that breath of life, everything goes back to dust. Man goes back to dust. All flesh perishes together. Another example, I could give a dozen. Psalm 30, beginning in verse 8.
This is a Psalm of David. He's crying out about personal injustice. I cried out to you, O Lord, and to the Lord I made supplication. Lord, what profit would there be in my blood if I go down to the pit?
Will the dust praise you? This is so powerful. He says in verse 10, Lord, have mercy on me. Be my helper. He's saying, Lord, what glory would it be to you if I just revert back to dust? Can my dust praise you?
In other words, if you don't save me, if you don't help me, I'm going to go back to this condition of a dusty death. The sons of Korah in Psalm 44. Again, please notice this theme of injustice. Why do you hide your face and forget our affliction and our oppression?
And what's the impact of oppression? What's the experience of injustice? This is how the Scriptures relay it. Suffering trials because of the fall. Suffering injustice because of life under the sun. Why do you hide your face?
In other words, when will your judgment come? When will you vindicate? How long, O Lord? Why do you hide your face and forget our affliction and our oppression? Our soul is bowed down to the dust. Our body is clinging to the ground.
In other words, we're hairsbreadth away from returning to dust unless you move, unless you save. Arise for our help. Redeem us for your mercy's sake. So you're bowed down to the dust and the cry is, Lord, arise.
And in arising, lift me up out of the miry clay. Lift me up out of the dust. And then the way that the Christian is comforted, as we'll see at the beginning of chapter four, largely surrounds this theme as well.
Psalm 103, 14. He himself knows our frame. He's mindful that we are but dust. He knows that we're dust. He made us from dust. And because of God's curse and judgment on sin to dust, we must return. In that perspective, what makes us to differ from the beast?
We all go to the same place. We die alike. The one breath, that breath of life we've received is removed. Fallen human beings and animals in this sense have a common end. And as you said, that common end is the grave.
But for the human being, the grave is not the final resting place. Human beings alone being made as image bearers in the image of God. C .S. Lewis has this tremendous quote from his sermon, The Weight of Glory, where he says, entering into heaven is the means by which we become fully human in ways we never could otherwise.
Because of the influence of Hellenistic philosophy, sometimes we think that the flesh is something that we just need to eject from, this shell that needs to just return to dust, the soul, that immortality that's within us somehow, that's going to be the thing that persists.
And in that sense, we think somehow we become something less than or other than human in entering into glory, entering into heaven. That's entirely wrong. We become more human than we could have been under the sun as a result of the fall.
Jesus Christ being the last Adam, in that sense, the telos of humanity, the first fruits of what we shall become. A human being as it was meant to be. An image bearer, expressly reflecting the glories and perfections of God.
Because our life is under the sun, we have a common end with all life. Dusty death. The grave. In Adam, all dies. As a result of sin entering into the world, death enters into the world, and that shadow is spread over all of the nations and all life.
Who knows the spirit of the sons of men which goes upward and the spirit of the animal which goes down to the earth? Sometimes this gets pressed too hard as if it was a rhetorical question. Who knows?
And they supply if. Who knows if the spirit of the sons of men goes upward or the spirit of the animal goes into the earth? Who knows? That's, I think, an entirely wrong way of understanding verse 21.
Look at the way these questions are formed. I'll read it with verse 22. Who knows the spirit of the sons of men which goes upward or the spirit of the animal which goes down to the earth? So I perceive nothing is better that a man should rejoice in his own works, for that is his heritage.
Who can bring him to see what will happen after him? I hope you can see the structure in these verses. The first thing is the spirit of the sons of men that in the same way is dependent upon the life that has been received from God, just like the animal, and the common dusty end of both under the sun.
But the difference between the both, who knows the spirit of the sons of men which goes upward? God knows. Who knows the spirit of the animal that goes down to the earth? God knows. What's the difference between the man and the animal?
I perceive nothing is better than that a man should rejoice in his own works. Already there, you're getting the hint. There's something a little bit different about the man. The man that rejoices in his own work because it's his heritage, it's his portion.
