May 2 – Meaningful Riches (Ecclesiastes 2:1-11)

“I thought in my heart, ‘Come now, I will test you with pleasure to find out what is good’.”(Ecclesiastes 2:1)

IN WORD:
An exceedingly wealthy businessman who recently had bypass surgery was asked in an interview how the experience would change his life. He responded that he would spend more money and never, for. One example, let any wine that cost less than $100 per bottle pass through his lips. His great insight in his time of crisis was that life is short and must be lived to its fullest. That’s not a bad philosophy, if one knows how to define a “full” life. But his definition reflected a faulty foundation based on very short-lived values.
A mature Christian disciple can recognize the fallacy of temporal pleasure as a life goal. We live for something much more lasting than the cult of earthly empires and personal gain — real pleasure based on the realities of God’s kingdom and our fellowship with Him. This, at least, is our ideal. But if we examine ourselves carefully, we’ll often find a conflict within us — a revulsion toward the businessman’s philosophy but a lifestyle that reflects it. Human nature since the Fall is to build a heaven on earth, to reconstruct Eden. Though we are promised an eternal heaven, we want heaven here, too. Can’t you see it in the comforts we crave and the prayers we raise? Eden is always just out of our reach, but we keep on reaching.

IN DEED:
Solomon tells us in this Scripture what a life of investing in the temporal accomplishes: nothing. His resume of investments is impressive, but he is disappointed — even disillusioned — with the profit. It’s all meaningless, he concludes. One day we will die, and unless we’ve invested in the eternal, nothing remains.
Contrast the futility of Ecclesiastes with the riches of the gospel of Jesus. There is an inheritance that comes from God. The rich businessman missed it, even when confronted with death. Multitudes do. But the eyes of faith can see the riches of the Kingdom of God. Learn to live for them, at all costs.

“The real measure of our wealth is how much we’d be worth if we lost all our money.” -John Henry Jowett-