I'm sorry. How did. Good morning. Better. How are you? Good. I burned my back. It was two seconds. There's no way to read the music without the music. Because neither of us reach. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, y'all. Do y'all know that song in this very room? If not, you're about to learn it. It's. It's simple. You probably sung it before. And, uh. And we'll do good. Uh, let's see. Isaiah, uh, looks sharp in a new suit. Uh, so, uh, come up and welcome, everybody, and tell us what we're going to sing today. And call the choir up, too. Where's my. Yeah, we matched last week. Why not this week? Well, you're wearing blue. You're wearing blue. There we go. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. You're going to turn your hymnals to 157 in this very room. And Kamali is here to sing with us again. And we. We are glad. Brenda. Okay, let's. Come on. Come on up here. And Kamali, we're glad you're here. Come. Come up and sing. You go on the girls side here, and I'll. I'll separate the boys from the girls. There we go. And What'd you say? 157 in this very room. Let's sing it. How many verses are we going to sing? All three. Okay. In this very room there's quite enough love for one like me in this very room there's quite enough joy for one like me and there's quite hope and quite enough power to chase away any gloom for Jesus Lord Jesus is In this very room in this very room there's quite enough love for all of us and in this very room there's quite enough joy for all like this and there's quite enough hope and quite enough power to chase away any gloom Jesus, Lord Jesus in this very room in this very room there's quite enough love for all the world in this very room there's quite enough joy for all the world and the splendor, hope, power to chase away any glue Jesus, Lord Jesus is in this very room and now you're gonna turn your hymnos to number 72. Holy. We are standing on holy ground and I know that there are angels around Let us praise Jesus now we are standing in his presence on holy ground let's pray together Heavenly Father, thank you for the presence of our Lord here in this room through his his word, his life within us Christ in you the hope of glory and that there's Jesus in this very room and because of that dear heavenly Father, it is a, a holy ground of sorts and we rejoice in it and look forward to the opportunity to walk with the Lord today and to be encouraged by all that and that it would be a blessing just to be here. And when we go from this place, we would say, you know, I've been with the Lord and that has enriched me. And we ask this in Jesus name. Amen. God bless you. You may be seated. And welcome, glad, welcome to each one of you. Glad all of you are here with us today. We got a new sermon series we're going to start here in a little bit and I think we'll have some fun going through the book of Ecclesiastes over the next few summer months. And it'll, it'll be a blessing. But let's talk, let's talk. What's on the agenda? Kamali, we're glad you're back. You're here for this Sunday. Maybe next Sunday too. Wait, maybe, Maybe. Okay. Anyway, we've missed you. We're glad you're back here today and glad all of you are here. Wednesday night we've got smothered hamburger steak. How's that? That and John of course, asked me if we're smothering it in red or green. Okay. Brown is what we're going with here. And so, so that's on the Wednesday night menu for, for us. And you can bring anything that would go with a smothered hamburger steak. How's that? It'll be, it'll be a good, good meal. And I'm starting, Let me, let me get over there. I got a picture. There we go. Faithful Footnotes, a new series that I'm going to start this Wednesday. It's been a long time since I said I have a new series this Wednesday because We just finished 70 weeks in the Gospel of Mark and that's 70 less all the holidays and everything else. So it was a long time, but a fun journey. Now we're going to learn from the Bible's lesser known believers. Actually, it's going to be the New Testament's lesser known believers and we're just going to take probably a week on each. But you know how I am. I hate to leave anything unsaid if you could possibly say it. So we're going to look at some of these lesser known characters this Wednesday. We're going to start with Barnabas. You know, he's one of those guys. We, we've seen him, Paul and Barnabas. He's here, he's there. But what do we know about Barnabas? There's about four or five scriptures where Barnabas comes up. So we're going to get to meet some of these guys like Barnabas this Sunday night, Wednesday night, and maybe even figure out how his name means encourager because that's what Barnabas means. And he is, he kind of lived up to his name. So we'll see the encourager this Wednesday night. Barnabas, 6pm After a little smothered steak. There we go. Look forward to that and men's breakfast. So here's the biggie, okay? All the other stuff on there, but here's the biggie, okay, listen up to this because we have never done it before. It's so big, I have to move the microphone. Mother's Day. The men are cooking the breakfast for the ladies on Mother's Day. See, the men don't even know this yet until now. The men are cooking for the women. And it's a whole family thing. And it'll be in the fellowship hall and at, at, at a certain time On Mother's Day, the 13th of May, that would be. I. Did we say 9:30? Maybe, maybe 9:15. We'll announce the time. You just know that Sunday morning we won't have Sunday school, we'll have breakfast and then we'll come in here and have church on Mother's Day. Now by next Sunday, I'll put up a sign up sheet too because we are also inviting the Taos Valley Baptist Church and they're, they're all coming over here for breakfast. So it'll be a nice bit of fellowship with all sorts of people that you know or don't know. And they're all, we're all going to cram in a fellowship hall and uh, and maybe on the patio. We're hoping weather's good too. So we have some overflow. Yes, sir. Are you gonna do the national day of prayer on Thursday? No. The first Thursday in May is the national day of prayer in which I would encourage you all to pray. There you go. Pray for your country. But on Mother's Day we will. I got to teach my minister of music. You never interrupt the pastor. This is, you know, pastors deal with this all the time. And I'm trying to start here him young, training him, all these things. I remember one time, y'all remember, some of you might know the, the, the pastor Jack Graham, he's the pastor of the Prestonwood Baptist Church in Dallas, which is huge church, he's on television, all that kind of stuff. He was Preaching for me in