The idea is there's actually something that continues, something that's received. He's no longer speaking in terms of the animal. He's speaking in terms of the man, of the sons of men. The spirit goes upward.
God knows that. And the man who knows and fears God can rejoice in his work. That's his portion. And then we return to the rhetorical question. Who can bring him to see what will happen after him? Well, under the sun, he can't know.
That point was already made. No one can know the work that God does from beginning to end. But because God does that work, the day is fixed, that judgment day, when all will be revealed. All will become clear.
So this is a reminder. It's God who knows the difference between man and beast. It's God who made the difference between man and beast. It's God who appoints the destiny between man and beast. The things that draw us together are our mutual reliance upon God and the fact that as our creator, he has given us a portion.
He has given us a lot. He has given us work to do, a calling to do. Did you know that God assigns the work of the squirrel? Do you know that God planned the circuit of the crow? Do you know that God designed the song of the sparrow?
The idea is there's an apportionment. There's a fittedness. There's a creatorly design to all creatures. And this breath of life is something we hold in common. In fact, in Genesis 6, in the flood narrative, that phrase, the breath of life is attributed to animals.
Whether they drowned in the flood, Genesis 6, 17 or 7, 22, or as we read, those that had the breath of life entered into the ark two by two. I think of Psalm 104. Oh Lord, how manifold are your works.
In wisdom you have made them all. The earth is full of your possessions. This great and wide sea in which are innumerable teeming things, living things, both small and great, ships sail about. There's that leviathan which you've made to play there.
These all wait on you. What are the these? Every innumerable tiny little living thing. Everything that God has made in the heavens above, in the land far, in the depths of the sea. All these things wait for you, that you will give them food in their due season.
What you give them, they gather in. You open your hand, they're filled with good. You hide your face and they are troubled. You take away their breath. They die and return to dust. You send forth your spirit, send forth your breath.
They are created. And so you renew the face of the earth. You see, it's the same imagery here. For all that's different about man and beast, this is what is similar. When God takes away their breath, both man and beast die and return to dust.
They were only created because God sent forth his spirit hovering over the face of the deep. God is the one who renews the face of the earth. God is the one who's able to redeem his image bearers out of dusty death.
Now we come to the very end here. We come to the acopadium statement at the end of chapter three. Why is that here? Why is that here? Well, the king may be thinking of the injustice that is coming our way, which we cannot prevent, nor can we foreknow.
He might be thinking of the fact that we are going to return to dust. And that perspective, of course, is what helps us think differently about each day. If I live in the prospect of being judged by God, it should have an impact on my daily life.
If I live in the prospect that I must return to dust, it should have an impact on the way that I live. So essentially it runs like this. You could be wrongfully treated tomorrow. You could die in your sleep tonight.
No one knows the work that God does from beginning to end. So enjoy your work now. This is your portion. In other words, you're far more like the animal than you are like the creator. Don't live like you're a demigod.
Tomorrow I'm going to do this and next week this and next year this. Rather, we ought to say if the Lord wills, like a creature dependent upon him, if he opens his hand, if he enables me in both body and soul and according to his providence, I will be able to do these things.
But I'm entirely dependent upon him. No one knows the work that he's doing. That's my portion. Simply what he gives to me. Like he gives to any animal, it's portion. It's lot in life. We're returning in some ways to a theme that's been held out, this mystery of life, the things that we can't know about life.
Because we don't have the wisdom of God or the mind of God. We don't have the power and control of God. We can't see the beginning from the end. We're just here for a little moment, a flicker in the sun.
And the idea is that rather than endlessly speculating about where things are going or what things need to happen, we simply need to be tending to the portion that God has given us. I think that's why it's here.
You can't control injustice. And if you think about your frailty and dependence, you're really no different than an animal. In fact, you're just a mere breath as Psalm 104 says, as James says. And so rather than living like a demigod or trying to control or change your portion, you should receive your portion from God's hand and be faithful to it.
