Grace Baptist Church, Nokomis, IL.

Main Idea: God only knows why we go through what we go through, but we can learn to trust Him through every situation of life.

Text:

On January 15, 1919, a storage tank containing 2.3 million gallons of molasses broke in Boston, Massachusetts, causing the molasses to flood the streets of Boston, covering a portion of the city waist-deep in thick, sticky sugar. It was named the Great Molasses Flood.

[Picture of the Great Molasses Flood]

One witness described the scene as “like a river of chocolate.” Many people and animals got stuck in the molasses and had to be rescued by firefighters. The molasses was so thick that it took days for it to completely dry up. Some residents claimed that the area still smelled like molasses for decades afterward.

It sounds kind of humorous at first, a city covered in sugar, but the first newspaper to report on it stated that it injured 50 people and killed 11.

[Picture of Boston Newspaper]

When all was accounted for, however, they found that it had actually injured 150 people and killed 21 people, as well as many more animals. The flood also caused widespread damage to property. It destroyed buildings, uprooted trees, and overturned cars. It was certainly a tragedy.

And yet, it also had some unexpected positive results. For example, the molasses actually helped to fertilize the soil in Boston, which led to an unusually successful crop of fruit and vegetables. It also brought people together.

[Picture of Cleaning Up Boston]

In the aftermath of the disaster, the residents of Boston came together to help those who had been affected. This sense of community helped to heal the wounds of the flood and made Boston a stronger city.

One interesting thing about this entire incident is that they never completely determined why the storage container broke that released all the molasses into the streets. Some at the time claimed that the storage tank had been blown up by anarchists. Others say that the tank had a small leak since the day it was built, and that the summer heat built up pressure in the tank that caused it to explode. In 2016, a team at Harvard attempted to determine the cause, but the researchers still couldn’t determine the ultimate reason for the tragedy.

And the same is true for so many of the things we go through. We often find that the hardest times in our lives strengthen us, increase our faith, increase our perseverance, and even increase our joy as we learn that life isn’t about us and our plans, but about God and His plan. God only knows why we go through what we go through, but we can learn to trust Him through every situation of life.

Ecclesiastes 7.

A good name is better than fine perfume, and the day of one’s death is better than the day of one’s birth. It is better to go to a house of mourning than to go to a house of feasting, since that is the end of all mankind, and the living should take it to heart. Grief is better than laughter, for when a face is sad, a heart may be glad. The heart of the wise is in a house of mourning, but the heart of fools is in a house of pleasure. It is better to listen to rebuke from a wise person than to listen to the song of fools, for like the crackling of burning thorns under the pot, so is the laughter of the fool. This too is futile. Surely, the practice of extortion turns a wise person into a fool, and a bribe corrupts the mind. The end of a matter is better than its beginning; a patient spirit is better than a proud spirit. Don’t let your spirit rush to be angry, for anger abides in the heart of fools. Don’t say, “Why were the former days better than these?” since it is not wise of you to ask this. Wisdom is as good as an inheritance and an advantage to those who see the sun, because wisdom is protection as silver is protection; but the advantage of knowledge is that wisdom preserves the life of its owner. Consider the work of God, for who can straighten out what he has made crooked? In the day of prosperity be joyful, but in the day of adversity, consider: God has made the one as well as the other, so that no one can discover anything that will come after him. (Ecclesiastes 7:1-14)

Father, we don’t usually know why You do the things You do. With so much tragedy in the world, help us to trust in Your sovereignty and plan. Help us to trust in Jesus. In Jesus’s name, Amen.

I’m sure most, if not all of us, are familiar with the name Anne Frank.

[Picture of Anne Frank]

She was a Jewish teenage girl during World War II, and when the Nazis invaded the Netherlands, she was forced to go into hiding with her family. She lived in a secret annex for two years, during which she kept a diary of all of her hopes and dreams. And even though she was in constant fear of being discovered by the Nazis, she also wrote about the importance of facing difficult times with hope.

Because the truth is, we also will all face difficult times.

God’s plan from the very beginning was and is Jesus Christ, and Him crucified. Keep that in mind whenever you face things you would rather not need to endure. God didn’t spare His own Son from trials and death, so why should we expect that we would avoid trials in this life, even those which lead to death?