a guest thing one time. And I said something like, I, you know, I think the choir was coming in late. And we were, you know, hurry up choir. And so I said, sorry, the choir is a little late today. And he, he leaned over to me. This was in the days when you set up on the P, you know, and everybody was watching you. He leaned over to me and said, when the devil fell down from heaven, he landed in the choir loft. So anyway, you know, I'm. I gotta, I gotta do the training lessons here when I can. God bless you, Isaiah. Anyway, Mother's day breakfast. Be sure and, and come on that Sunday we will have a little bit of sign up. We'll send out some texts and all that kind of stuff and, and work with the men. See what, what, what we can. I don't know, do you ladies prefer Cheerios or corn flakes or. You know, we'll figure out something nice. It'll be. Be good. Glad to have all of you with us. I don't think we have any first timers today. We're all back. Back from last week. At least second timers, right? Good to see Derek and I'm going to get this one of these days. Shraddha. Derek and Shraddha. Thanks for Luke. Dustin, not Derek. Excuse me. So I can't even get the easier ones. Yeah. Anyway, I'm Bob. Nice to meet you. Glad all of you are here. Those of you online, we're glad you're here too. Why don't stand together and greet one another and let's. Let's get started here. Singing in just a moment. Nice to meet you. Nice to meet you, Pastor Bob. Satisfaction. No one ever cared for me like Jesus there's no other friend so kind as he no one ever cared for oh, how much he cared for me. And now we're gonna turn your Baptist hymnals to 164. I don't know why I said that. Do all three. All three verses. 164. 164. Let's sing it together. I would love to tell you what I think of Jesus Since I found in Him a friend so strong and true I would tell him how he changed my life completely Completely he did something that no other friend could do no one ever cared for me like Jesus there's no other friend so kind as he no one else could take me sin and darkness from me oh, how much he cared for me all my life was full of sin When Jesus found me all my heart was full of miseries and woe Jesus placed his sin in loving arms around me and he led me in the way he ought to go Never cared for me like Jesus there's no other friend so kind as he no one else could take the sin and darkness from me oh, how much he cared for me Every day He comes to me with new assurance More and more I understand his earth love But I'll never know just why he came to save me Till someday I see his blessed face above no one ever cared for me like Jesus there's no other friend so kind as he no one else could take the sin and darkness from me oh, how much he cared for me. Now you may turn your hymn notes to 170. Oh how he loves you and me oh, how he loves you and me oh, how he loves you and me he gave his life what more could he give oh, how he loves you oh, how he loves me oh, how he loves you and me Jesus took Calvary, his love for mankind to show what he did there brought hope from despair. How he loves you, how he loves me oh, how he loves you and me and you may be seated. I took your job. Isaiah say that and that, that, that idea right there that he. What. What he did there brought hope from despair is what we're going to look at even in the book of Ecclesiastes here the hope from despair in just a little bit. But we will take a little time for our our prayer for our missionaries and our offering. We have been praying for Joel and Leah Saunders in Southeast Asia and today's the last day we lift them up in our prayers and if you'd like to give to their ministry you can market missions. It'll go to to them and then course unmarked gift goes right here to our church. We won't pass a plate today but we do have a box back there you can put it in and take care of that at any time and always, always a blessing there. Let me lead us in a word of prayer. Heavenly Father, as we are about to go into the sermon time here we pray that you give us some insight into this book of Ecclesiastes and that it is an encouragement and a blessing and that life would be given hope because of what we see in this book but especially because of the work of Jesus Christ. Be with Joel and Lee as they proclaim this in Southeast Asia as well we ask it in Jesus name. Amen. We have just a short time of offering here and then we'll come into the sermon it. And now open your Bible to Ecclesiastes, that book that sounds a little bit like somebody's got a disease, right? And we go to Ecclesiastes. We're going to look at chapter one, verses one through 11. I think we're going to go. I don't know about. I'm going to say 20 weeks on the book of Ecclesiastes, looking through it. We'll see as we go along. But let me give a little bit of an introduction here. If you notice, depending on the Bible, you've got mine at the top right there it says Ecclesiastes or the preacher. There we go. Open to the preacher's book. There we go. Ecclesiastes or the preacher. Now, ecclesiastes is a. That's a Latin term that came. It was not from the. It was not the original title. These books didn't really have titles, so to speak. And so the Jewish people, they always just called the book by the first word or term within the book. And the first word in this. If you look at chapter one, verse one, it says the words of the preacher. Well, in Hebrew, that comes first, the preacher. It's the word koheleth. There we go with their little Hebrew for today, Koheleth. But what you understand as the preacher and what this preacher is probably is a little bit different. Of course, you understand a preacher who has studied hard all week and stands in front of the church and delivers a fabulous, rhetorical, unforgettable exposition of the word of God. And at the end, you come crying, seeking mercy and grace. Right. Thank you. That's what we understand the preacher to be the word koheleth. Preacher is probably the best word we've got for it, but it's not. Not the same kind of thing. They didn't have the church like we have it. This is the Old Testament. This we happen to know that the preacher is. It goes on in verse one, the son of David king in Jerusalem. Well, who is the son of David king in Jerusalem? Solomon. King Solomon wrote this, you might even be a little surprised to say. Solomon called himself a preacher. Huh? Have you all seen Solomon's life? He wasn't always preacherly in the way that we understand a preacher. He didn't always obey the law. Sometimes he got out of it. Sometimes he rejected things. Sometimes he was maybe a lover more than a preacher. Right? There were a lot of things about Solomon you would look at, but he is