But because you're a human being, and if you know and fear the Lord, this portion under the sun will not be your only portion. This will not be your portion forever. You will have a portion that will occur in everlasting glory.
So the idea is that we can be faithful to the portion that God has given us under the sun as we fix our eyes on our portion forever. It's going to be a major. Look at that next week. Next week, we'll be seeing how this is how Jesus Christ endured.
It was the joy set before him. He knew his portion. He knew the difference between the lot he had in his life under the sun and the everlasting inheritance he was seeking. And that's why he was able to endure the cross and its shame.
He had a resurrection hope. As all of the prophets long to have, as we see in the Psalms, and as we see in the prophets, a way out of dusty death. In any given season, we're tempted to imagine or think or speculate or worry about the things that we don't know that we so desperately want to control.
But as we've seen throughout chapter three, God is the one who designates our times and our seasons. We can't shorten them. We can't extend them beyond his will or his control. So rather than digging and scraping to find out the things we cannot know, to uncover the purposes that time under the sun will not reveal, we rather to receive every day from his hand as our portion and be faithful to what he's given us.
This is how to deal with the dust of death. The way forward in our seasons is not rehearsing what we cannot control, what we cannot find out. It's rather being faithful to what we do know, to what God has made clear.
What has he shown you, oh man? That's what we're responsible for. We're not responsible to control or uncover or make sense of the things that we cannot. The dust of death accumulates over all of that.
I use this phrase very, very broadly. I love it. The idea of returning to dust is this condition of death. You walk around the ruins from Mount Vesuvius and everything is dusty death. All that volcanic soil just begins to crumble and you just have gray dust clouding up everywhere.
It's just this picture of absolute dusty death. If you have a home that perhaps is not well kept, you'll know about the dust. Thick half inch layers of dust across the shell. Sometimes the only people that notice dust are the guests you have over your house.
No one's ever looking up at the corners to notice the cobwebs until you have a guest over and they're like, yikes. When did you paint your ceiling gray? No, we never did. It's the dust. It accumulates over time.
It begins to layer over and cover over everything. That phrase, the dust of death, it's something that's gradual. It's a testament to time, but more than that, it's a testament to how activity ceases and presence is lost and all that's left in its place is dust.
The presence, the activity, the signs of life, the things that would keep things moving and wind swirling, all of that gives way to dust. And in this sense, man, like the animal, whether it's through injustice or just life under the sun, as life under the sun, we all return to this dust and it begs the question, what is our portion?
What is our portion? Remember verse 11. Eternity is in the heart. My portion cannot be any season under the sun. My portion must not be any of the things that God appoints in his providence under the sun.
I have eternity in my heart. My portion must be forever. I need to actually have the portion I was created for. Nothing else will satisfy. And so all these earthly appointments, all these earthly portions ought to draw my heart successively and consistently to that greater portion yet to come.
If you have an ear for this, you will find it throughout the Scriptures in this way. There's an immediate portion, an immediate lot, an immediate heritage, and then there's the heritage my heart is actually seeking.
This can be a beacon, a signal toward that larger portion. You think of Asaph in Psalm 73. He's looking for some sense of justice, isn't he? My foot almost slipped because I see it as unjust. Why do those who love you suffer?
And why do those who spurn your ways and break your commandments seem to prosper? I can't make sense of it. So my faith is faltering. I'm losing any sense of the point of it all. Why walk in this way?
Why walk the straight and narrow? Why fear you and keep your commandments if there's just injustice like this under the sun? And he says, my heart was grieved. I was vexed in my mind. I was so foolish and ignorant.
I was like a beast before you. But now he comes to recognize the providence and purpose of God. He says, nevertheless, I'm continually with you. You hold me by my right hand. You'll guide me afterward with your counsel.
And afterward, you'll receive me to glory. Where's his hope? When he was looking at his lot, his portion as a faithful law keeper, as a believer of God compared to the lot, the portion in life of those who spurn God's commandments, and everything seems to go well for them.