Most of our Scripture passage this morning is a poem that takes the book of Ecclesiastes in a slightly different direction from what we’ve been reading up to this point. We saw last time, in Ecclesiastes 6, how the Teacher summarized much of the first half of the book and his observations of the world, once again pointing out how pointless so many of our temporary pursuits in life are. And now, in chapter 7, we start to read some of the Teacher’s advice. So while the first half of the book dealt primarily with all the vain things that we often strive in life, and we’ll certainly see a little more of that in the chapters to come, most of the rest of the book of Ecclesiastes deals with how to actually live so that we don’t fall into the traps of a meaningless life.

Chapter 7 specifically is written in response to the way of thinking that says that we only want good things in life. And we’ve all done this. We’ve all wished that life could be full of only happiness, and no sorrow, because no one likes sorrow. But God gives both. In fact, maybe the things we consider to be negative are even more significant, and we should give them much more attention. Only God knows what will happen to us over the course of our lives.

So the Teacher writes in verses 1 through 4:

A good name is better than fine perfume, and the day of one’s death is better than the day of one’s birth. It is better to go to a house of mourning than to go to a house of feasting, since that is the end of all mankind, and the living should take it to heart. Grief is better than laughter, for when a face is sad, a heart may be glad. The heart of the wise is in a house of mourning, but the heart of fools is in a house of pleasure. (Ecclesiastes 7:1-4)

I’m sure most of us would prefer to go to a party than a funeral. I have many pastor friends who say that they would rather preach a funeral than a wedding because there are often greater opportunities for real ministry at funerals. At weddings and parties, people are often thinking about their own pleasure, or maybe the pleasure of those getting married, and that can be good in light of how it symbolizes Christ and His Church, the Wedding Supper of the Lamb. And yet, going to a funeral can be much more impactful for this life. As difficult as they can be, funerals remind us of how brief this life is. They remind us that we will all die. And so, they remind us to not waste the short lives that we have on this earth.

And the Teacher tells us how to do that: as it says in verse 1, a good name is better than fine perfume. In other words, it doesn’t ultimately matter what you smell like, or how you physically look to others, it matters far more how you treat people. It matters far more that you be kind to people and deal with people fairly.

But so often, we’d rather have the perfume. Perfume masks the smell, but it doesn’t really solve the problem of the smell. When it comes to our sin, we don’t need to just mask the smell, we need to be cleansed of our sin. And only God can do that by grace through faith in Jesus. But that takes humbling ourselves and admitting that we need His forgiveness. Verse 5.

It is better to listen to rebuke from a wise person than to listen to the song of fools, for like the crackling of burning thorns under the pot, so is the laughter of the fool. This too is futile. Surely, the practice of extortion turns a wise person into a fool, and a bribe corrupts the mind. (Ecclesiastes 7:5-7)

I felt a little foolish yesterday as I went for a walk early in the morning. There’s a nice long road next to my house that many of you know as Beer Can Alley, because people used to drive down the road and throw their beer cans onto the road, which they still do, because I saw several beer cans in the grass as I was walking. But that’s actually besides the point. My point is actually that I don’t like birds. I’ll explain.

My wife Abby loves birds and grew up with birds in her house. They would just fly around her house, and they would put food in their teeth, and the birds would just fly up to them and eat the food out of their teeth. One of the first times I went to her house, I thought they were just crazy bird people! I would freak out a little when the birds flew over my head or even thought that it was normal and appropriate to land on my head. It’s not!

So as I was walking yesterday, I saw this bird. I don’t know what kind of bird it was, but it was black and had a little orange on its neck. Anyone know what it was? Well, anyway, as I was walking, this bird started watching me. At first, it kind of chirped and flew next to me about 10 feet away from me, and then it actually started circling me, getting closer and closer. And I had flashbacks of Abby’s parents’ house, feeling like I was going to be attacked by a bird, so I shouted at it, “No! Get away from me!” And I started running away, flailing my arms over my head!

I was rebuking the bird. Verse 5 says, “It’s better to listen to the rebuke from a wise person than to listen to the song of fools.” I’m not sure in this scenario whether I was the wise person rebuking the bird, or whether I was just adding to the noise of the world with more foolishness. I don’t know.

Verse 6 compares the laughter of fools to thorns burning under a pot. In other words, it might sound like a lot, a lot of crackling, a lot of noise, but it ultimately comes to nothing, and the thorns are quickly burnt up.

Our world today has become a sounding board for fools. Our culture has accepted some of the most ridiculous things in order to seek to not offend people who are confused about their sin. And it’s interesting that the Teacher in this passage also compares this sounding board to a song, calling it “the song of fools.” Our world tries really hard to make immorality seem like a lovely thing, like a love song, but in the end, it’s still just trying to put perfume on a decaying body.