the author of both the Book of Proverbs and. And Ecclesiastes and Song of Solomon. I was going to see if you all will get stumped up on the easiest one, the Song of Solomon. So he's the author of these three rather significant books. They're all what we call in classifying and we call them books of wisdom. So the wisdom books. I happen to be doing a study of the Book of Proverbs in our online Thursday night study, if you want to go back and catch up on that. Some interesting things there. Ecclesiastes comes a little bit different than Proverbs does, and it is a book that we assume really because of some of the things that we'll read in it. He doesn't explicitly state it, but it sounds like this is an old man kind of looking back on life. He has, he's gone through the journey now and he's writing these various things. And so he comes right at the beginning and he calls himself the Preacher. Now that a little bit is how I want us to understand it as the preacher, or let's go more with the Hebrew term koheleth, but I won't put that on the test for you. The word koheleth, it is rarely, perhaps never used in any other time in the scripture other than the Book of Proverbs. And it really kind of means, let's call it the assembler, the one who assembles the people together to talk to them a little bit. So he does it. It's, it's not assembler like, you know, working on the assembly line kind of assembler. And it's not just the assembler as in the guy who builds the crowd, you know, the, the, the, the PR guy, not that kind of assembler. It is a guy who, who has a lot of influence like Solomon does and who says, hey, you know what I would like to do? I'd like us to all get together and I want to talk a little bit. So he gathers the people together and talks. I think if we could put it this way, maybe you could take the book of. In fact, I think you could, you could take the Book of Proverbs and view it in a very royal way. It is official documents of the, of the kingdom and of the Torah, if you will. But when you come to the book of Ecclesiastes, it is, let's leave the, the, the, the, the state room and let's just come out here onto the front porch and talk a little bit. So if you can imagine this as we go through of Solomon saying, let me pull up the rocking chair, you all grab a seat somewhere here and I want to talk a little bit, I want to tell you some things that I have learned. You know, this is. There's something kind of fascinating, and I think, I think rightly so, kind of something kind of fascinating at listening to someone who has been there, done that, had his highs, has had his lows, and come and sit down on the porch and talk to you. You know, one of the guys that has done this very well is a guy you may have heard of, Richard Nixon. Right? Richard Nixon lived 20 years after the Watergate fiasco. And during that 20 years he did a lot of pulling up a chair and sitting around a table and drinking a cup of coffee and talking and he talked about all sorts of things. And you know, it was obviously in the form of media interviews and things like this that were taken care of. And some of it surely self serving, you know, to try to rebuild his image and whatnot. But as he talked through some of those, it's like, whoa, that's amazing to see your hindsight now on it and the things you say, well, here's come Solomon in this thing that's sort of intriguing. We just want to know these kind of things. What does the guy think afterward? And so we, we, we, we join with Solomon as he comes. And so, you know, we gather up with Solomon on his front porch and hear him out a little while. Well, since I'm talking presidents, I'll go ahead. You, you'll remember George W. Bush. Don't you think of George W. Bush out at the ranch in Crawford? You know, not, not when he's at the White House, but when he gets behind his, the steering wheel of his pickup and drive down the road and he says, yeah, oh my, you know, that kind of thing. This is a little more Solomon kind of talking, you know, friendly, me and you. I'm not trying to impress anybody. I just want to talk about some things that I have sort of learned along the way. Luca doesn't really like riding around with me because I'm always like Solomon telling him, yeah, I remember when I was a kid. And so it's Solomon sharing some wisdom here. Now one of the surprising things. Well, a couple of things we ought to speak of. First of all, I think you notice in verse three, we'll read the verse in a moment. But the last three words there are under the Sun. We've got that even in our title here. Life under the Sun. That's a key phrase. We're going to see that phrase over and over again. Under the sun. Now let's understand that phrase to mean in this world we Live in. Okay. It's not talking about, wow, the weather's nice, let's go out under the sun. It is. Here is where we live. We live under the sun. It sort of gives the implication there's something beyond there that would be interesting, too. But really the book of Ecclesiastes is not very much going to talk about what's beyond. It's going to talk about what's right here. It's kind of a nitty gritty book that we'll look at. Now, another very central word in the book we see right there in verse two, where it says vanity of vanities, saith the preacher. Vanity of vanities, all is vanity. Anyone want to guess the key word of verse two? Yeah. Vanity. Now we use the word a little bit different. Was it. Was Bette Midler a singer, and was she the one that sang you're so vain, or is that someone else? Carly Simon, Carole King, Carly Simon, Bette Midler, Carol Burnett, who knows? Somebody sang, you know, you're so vain, you probably think the song is about you. Yes. Oh, vain. There we go. Okay. That's the way we use vain, as in, I don't know, stuck up, conceited. Vanity. It doesn't use it that way at all. Uses it in the more biblical sense almost every time. You see in the Bible, vanity is fleeting. It's not permanent. It is a vapor here one moment, gone the next. So his wording there, vanity of vanities, of course, is about. About that fleeting nature. We'll come back to that in just a moment. But we're going to see that word, the Hebrew word is havel, if you want to look that up. And it is this word for poof. Wow, there it is. It's gone. And. And now, you know, this year I'm going to celebrate my 60th birthday. I'm hoping to do it at Whataburger, but we'll see. And I. I can remember. And you all can remember, too, and a few of you are older than me. How people used to say to young people, watch out, you know, it goes fast. Day after tomorrow, you're going to find you got grandkids and you're old and your knees doesn't work and all that kind of