His foot almost slipped when he wanted his portion to be like their portion, when he wanted a portion under the sun to somehow fulfill his eternal heart. He couldn't find it. It was vexing to him. He started living like a beast, started thinking like an animal.
It was only when he understood God and the purpose of God and desired a portion that could not come under the sun. Afterward, you will receive me in glory. And then look at the confession, verse 25. Whom do I have in heaven but you?
There is none on earth I desire beside you. You see how that little twist totally shifted the desire of his heart? I was envious. I was vexed because I saw their portion under the sun. I can't make sense of that injustice.
But now that I see you, now that I know you, I know there's no portion under the sun that can fulfill my heart. My desire is now for you. Who do I have in heaven but you? On earth now, there's nothing I desire beside you.
And so he says, my flesh, my heart fail. I'm ashamed that my heart ever deceived me in this way. I'm ashamed that I was daydreaming about that portion under the sun, knowing it all goes to dust, just like my flesh will return to dust.
My flesh, my heart fails. God's the strength of my heart. My portion forever. You see, the whole conclusion of Psalm 73 is Asaph understanding how the earthly portion gives way to the eternal portion.
In Psalm 31, when David, without realizing it, prophesies, into your hand I commit my spirit, my breath, this life that you've given me. It's just yours. I commit it to you. And of course, Christ, the greater son of David and David's Lord, says those words on the cross as he dies, into your hand, the one who brought me up from my mother's womb, into your hand, the one who now is presently encircled me with great bulls of Bashan as I watch them cast lots from my clothes and I can count all my bones, into your hand, I commit my spirit.
I give you my breath. It's the earthly portion that gives way to the eternal portion. I know I can trust you with it. I know I'll get it back. Glorious. I don't need to be envious. I don't need to daydream.
I don't need to try to claw my way through life, securing some portion under the sun. I have to be faithful to the portion God has given me. I can't know what I can't know, but I must respond to what I do know.
I know that God's hand has a purpose. I know that nothing can be thwarted or withheld from him. That's what I'm responsible for. And if you understand why this statement is here, that's what I can enjoy.
So maybe the question, the big question I want to ask is, what is your portion? What is your portion? Are you like Asaph in Psalm 73, but only the first half of the psalm? Or have you come to the conclusion and are you living in light of the second half of that psalm?
In other words, has your earthly portion brought you to live for the eternal portion? Like Abraham who dwelt in the land of promise, in a tent, because he wasn't looking for this land of promise in its present form.
He was looking for the city whose builder and maker is God. We're not looking for this portion in its present form that must return to dust as we sang in the hymn earlier this morning, when Victor's wreaths and monarch's gems shall blend in common dust.
We're looking for the eternal portion, the eternal inheritance. That's the portion that will fulfill the eternity in my heart and nothing less. A couple of thoughts about that portion, just to help you understand whether you're living for eternity, living for the eternal reward, or like Asaph, you're vexed with the injustice and the frustration of trying to seek an everlasting portion under a sun.
The first thing to say is the portion, first and foremost, is God's portion. It belongs to God. Again, don't live like a demigod. You are not in control. God withholds his breath and everything goes to dust.
He's the one that renews the face of the earth. It's not your portion. Let me just, I don't want to move on from that point too quickly because it's such a radical challenge to the way we experience life.
I've earned this. This is my keep. I built this with my hands. That's our attitude. Now, the only one who ever rightfully says, mine is God. Everyone else is simply a steward. A suitor, a dependent. The portion is God's.
It's God's to give and it's God's to take. Don't you see some resonance in that pathetic picture of the prophet Jonah under the shriveling gourd? All I wanted was just some shade and now you even took that away.
How many shriveling gourds do we have in our lives, brothers and sisters? Well, the first thing is these are God's to give, God's to take. As we said last week, shall not the judge of all the earth do right?
Others may treat me unjustly. My God will never treat me unjustly. So he distributes it according to his will. This will is not arbitrary. It's not capricious. It's not like the gods of Greco-Roman mythology.
