The Absurdity of Worship

Up until Chapter Five in Ecclesiastes, Qohelet does not address man’s relationship with God directly. He infers things here and there but is not specific regarding the way man relates to God. But now in Chapter Five Qohelet addresses the worship of God, specifically, or the way in which man should approach God. In this passage Qohelet warns the reader to be sincere before God, to not burden Him with unnecessary ramblings in prayer, and be careful not to make promises to Him because He will hold you to them. In all, Qohelet says we should walk on eggshells around God, do what we can so we don’t make Him angry. The best you can do with your worship is to do it as rarely and carefully as you can.

This attitude, though, can only inhibit true worship. Worship is an expression of love and a person cannot love what they fear. 1 John 4:18 states the opposite of Qohelet’s claims in Ecclesiastes: “There is no fear in love. Perfect love casts out fear. “ Because we live under a sinful state, it is difficult to have this perfect love. Even as Christians we can still operate from the fear that God will punish us for sinning or for lack of growth. God’s Word actually operates under this assumption – the assumption that our false view of the Father is a result of our fallen, imperfect relationships on earth.

Matthew 7:7, Isaiah 49:15, and Psalms 103:8-13 all assume that the way in which we relate to our parents or we as parents relate to our children is similar to the way the Lord relates to us. But in each reference, the Lord does not fail as earthly relationships do. He is the supreme parent, able to love us more than earthly parents ever could.

As wonderful as the love of God is, we must guard ourselves against a rebellious attitude towards His corrective love. To see His work in our lives as harsh at times can cause us to feel He is unloving, to think He is cruel. In those times, if we rebel, we feel justified in doing so. Rebellion becomes a means of defending ourselves against God’s perceived cruelty. Also, we must guard ourselves against pride. To depend on God’s love is to be as children, needing someone’s provision and protection in our lives. To be a Christian is to be a child of the Father. But to be a child goes against our sinful nature – we don’t want to be weak, needy, or childish. But for both of these things we have to remember that all our sins have already been covered by Christ’s death on the cross. None of life’s adversities and difficulties are punishment. Jesus was punished for our sins and we are only recipients of God’s love.

The Absurdity of Injustice

Throughout Ecclesiastes, Qohelet seems to be overly sensitive to the difficulties of life. After all, who really is affected that much by life’s incongruities and absurdity? At the same time, one application of the book of Ecclesiastes is to remind us of the sober aspect of life. It is part of life in a fallen world. And then too, we have the hope of Heaven and resurrection. “There is light, beauty up there, that no shadow can touch.” And while we live in the shadows and taste the bitterness of life from time to time, the sweetness that follows will be all the more enjoyable.

In the second part of Chapter Three and in Chapter Eight, Qohelet addresses the absurdity of injustice. Life can be full of arbitrary and unjust rewards and punishments, but these can point us to Grace. It is a sign of God’s grace because it proves that life is not about performance. If being good doesn’t guarantee a smooth life, and being bad a rotten life, then life must not be about performance. There must be a higher principle in play.

This principle operates for the believer to several ends. One, if God governed the world on the basis of performance, everyone everywhere would continually suffer through a miserable life. But we’re so used to Grace, we don’t see our comfortable lives as grace. Another, suffering furthers sanctification, Romans 5:3-5. Third, suffering reflects the fact that the world is still fallen and we are still waiting redemption from this state. If life was continually easy, we might feel we are fine without God, which is the opposite of the truth. Next, suffering draws us ever closer to Jesus. In times of most need, He is the one to whom we flee. And last, we take confidence in the fact that our sins were borne by Christ on the cross. We no longer have to answer for our wrongdoings. Justice for us was served through the world’s greatest injustice – guiltless Jesus bearing the punishment we should receive.

The Absurdity of Time and History

After addressing the six ways in which individuals try to cope with the absurdity of life, Qohelet then addresses the larger scale of time and history in the first half of Chapter 3. In verse 11, Qohelet states that God “has also set eternity in their heart, yet so that man will not find out the work which He has done from the beginning even to the end.” People, Qohelet states, have this innate desire to make sense of the chaos of life. But waylaying this desire is the fact that history is inevitable and cyclical. It is inevitable in that God has established all things that will come to pass beforehand. Life is a series of appointments you never scheduled for yourself. It is cyclical in that the same things often happen over and over again. People generally follow the same pattern of doing life as everyone else.