stuff. And boom, just like that, there we are. How in the world did we get here? Right? So that sort of. It's just a. It's just a blink, a blink of an eye and it's all gone. That really is his. His word there with Havel or vanity, you know, the Jewish people put together what we today called the Old Testament. They, they gathered it, they determined long before even the life of Jesus was already settled by then. They determined what was scripture and what was not scripture. There were other books like first and Second Maccabees, some, for example, some of these books that sometimes we call the Apocrypha. Even the Jewish people back then said, okay, those are kind of interesting, but that is, that doesn't meet the standard of being included in the, in, in the Holy Scriptures in the Bible. It was the book of Ecclesiastes was actually the last book that they included. Now, it was a long time ago. They didn't have any question that Solomon wrote it. They weren't, it wasn't, you know, oh, I'm not sure the, that this is legit. This is real author. Their issue was. I don't know if this sounds lofty enough. This sound, it's, it's, it can sound a little pessimistic. And all of this right from the beginning, vanity of vanities. All is vanity. Hopeless, gone in a moment. The, Some of the Jewish people said, are you sure that belongs in the Bible or was Solomon just having a bad day, you know, when he came along and wrote these things? They did finally decide and I think, of course, rightly so, and under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Yeah, this belongs in the Bible. This has a, a purpose and a meaning to it. Some people look at this, this book as very pessimistic. You can understand after verse two. This doesn't sound like this is going to be a happy meeting at the porch. This is a guy whining the whole time, vanity, vanities. And you kind of want a little bit slap him upside the face and say, get over it, you know, I mean, you know, don't worry, be happy. Let's go on. But what we've got here in this particular book here, I think is not, I think the philosophical term is nihilistic. Did I pronounce that right? Nihilism. Nihilism, that word, none of us use it. And that, that's the idea that life is hopeless. But he, he's not really saying hopeless, hopeless. Everything's hopeless. He's saying, it's gone. I want you to know, gone. And there's actually going to be a very positive message that comes out of this. And I think the Jewish people recognize this too. They have this. It's a tradition. It's not comes, doesn't come from scripture. But in Judaism there is a, a schedule, a scheme on when you read various portions of Scripture. And that's true in some parts of the Christian world as well. Here in our more free church idea, we just, you know, read whatever we want whenever we want. But in a lot of places, it's, you know, this is the month of. And so you're supposed to read what's, what's, what's, what's a knot. There we go. Now at Sukkot, does anyone know what Sukkot is? The Feast of Tabernacles. Exactly. Camellia. At the Feast of Tabernacles, the Jewish people always read a number of things, but one of them is the Book of Ecclesiastes. Now remember the Feast of Tabernacles just a little bit. That is the one where they go out and live in tabernacles, tents, booths. Sometimes I think the King James many times says booths. But saying the Feast of booth almost sounds like the feast of booze, and that's a little different. So we'll call it the Feast of Tabernacles. They go out and live in a tabernacle and they live in the tabernacle to remind them of their time in the wilderness when we were wandering around. It's kind of a. Don't forget that we used to live in tents. Now God has blessed us and given us a permanent home, but we don't want to forget that. So that's what the Feast of Tabernacles is about. But also the Feast of Tabernacles became not only a looking back to when we lived in tabernacles, but also a looking forward to when Messiah was going to come and tabernacle with us. As a matter of fact, the Feast of Tabernacles is the single Jewish feast that gentiles are invited to come participate in. And the reason that gentiles are invited and really welcome and encouraged to come is because when Messiah comes, the Gentiles are going to flood into Jerusalem. They're going to celebrate the Messiah. They're going to worship along with him. And so it's, it's, it's a forward look to the Book of Tabernacles. Now let's take this concept. Here is a book that they read during tabernacles. Why I think it is. And the Jewish people would tell you this as well. They read it during tabernacles to remind, hey, we lived in a tabernacle back then, but we still do. This is a little bit different Tabernacle. This is one where we are looking for, to borrow from the words of Hebrew, Hebrews in the, in the New Testament, we're looking for a city which hath foundations whose builder and maker is God. We're looking for something more permanent. So the book of Ecclesiastes, as we get some wisdom for from it, is going to remind us this world can offer some really good and wonderful things for us. But poof, it's gone. This, it comes and goes, it's quick. This is not the place that we want to. Under the sun, is not the place where we want to put. Put all of our investment. We want an investment in that future home. That, that is the solid one. That tent, this tent we live in now is temporary. So let's start with that little idea there. Doesn't that discourage you when the preacher goes that long on the introduction and hasn't got to the verse yet? So here we go. Chapter one, verse one. The words of the preacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem. Vanity of vanities, saith the preacher. Vanity of vanities, all is vanity. Now, I did kind of COVID all that in the introduction, so we'll go on to verse three, in which he gives somewhat of a declaration. He says, what profit hath a man in all his labors which he taketh under the sun? Okay, what prophet. That's. That word is exactly what it sounds. What kind of lasting gain when it's all said and done and all the bills have been made? What have been paid? Excuse me, What. What do you have left? What. What endures? And Solomon gives. And Solomon was a hard worker, no doubt about it, when you study his life. But Solomon gives this, this question to say, hey, when, when you're done with all that, what's. What's left? Solomon had built what. Probably, maybe if we were digging deep into history, we could argue with this. But I think, I think it would. It would certainly be in the running, if not what probably was the most powerful kingdom that the earth had ever known up to