He distributes it according to the perfections of his character, the goodness of his purpose, the mercy that surrounds us and renews every morning. So you recognize this portion is mine because I am seeking to follow the almighty hand of God that will not lead me astray.
I cannot control this portion. I cannot secure and make this portion under the sun everlasting. This portion will never satisfy me. I have no scope over its quality. I have no say over its fruitfulness.
I can't expand it. Some of you homeschooling moms, you think in portions, don't you? Like if you have a big family, you know, one big crock pot gets dropped on the kitchen table and everyone doles out a bowl full and that's your portion.
And if there's anything left, that's it. I remember my dad saying he grew up with a lot of brothers and sisters and it was like you learned to eat quick because you wanted that second round. If you didn't eat fast enough, then that was your portion.
That was it. You missed out. The modern mindset is you got to scramble. You got to secure. Do you see what's happening here at the end of chapter three? You can enjoy. So here's a little litmus test for you.
Here's a little way of indicating whether these earthly portions are giving way to the eternal portion, the eternal reward. Are you enjoying what God gives? That's the whole point of these statements that are occurring throughout Ecclesiastes.
Are you receiving it? Are you receiving it from his hand? Sometimes we think, and this is not necessarily a wrong way to think, it's just a difference. I'll know that I'm living for the reward if I'm more diligent, if I'm trying harder, if I'm surging forward, if I'm fighting that good fight.
It's not a bad thought. There's a lot of truth to that. You'll know you're living for the eternal reward if you're sacrificial, if you're not holding anything close, but holding everything with a loose hand.
In that sense, you've learned how to be content. That shows that you're living for the reward. That's how Abraham lived in a tent. Let me tell you another way you'll know you're living for the eternal portion.
You're enjoying every day, every season. You see gifts that surround you from God's hand. You don't shake a fist at a shriveling gourd because your eye is too keen on noticing and being thankful for all the gourds that haven't shriveled.
Thank you, I still have this. Thank you, I still have my health. And if not my health, my mind. And if not my mind, breath, that I can at least groan out prayers to you. Thank you for any gourd that hasn't shriveled.
They'll all be dust once you take your breath away. You see, this is the beginning of where we're going in Ecclesiastes, this idea of casting bread on many waters. Thinking about God's portion, God's allotment for you, it implies a response, a response of awareness, and then gratitude, and then responsibility.
So are you enjoying it? And then with that, are you cultivating that? Are you cultivating that joy? This is a key. Are you sharing that joy with others? Are you testifying of that joy? What difference is that joy making in terms of your peace, your contentment?
Are you cultivating that in other virtues in the Christian life? Are you growing in the fruit of the spirit as a result of that? That'll tell you everything about, I will be able to do that in the next portion, in the next chapter, in the next season I'll do that.
I just need to get there. Wrong. You can do that this morning, whatever the portion may be, this season, whatever the trial may be. Are you aware of it? Are you grateful for it? Are you cultivating that gratitude?
This joy is directional. It has to go somewhere. It has to return to God and worship and to man and service. It shows whether we're living for the eternal portion or whether we're clawing our way like Asaph to try to secure it in this life, in this world.
What is your portion? How are you receiving it? You come to this realization like David in Psalm 37. The little that a righteous man has is better than the riches of many wicked. For the arms of the wicked shall be broken, but the Lord upholds the righteous.
The Lord knows the days of the upright and their inheritance shall be forever. So a righteous man has little. That's no trouble to him. Because he knows his inheritance is forever. He knows the difference between a portion under the sun and a portion beyond the sun.
Or as one Puritan said, the difference between a passage in life and a portion to come. Do you know the difference between your passage in life and the portion to come? If you've read Jeremiah Burroughs, Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment, which I've referenced over the years, and he has this tremendous little section where he's talking about the mystery of godliness.
And he says it's not just a mystery in doctrine, it's a mystery in practice. Because here's the thing about a godly man. A godly man will be content over a scrap of bread and a cup of water. He can rejoice over that.