Qohelet’s view of life in this way however, turns God’s sovereignty into something mechanical instead of something relational. If God does not interact with His creation and those whom He loves, if He has not established the redemption of a corrupt world, then life would seem pointless and absurd. But because of the cross, we see that history is personal and directional. Through the cross, God redeems those He loves, those who with He has a relationship, unto Himself. And through the cross, all things are brought together in a purpose, Galatians 4:4-6.

Qohelet's Quest - Part Six - Epicurianism

The basic things of life, because they’re so real, so immediate, so tactile, and so moderate, seem like they alone can bear the weight of meaning that we need. Taking pleasure in life’s enjoyment is not sinful, but should not be held up to be the sole satisfaction we draw from life. Only the Lord is to occupy that place. Psalms 16:11 – “In Your presence there is fullness of joy. In Your right hand are pleasures forever.”

We see from 1 Timothy 4:3-4 that God has created the enjoyments of life to be partaken of by those who know the Truth. But enjoyment of life’s simple things is not found in those things. A peaceful lunchtime reading a book is not found in the book. The enjoyment of that comes through the book. And enjoyment is only an image of our longing for true enjoyment whose actual source is in an object, the Lord, the scent of a flower we have not found, the echo of a tune we have not heard, and glorious news from a country we have never yet visited.

In whatever we enjoy in life, as we experience that sense of satisfaction and enjoyment, we should tell ourselves, “echo. This feeling is but an echo of Jesus. If this is so enjoyable, how much more is Jesus.” Jesus gave up the true pleasures of life, the eternal communion with God, so that we might achieve that as well.

Qohelet's Quest - Part Five - Work

For many people, work is constant. Even when they are not working as in a job for pay, they still are trying to make everything they do worthwhile. Enjoyment in doing something just for its own sake can make them feel as though time is wasted. Above that there is the desire to do something worthwhile with their vocation. People want to make a difference in life. They want to know that what they do matters.

The Gospel helps us as Christians put our work in the proper place. Foremost we must remember we serve the Lord with our work. In whatever He has called us to do, we are to do it unto Him. We don’t need to get caught up in trying to make work important to us. We are not serving ourselves for it. Also, we can take heart in knowing that what we do accomplish in our jobs and in work won’t be for nothing. The good things in life will ensure beyond the end of time. And lastly, we can rest in our salvation. Let us make sure “we enjoy ourselves, and not taking our work too seriously. We don’t have anything to prove to anyone. The Work is finished at Calvary and that work alone has unlimited meaning and value.” We cannot look to our work to justify our existence. Jesus justifies our existence.

Qohelet's Quest - Part Four - Romantic Love

One of the most powerful tools people use to overcome life’s absurdity is romantic love. In their efforts to make love bear the weight of meaningfulness in life, they distort its true purpose. In self-centeredness, people praise the initial feelings of being in love as the key point, thinking the more they feel that, the more life is worth living. One reason for this is that everyone has feelings of inferiority. Being in love really deadens those feelings.

This addiction to romantic love actually equates to idolatry as shown in 1 Kings 11. The idolatry of the heart, Solomon’s loving so many foreign women, led to the idolatry of his physical worship. Romantic love feels so close to the Truth that it’s so easy to make it the source of worship.

Isaiah 62:5 – “as the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so your God rejoices over you.” If having another human being being in love with you gives you a sense of meaning, how much more should the Lord’s love for us do so.

As seen in an earlier message, Romans 8 contains the New Testament understanding of futility. But under Grace, we have a hope. And Paul identifies this hope in the love that God has for us, just as is shown in Isaiah 62: “who shall separate us from the love of Christ? … no created thing will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Qohelet's Quest - Part Three - Fame

Another part of the human condition is that we want to feel accomplishment. We seek accomplishment to feel as though our life means something or that the end of the object means something. And then, when that accomplishment happens, people often are then filled with anxiety over maintaining that success, lest they lose it.

In Philippians 3:4 the Apostle Paul gives his resume: his pedigree (vs 5), his education (vs 5), his dedication (vs 6), his list of accomplishments. And all those things he said, are loss for Christ. When it comes to both satisfaction in this life and eternal destiny, our accomplishments don’t cut it, and don’t save us. We don’t need to have success and our own righteousness because we have the Lord’s.