that point. He had taken Israel, which under David thrived, but still was a fairly small piece. He had really expanded it. If you look up in a map on the, the, you know, a map of the, the Solomon Kingdom, you're going to find, wow, this thing stretches, you know, way over towards Babylon, goes way up into Assyria, goes way down south, way over into Arabia. He had a lot of territory that was his, and he really was the. I don't know if you want to call them the. If you put Donald Trump and Elon Musk together into one, there he is. You know, he's got the power he's got the prestige, he's got the money, he's got everything about him. And then to. To sit as, as. As you pull this guy up, you know, and there he is, and he's sitting on the porch and he says, what profit is it? All this labor which we take under the sun? What good is it? Now, again, you can read that very negatively, or you can read it as wise advice. I want you to know there's more than just the stuff you work for right here, that you really ought to have a life that reaches beyond that career life that is yours and all that is taken care of. Because he really kind of says, if I can put it in another way, and this is going to sound negative, but what he says is, you get up, you go to work, you come home tired, you go to bed, you get up, you go to work, you come home tired, you go to bed, you get up, you go to work, you come home tired, you go to bed, you multiply that by 60, 70 years, and then you're dead. Go fishing. Amen. Somewhere along the way, it's like, hey, what profit is there? Now, he's certainly not saying, hey, forget it. Just don't ever even go to work. Don't ever even try anything. You know, this is a guy who's tried everything, but he wants, as he gathers, assembles, everybody around, wants them to know there really is going to be more to this. And. And I think what we have here is a little bit of a refreshing honesty about life, because it is kind of easy just to get caught up in our work, isn't it? That there's quite a necessity to work for one, we do have to pay the bills. We do have to get out there. And besides that, you know, we kind of enjoy it. Most of us, many of us, from time to time, you know, it's like, hey, it's kind of fun. I get to go to work and I get to. I. I don't know, you know. Well, John and Jeanne talk about their son who gets to go to work and blow things up. It's kind of a fun job, isn't it? Let's go blow things up today. So there's. There's these things that, hey, I get to learn something. I get to travel somewhere, I get to. I get to help somebody, whatever it is, all that's good. But. But you and I would again recognize, hey, there really is more to it. You know, when I was a young preacher. Sound like Solomon now, don't I? When I was a young preacher, I, this is going to sound odd because I'm. I've always been a little bit of a workaholic and work is sort of what I do. But when I was a young preacher, I was goal driven, really focused on building, building the house for the Lord or building me an empire or, you know, whatever it was. And you know, I took all the church growth classes, by the way, looking at it now, you know what church growth classes teach you? Group dynamics. You work the group dynamics just right, you can build a crowd, you can do it whether you're a good preacher or you're a bad preacher or whatever you do, the psychology and the sociology behind it, you can make it happen. And it's really not rocket science and it's really not the work of the Holy Spirit. It's really just, I need to tweak this a little bit and do that a little bit and make sure, sure that people feel this way. And now that. But. And so when I was a young man, I wouldn't have looked at it quite as pessimistically as I do now, of course, but I always had goals. I remember in my first church, poor God, bless their souls, you know, I went in and I was the pastor at the First Baptist Church in Monday, Texas. I've talked about this before. It's between Sunday and Tuesday. And this was a church that had been there. I think it just celebrated its either hundredth or 125th, and I think it was the 100th anniversary that this little west Texas farm and church had celebrated. So they've been around for a hundred years and some of them were founding members. So they were, they, they had been there, they had, they'd seen everything come and go, you know, all the world wars and all the, the stock market ups and downs and everything. You know, farming was good and farming was bad and all that kind of stuff. And they just sort of lived through it and did a good job, you know, keeping a church going and keeping it there. And I came in and I said, you know, what we need here is a five year long range strategic plan. And so I created this, you know, five year strategic plan. Two and a half years later I moved. But it involved all this big kind of stuff. And I was, I was aggressive. And I would have to tell you in a lot of ways it worked. The, the church there, when I went to be their pastor, they had about 135 people in on a Sunday morning, about 135 of them. And when I left, they had about 235 people. I was pretty good growth for two years, you know, to almost double the church and bring it. And we had a packed house every Sunday because of the fine young preacher that was there. And, and, you know, I was, I had this little, this little, this little thing that came to be a great nightmare for me. This was, I started there in 1992, 1994. I decided to go with a little slogan. Every door in 94. Yeah. And so I set out to knock on every door in Monday, Texas. Now, fortunately, it was not New York City. You know, you could do it. I mapped it out. I had a map on my office, and I had it, you know, where I would mark it off. And I would say, okay, I gotta go this, this neighborhood this week. And, you know, I got, I counted, I went to the post office and said, how many houses are there? You know, and I gotta have this many houses a week. And I go, hi, I'm Randy. I'm the stunning pastor at the First Baptist Church. And I would meet everybody, you know, and, and in a town like that, when you're the pastor of the Baptist church, you're sort of known anyway. There's no, you know, it's, it's a West Texas Baptist town, and you're the Baptist preacher. Everybody knows you. But anyway, I went and, and the church grew and, and flourished. And, you know, we had people and we had money and I, and, and the first thing then that happens when you're, when you're a young pastor in a Baptist church and you do. Well, we're looking for a pastor. We understand. You're stunning. Why, yes, I am, as a matter of fact. And you end up, you know, moving off. And this happens when