That's what Psalm 37 is saying. And yet give him the entire world, his wildest dreams 10 times over, and he'll be the most discontent man on the earth. Such is the mystery of godliness. A righteous man will be content with ramen noodles and Diet Pepsi.
But give him his wildest aspirations 10 times over, and you will have the most discontent man on the earth. That is something that only the Spirit of God can do. I can rejoice and be thankful for my portion, Lord.
But if this is my only portion, if this is all there is, woe is me. Woe is me. I need more than this. I've got eternity in my heart. I need something everlasting. I need you. You are my portion. That's the conclusion of Psalm 73.
There's nothing on earth I desire besides you. When you're at that place, every portion is something you can appreciate and celebrate, testify to, and serve. You can cultivate it for the glory of the God you're seeking.
It's his eternal reward, his portion. How many of us live this way, brothers and sisters? Burroughs says, a contented man, though he is most contented with the very least things in the world, is the most dissatisfied that lives in the world.
Or to put it in another way, Burroughs says, the little in the world that a Christian has will content him as his passage, but all of the world and 10 ,000 times more will not be content for his portion.
And Burroughs goes on to say, the Christian that thinks in this way knows their portion is not Golden Streets. It's not the crowns we cast before nailed, pierced feet. The portion, as Asaph says, is God himself.
The contented Christian is not someone who has finally found the peace of God or the health of God. It's someone who's found the God of peace, the God who gives health. It's not a Christian who finally finds mercy it's one who's found the God of all mercy.
You see the difference? That's the portion. That's the call. God has put eternity in our hearts, but he's bound us within time. And this is all, as we'll see, to drive us to himself. He's doing a work.
This work will continue until we return to the dust from which we came, just like the animals that we live with. They're a picture to us of the purpose and portionment of God. You're here in the way that I've allotted your life, and then you go to dust.
The Christian has his eye on the portion yet to come. This life will not satisfy the eternity with his heart. He knows judgment is coming. And so with the spirit yearning jealously within, he fights the good fight of faith.
He resists the world and the flesh and the evil one. He labors and sows diligently in hope, awaiting the fruits of righteousness to be yielded, like a patient farmer waits upon the earth. Longing in his heart for the day when creation is made new, and the Savior comes to reward all those who labored for the eternal portion, rather than wasting and spurning their breath for something under the sun.
I perceive there's nothing better for a man than this. If you're rejoicing in this kind of work, that's your portion, but it's not your portion forever. Who do we have in heaven but you? There are none we desire on earth besides you.
Our flesh, our hearts, they fail, but God is the strength of our hearts. Is he our portion forever? Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your word. Lord, have your way with us. Reveal the things in our hearts that cause our affections to go astray, that make passing seasons and portions under the sun seem so alluring.
And so desperately and anxiously, we try to secure them and see them as a firm foundation for hope. Lord, peel these things away. Let our faith in the glory yet to be revealed be the anchor of our souls, our hope of what is yet to come.
Help us navigate this passage of our life, Lord. Forgive me for often trying to make lesser things my portion, for as Lewis says, playing in the mud puddle when you've called me to Dover Beach, for looking for the things that are heavil, vanity, rather than the things that have the weight of glory.
Help us, Lord, to have the faith of our father, Abraham. Let us have our hearts and our eyes intent on you that in the day you finally withdraw your breath and we return to dust, Lord, nothing will have been lost but the pains and failures and sins of life under the sun and we'll be redeemed.
Indeed, be like him who is the first roots of our glory and seeing him being made like him. Father, this is all our desire. Break and cast down every idolatrous desire otherwise in our lives. I pray you'd help young men and young women to bear the burden in their youth.
Give them this eternal desire, Lord. It does not come by the flesh. It doesn't come by catechizing or homeschooling or even by just showing up at a place on a Sunday morning. It comes by your spirit. Lord, open their eyes, we pray in your son's name, amen.