But it’s not just the people you deem most sinful that do this. It’s not just one political party or the other, or some other fringe religious group. We’ve almost all done this. In fact, the very fact that we have denominations today kind of shows that we continue to do this. We tend to surround ourselves with people who mostly agree with us, because that’s far more comfortable.

There’s no question that it’s more comfortable to listen to people who will affirm us in our sin. It’s more comfortable when people don’t challenge our way of thinking or living. But when we’re in the wrong, we need people to challenge us. If you’re standing on train tracks with a train heading straight toward you, who cares about comfort! It’s more loving for someone to tackle you off of the tracks than for them to affirm your choice to play on the tracks.

I fear that many of our churches today have become sounding boards for fools. Church ought to challenge our thinking. The Bible ought to challenge our way of living. Because we’re not perfect, none of us are, and we need God to continue to transform us into His image because otherwise we’ve be guilty of making God in our image, which is idolatry.

So it’s better to listen to a rebuke from a wise person. It can sting, but it’s better. You might hate the wise person for saying it, or think that they hate you, but it’s better. Because if we’re not challenged in our sin, we’ll remain in our sin. But it’s far better to humble ourselves and admit that we’re sinners. Verse 8.

The end of a matter is better than its beginning; a patient spirit is better than a proud spirit. Don’t let your spirit rush to be angry, for anger abides in the heart of fools. Don’t say, “Why were the former days better than these?” since it is not wise of you to ask this. Wisdom is as good as an inheritance and an advantage to those who see the sun, because wisdom is protection as silver is protection; but the advantage of knowledge is that wisdom preserves the life of its owner. (Ecclesiastes 7:8-12)

We’ve probably all said it, or at least heard people talking about how things are worse now than they used to be. The idea is expressed in many ways, such as saying, “Back in my day, people respected their elders.” Or, “The glory days are behind us.” Or even, “The world is going to the dogs.” I’m not sure where these dogs are, but apparently the world is going to them.

And certainly, there are aspects of society which we can point out as being worse than they used to be, especially when you just look at the United States over the last one hundred years or so.

[Chart of Mass Shootings]

There are more mass shootings than ever.

[Chart of Abortions]

Despite the Supreme Court decision to overrule Roe v. Wade in 2022, there are still nearly a million abortions every year.

[Graph of Perceived Morality]

The majority of our culture has come to accept some things like promiscuity, same sex marriage, and drunkeness as morally acceptable while the Bible says otherwise. So we might look at these things and say that the world is going to hell in a handbasket.

But there are also some things that are better. We don’t have slaves anymore in our country. Racism is generally seen as a bad thing now in our country. And even though there are certainly still people who are racist, they generally know they shouldn’t be racist, or they’ve convinced themselves that they’re not racist because they know that racism is bad. We also have better technology, which has led to better medical care, better living conditions, and better communication with people all over the world. It’s easier now than ever to share the gospel all over the world! I’m truly in awe of the good things God has allowed us to experience in this very exciting time!

So the Teacher actually says that it’s not wise to ask, “Why were the former days better than these?” Because there have always been good things as well as bad things in every generation. And it’s true that things are going to get really bad before Jesus returns again. There’s going to be a great tribulation! But we don’t know when that’s going to be. We don’t know if it’s going to be in our lifetime. No one knows the day or the hour. So instead, we’re to be wise, taking the good and the bad, because only God knows what He’s up to. Verse 13.

Consider the work of God, for who can straighten out what he has made crooked? In the day of prosperity be joyful, but in the day of adversity, consider: God has made the one as well as the other, so that no one can discover anything that will come after him. (Ecclesiastes 7:13-14)

Only God can straighten what He has made crooked. It’s not that God made anything bad, it’s just that God has allowed us to experience adversity now, for a time, until He makes all things new.

That’s what God has been up to. That’s God’s plan for the fullness of time. And we don’t know when, and we don’t know all the why’s pertaining to all the trials we face, but we do know how God brings about His plan. It’s through Jesus. Ephesians 1:9-10 says it like this:

He made known to us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure that he purposed in Christ as a plan for the right time—to bring everything together in Christ, both things in heaven and things on earth in him. (Ephesians 1:9-10)

God’s plan is to unite all things in Christ. That means that while we have all kinds of divisions and denominations and tragedies and funerals and failures and fights now, we can cling to the sure hope that God’s plan will not fail, and in the end, everyone will come together by grace through faith in Jesus.

Don’t put that off. Don’t fight against God’s plan. Be reconciled to God through Jesus today, and find joy in Him even in the midst of the greatest tragedies of life.