you're young. It happens as long as you do good. The phone keeps ringing and they get, I don't know, somewhere. My old mentor told me this was going to happen years and years ago. Jack Riddle Hoover. And he, he said, he said, they'll call till you're 50. And then the phone quits ringing. But I don't know if they quit calling or if you're like, I ain't moving anymore. I don't want to do that anymore. So whatever. I, you know, all of that, I, I, I, I put that to say that now as a pastor, I am much more interested in learning someone's name. Yeah. So glad to have you here, Douglas. I really would rather say, hey, I want to know what the Bible's about. I want to know what the Bible says. I want to be kind and friendly and you know, I'm not all that. In fact, I will say Isaiah here, I'll use you as an example. When I was a young man, I would not have let Isaiah announce the hymns. You could hear a pin drop. Yeah, because I thought everything had to be crisp and perfect and professional and just like I wanted it. And as a matter of fact, you never would have found me when I was 27 years old. I would not have been standing here like this because I knew a standing man is supposed to button his coat. Sitting man is supposed to unbutton his coat. And I promise you, you could find any video of me from when I'm 27 years old. If I'm standing, I had my cut coat buttoned. If I'm sitting, I had it unbuttoned. Now I kind of wish I'd have listened to Solomon who said, vanity is vanity, all is vanity in your vain. And in vain in the modern way, but vain in the. In. In that. You really. Do you think that this is going to be this stunning thing that completely changes the world forevermore? I got a surprise for you. I should have gone fishing more. Now here he goes. That's so. So he gives this, this declaration about. It's this fact. Hey, don't forget on the feast of Tabernacles, what you got right here is not the end all. There's more. Build relationships, build them deep. Enjoy the journey. Have at it. And, and make it go. Well, let's, let's pick up in, in verse five, verse four. Excuse me, where he. He speaks of some cycles here. He says, one generation passeth away and another generation cometh, but the earth abideth forever. Well, let's just take that for a moment. We see that in our church here. We see it. I see it at the, at the First Baptist Church of Monday. And as a matter of fact, let me tell you also, when I was a young man, I'll tell you stories here. You know, like the preacher, come on up and tell you some stories. The, in the, the First Baptist Church of Pampa, Texas, when I was pastor there, I said to them one time, I've done the demographics, and in five years we're going to be running eight, because you all are going to be dead. Okay, I said it a little bit nicer than that, but you know, hey, look around. We're a bunch of old people. This, this. There's no way we got. We gotta reach the young. We gotta reach the young. You know what I've realized now over the years is, by the way, that church is doing just fine. And most of those people are dead. Wives are doing fine. Because there is a sense in which people grow older and decide to go to church. That's one of the reasons why churches have a lot of old people in them, is because they say, you know, I think I'll sit on the front porch a little bit and think about the next world. Think about above the sun, the other side. And it happens. So here, here he goes. Excuse me. One generation passeth away, another generation cometh. The earth abideth forever. There, there really is kind of a beauty to that, isn't there? That, hey, yeah, there's some vanity, some, some poof. It's gone. And yet there's some stability also. But I want to warn us right up here, from the beginning on this book of Ecclesiastes, Solomon is talking, not scientifically. He's sitting on the front porch talking to you. The earth abideth forever. If you really want, you know, I'm kind of persnickety and I want you to be persnickety. You could really get persnickety and say, oh, you're wrong. The earth does not abide forever. God said heaven and earth will pass away. Okay, It's a scripture, isn't it? Heaven and earth will pass away. We read about it in, in, in one of Peter's letters. We read about it in the book of, of Revelation. When the earth, you know, the elements are going to be done away. There's going to be a new heaven and a new earth. The old things will pass away. So is Solomon wrong when he says the earth abideth forever? No, he's not wrong. He's sitting talking on the front porch and he's talking like you would talk on the front porch. He's not giving a theological treatise. Now, I say that not because probably nobody here is like, oh, I think he's theologically incorrect. Correct. But I say that because later on in the book of Ecclesiastes, there are some things that were going to come that people do take a front porch poetic declaration to be the, the, the, the, the, the, the grounding for some crazed theology that they build. And I just want to say up front that's the wrong way to do it. There are places where theology is very particular and there are places in which the talk is friendly and poetic. This is one of those. We'll see another one in just a moment. So he is reminded, hey, things come and things go and things change. Yeah, you know, let me. My wife might not like this series, because I might tell a lot of stories, but I even did some research the other day on how many times it has been said, this is the last election we're ever going to have. And I found out they've been saying it since the 1800s. This is the greatest election in our lifetime. You know, speaking of Nixon in his 1960 campaign, he was saying, if you don't vote for me, your children are going to be raised under communism. Well, that was before I was born. I've never been raised under communism until I moved to New Mexico. So we exaggerate in our mind. And I see it. This is a. It's a human phenomenon on both sides. I see that, you know, those on the conservative side are, you know, he got elected. This is the end. It's all over. He's a dictator and a fascist. And then, you know, the conservatives get their guy in and the other side is, he is a dictator and a fascist. This is the end. We might want to. I don't know how much I should say here. Okay, I've been writing a few politics articles on some web on the American Thinker, and I wrote one. I haven't submitted it yet, but it's about some of the protesters and I titled it Chill Lady, Chill. I won't give you the rest of the article. You might be able to figure it out. But. But a little bit of the point of my article is. Is right there in verse. What is it? Verse 4. One generation passeth away, another generation cometh, the earth abideth forever. It's not really as bad as you think it's going to be. As a matter of fact, I gotta finish the sermon here soon, don't I? But why did I get such a hearty amen out of that one? I. I actually did a little study this week too, on presidents who were operating outside of the Constitution. And what I found is virtually all of them, except the really bad ones, they all push the limits of the Congress Constitution. So I. I kind of want to say, chill, lady, chill. This thing is comes, it goes, it ebbs, it flows. Maybe we could sit back and say, you know what I think? I think. I think I'll go to the happy hour at Sonic and get me a cherry limeade. And I think that's a little bit what Solomon was saying is it's okay, you know, a bad thing happens, a good thing happens, it passes, this too shall pass. We pick up in verse five. The sun also ariseth, and the sun goeth down and hasteth to his place where he arose. Now it's the same idea. One generation comes, one generation goes. The earth still there. The sun comes up, the sun goes down. This is another place where I want to say, by the way, that he's not teaching a flat earth or teaching a, an earth centric model that the sun goes around the earth. If you, if, if you get that, you're reading way more into an old king sitting on his porch talking, you know, how we see life is what he's talking about. And so there is a little bit of that. Well, I think even, what was it Fiddler on the Roof saying about that? Right? You know, sunrise, sunset, sunrise, sunset. And so we've got this thing that says, chill fella, chill. This is going to be okay. The sun's going to come up tomorrow, it's going to go down the next day. And that there. Wouldn't you agree that though there's a bit of pessimism in the way it's said, it's really also quite liberating to say, hey, what if there's a big disaster today? Guess maybe tomorrow will be better. What if, what if, you know, today was grand and glorious. I better not count on it. That'll go away. I tell young preachers a lot when I mentor them. I say, never judge your ministry based upon a single sermon because you can go away. Oh, I don't even know how to preach. I can't do it. It was absolutely horrible. I quit. In fact, that preacher, I texted him this morning, said, you ready? And he said, well, it's not going to change the world, but I'm ready. And I said, weekly sermons are a lot better than world changing sermons. Yes. This is, this diet you put out there. You keep another one, another one, another one, and you keep it going. Okay, so the sun rises, sunsets, verse 6. The wind goeth toward the south and turneth about around the north. It whirleth about continually and the wind returneth again according to his circuits. This is about Taos in the spring. So here again you've got this. He's talking about this cycle that is going on. Verse 7. All the rivers run into the sea, yet the sea is not full into the place from whence the rivers come. Thither they return again. Let's just. You could take the winds, you could take the rivers, but let's just think about the rivers here for just a moment. He gives this, this concept of, hey, that water keeps flowing the earth, the, the ocean isn't overflowing, it's not. It's not going up and that one's not stopping. What's going on here? What he says is, hey, God's kind of taking care of this earth. It's going to. It's going to work. It's going to keep going. I remember my grandfather, when he began to get Alzheimer's and. And they had this little. You know, one of those little fountain things you set at the table and it cycles water. Somebody had got it because it's pretty and you give old people pretty things. And I remember grandma finally had to turn it off because she kept saying. He keeps telling me it's going to overflow. Okay, it makes sense, doesn't it? Well, there's a river flowing down. And you know, every time I pass that old river down by that old bridge down on the river, you know which one I'm talking about. Is there a name to that, Roy? A little old wooden bridge that crosses the Rio. You know which one I'm talking about, don't you? Oh, can't say it in church. What? The Woody Bridge. Okay. The modern term is decapitated. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, That's. Well, not this year. It's not enough water. But anyway, when I. When I drive over there, I think you drive that by that when I was a kid. And you know what? That water still flowing and somebody down south surely drowned by now, right? No, it just keeps coming and keep going. I don't know how this works, honestly. Ben, who is at a funeral today, unfortunately couldn't be here. But Ben, he rides the river. This is one of his jobs. And he told me that our part of the river never runs dry because we have springs that feed it. And I thought, oh, I didn't know that. I wondered. But now I'm wondering, like, where does the water come from in the spring? I don't know. Again, you get the idea and the picture that if you try to spend your life keeping the rivers from running dry, you're kind of. It's kind of a dumb job. Try to keep the oceans from overflowing. God's made this cycle. This works. We don't have to sweat some of these things. Now, I got a few more verses, so I better hurry up. Verse. Verse 8. He says, all things are full of labor. Man cannot utter it, for eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing. The thing that hath been is that which shall be. The thing which is done is that which shall be done. There is no new thing under the sun. Is there anything Whereof it may be said, see, this is new. It hath already been done of old time which is before us. There is no remembrance of former things, neither shall there be any remembrance of the things that are to come with those that come after. Okay, here's again, sounds a little pessimistic, but the things that are happening today, somebody's been there, done that. It's not this new stunning thing, the things that are going to happen. Maybe we did it. We, you know, it all, it all cycles, it all comes around. And he, and he actually, I think is trying to get his crowd around him to be encouraged by that, to say, hey, the, the eye always. What is it in verse? Verse seven. I believe it is verse, yeah, verse, verse eight. Excuse me. The eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the earth filled with hearing. I think the encouragement there is, don't think that you're going to make a discovery that is going to make everything make sense from here on. We're constantly on this search to see something or hear something that's going to cause it to make sense. And we, there are a lot of things in this world that don't make sense, right? And we want it to make sense. We want some handles on this world. And so we kind of get into this thing where, hey, I'm going to go on a quest for that secret thing out there, that new thing that if everybody had known this, then all the pieces would have fit together. What he says is, there's nothing there that really does that. You, you search forever, you listen forever, keep your ear to the ground forever. It's not going to explain all these things. I get, I guess, somewhat frustrated sometimes in myself and others where we are constantly thinking, hey, I need to read all these books or listen to all this news or hear all this analysis so that I can figure out what's going on. And because, you know, there is bound to be the answer out there. And then it almost inevitably ends up with, did you know that two farmers got together in 1852 and one of them was a 32 degree Mason and they decided to take over the world and that's why Trump did what he did today. But of course, yes, maybe we can chase these theories from now till Jesus comes. Maybe the reason the world is stupid, because there's a lot of stupid people in the world, all of us, that's just kind of, it's the world we live in. And Solomon is like, hey, don't worry about it, you know, it all comes out, it'll work. It'll get there, it'll, it'll take care of itself. And that can really come. And really it can be this blessing. And then he kind of closes out, says, hey, we're going to forget everything anyway. You discover why the world operates the way it does. You publish it in a book and as soon as you're gone, they'll be like, randy who, it's done, it's gone. So chill a little bit, I think, is what he's saying to us. And enjoy the journey, enjoy life along the way, and it really can be good. A few years ago, we had this somewhere. I got an African violet, I don't know, and I had it on my desk and I realized those things kind of bloom and they look pretty and, and they're a fascinating little fuzzy leaf flower things, you know, and, and, and then, you know, it's like, oh, look, it had a baby. I put it into two pots and I had two or three or four or five African violets. And I would, I'd rotate them out to the blooming one on my desk. And in that it was always there for our online program, Ask the Theologian. So somewhere along the way, I, I, I got on to this idea. I negatively, I scolded this idea of the purpose driven life. To me, the purpose driven life is a little more of that. You've got to find your great purpose in life. And I wanted to say a little bit, ah, the wind comes, the wind goes, the river flows. You know, all these things, one, one generation. And, and so I started saying, and we actually put it on a little mug. I meant to bring the mug in today, I don't, but I still have one or two of them around. And on one, on the one side it says you don't need a reason to live. What? And on the other side it says you need an African violin. You don't have a reason to live. You need an African pilot. I think there's a little bit in this sermon Solomon is trying to say, you kids out there are striving for the purpose driven life, for the secret, for the, the one thing the eye could finally see that would make sense. The one thing the ear could hear, you know, the understanding, the new thing. You're out for it. You're out. Grow an African violet. Just grow an African violet and enjoy it and you know, see if you can have dominion over that. Mine died. But, you know, you can work on these things and there really can be a blessing to all of that. So you come. And in one sense it sounds like Ah, you know, that fellow just doesn't have enough drive. He needs some more ambition. He needs, he needs some dreams. And then another hand. You say, wow, you know, here's a person who's, who recognizes taking a walk in the woods is kind of a nice thing every now and then, developing some thing that will help you and someone else, that's a wonderful thing every now and then. Going fishing is a good thing from time to time. Spending some time time in, in, in lunch, in prayer, in Bible study, in friendship and whatever it is. This is a life in which really I'll go ahead and say none of us are going to make the whole thing make sense. It isn't. It's not sitting on us. And I think this is what Solomon comes in the end. And basically Solomon says, guess what? I'll be gone, the kingdom will be gone, they'll forget all about me and, you know, maybe they'll go read a few of my books and misinterpret them. And that's about all there is. It's all she wrote. But he says it in a more positive way, I think in the end to say, this world's not my home. I'm just passing through and so I'm going to enjoy it all along the way. Well, with that, I'm out of time. And we'll pick up next week in verse 12 and see some more encouragement from this book. Let's have a word of prayer. Heavenly Father, thank you for Solomon's wisdom given to us. And sometimes that the wisdom of an old man on his porch can be pretty good and a blessing to us. And we pray that these chapters do become that. We pray that we would live with an eternity in view. As even Paul the apostle said, I'm caught between a rock and a hard place, and in one sense I would like to go on to an eternal reward. In another sense, I know that to live is Christ, to die is gain. And so he determines to make the best of every day, to enjoy every day, to live every day for Christ. And we pray that we would do that as well and not get quite worked up over the things that really we're not going to fix anyway and that probably aren't as either good or bad as we have dreamed them to be. And so maybe we find some enjoyment in this life knowing that the real solution comes in the next. That's when the city not built with hands will be delivered unto us, that new Jerusalem for which we long, we ask it in Jesus name. Amen. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, for being here again Wednesday night. We'll have some smothered. Smothered hamburger steak and. And breakfast in two weeks on Mother's Day. You're dismissed. God bless. There. I have a group system, and then I put a tube down. Yeah, so you put that leaf fabric in there, too? No, I just drill the piece of plastic from the lid. Okay. About that big, just been. And it just. There's a space there. You know, you go fertilize way some flowers in a couple of them. And that's probably easier because you can't move. I have to have the tractor to move those buckets. Oh, they're heavy. Very heavy. But it was a dual purpose because you saw that fabric I had on there. It serves to keep the fabric down. Have six of them.