Turn, if you would, in the Word of God to Ecclesiastes. I was looking at some notes about a year and a half since we've been there. We had preached up through the point of chapter 8, verse 9. So I'd like to pick it up there at chapter 8, verse 10. This is after Proverbs, there in the wisdom literature, as you're reorienting yourself. Ecclesiastes 8, and I'd like to read verses 10 through 17. As the pastor said in prayer, this is the word that God by the Spirit has given to us. We're thankful for that. We want to hear it and give reverent attention to it. as we seek to open it up. Hear God's holy word. Then I saw the wicked buried who had come and gone from the place of holiness, and they were praised in the city where they had so done. This also is vanity. Because the sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the heart of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil. Though a sinner does evil a hundred times, and his days are prolonged, yet I surely know that it will be well with those who fear God, who fear before him. But it will not be well with the wicked, nor will he prolong his days, which are as a shadow, because he does not fear before God. There is a vanity which occurs on earth, that there are just men to whom it happens according to the work of the wicked. Again, there are wicked men to whom it happens according to the work of the righteous. I said that this also is vanity. So I committed enjoyment because a man has nothing better under the sun than to eat, drink and be merry. For this will remain with him in his labor all the days of his life, which God gives him under the sun. When I applied my heart to know wisdom and to see the business that is done on earth, even though one sees no sleep day or night, then I saw all the work of God, that a man cannot find out the work that is done under the sun. For though a man labors to discover it, yet he will not find it. Moreover, though a wise man attempts to know it, he will not be able to find it. Thus far, God's holy word, may he write it on all of our hearts. I should say, by the way, that that wasn't a mistake when I said it says if you have the New King James, it says we're forgotten. And I said praise that was intentional. So you have to hear the sermon to know why. So I'm going to pray now. And when I look up, I expect everybody to still be here. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for this word, how we want to hear you. how we want to learn from You. Lord, the world and all that it would purport to teach us is ever with us and in our face in so many forms. And we invite it. Help us to hear You and be transformed by the renewing of our mind as we come to Your Word. In Jesus' name, Amen. Verse 17, then I saw all the work of God, Kohelet says there. And as we return to Ecclesiastes after a long absence, perhaps you'll recall that a statement like that is an appropriate summary, really, for the book. Then I saw all the work of God. The preacher Solomon, our writer in the book of Ecclesiastes, seems to have experienced everything, right? I mean, if anybody saw all the work of God, it was this man. It was this Bible writer. So that one can easily understand why he could say that he saw all God's work. He saw sorrow and joy, justice and injustice, the wicked, the righteous, wealth and poverty. He knew what it was all about. He saw all the works of God. And what may be said by way of conclusion about all the works of God is this. And I want us to see this tonight. In these three points, God's work, first of all, perplexes the saints. Secondly, God's work encourages the saints. And then lastly, God's word remains an enigma to the saints. It perplexes the saints, it encourages the saints, and it remains an enigma to the saints. All the work of God perplexes the saints. We see that particularly in verses 10 through 12a and verse 14. I'm going to look at that under this first point. These verses testify really to the fact that injustice seems everywhere. Frankly, that our God permits injustice to prevail, or to appear to prevail, at least for a time, is perplexing. It's perplexing to the saints. And Ecclesiastes gives expression to that. It's very honest. This is a very, remember, this is a very real book. I'm not saying that other books of the Bible aren't real, but this gives a particular candid expression to many things that perplex us. Verse 10 is rather of a challenge interpretively. Longman notes that this verse vies for the most difficult in the book. Which is interesting, because this morning was a verse that was arguably difficult. I think this one's quite a bit more so. There's, I think, a translating challenge. Perhaps the verse is better translated, and you heard me translate the main part of that verse this way. Verse 10, Thus I observed the wicked buried and departed, They used to go out of the holy place and they were praised in the city where they acted in such a way. This too is meaningless or vanity. While it was said of all among the Romans, nihil mortuis, nisi bonum, nothing about the dead unless good, that was a common pagan saying, it is nonetheless perplexing and frustrating that the wicked, though gone, continue to receive the praise owed to the righteous. Kohelet cries out that this is vanity, this is meaningless. And I think that's why, and there's some discussion about what the word here is, I don't think that they were forgotten is a better translation. I think the word is a different word, and it should better be read, and they were praised. In other words, the preacher here sees the wicked buried. They've been involved in coming and going from the holy place. And after that burial, they're praised in the city where they had done so. We've all seen wicked men who, though they may make some show of religiosity by going to the holy place, in and out, yet continue in their wickedness. and are praised in life and in death by others. I was thinking about the kinds of instances of this and I was thinking about the mafioso in the Roman Catholic Church and how many of the mafioso are celebrated, the mafia, because they support the church while they engage in murder and mayhem. They engage in murder and mayhem and they're praised and you can see this In one of the film series about this, in The Third Godfather, you see this man who has been a very brutal man, yet being given this great honor by the church. He's being bestowed, great honors are being bestowed upon him. And he's a known killer. He's a known criminal. This kind of a thing. And we could see all kinds of celebrities and politicians whose lives have not been righteous receiving plaudits. both in this life and in their death. Well, Solomon cries out, this is meaningless. This is meaningless. You have men who are wicked, doing wicked deeds, yeah, maybe having some show of religiosity, but continuing in wickedness, and they get praised in their life, and they get praised in their death. You see, he's perplexed by this. Seeing the wicked prosper in this way, verse 11, can incite others to do evil and set them in a course of evil. You see, he says in verse 11, because the sentence against an evil work is not executed speedily, therefore the hearts of the sons of men is fully set in them to do evil. He's saying there, people see people getting away with it, even to their death. And so other people join in, of course, they join in as if God's delay, God's delay in executing sentence means He doesn't see or He doesn't care. We read that in other places. The wicked say, we're getting away with it, and God's not doing anything about it. Peter talks about that in 2 Peter. Where is His coming? Oh, we're glad we don't see it, because we want to do what we want to do, and we're getting away with it. And what they don't understand is that God is being merciful. He's being forbearing. He's being long-suffering. They ought to be swept away. And they mistake his goodness and kindness for his not being there. But this is a warning on several levels. You could even say it's a proper caution to the civil magistrate, isn't it? The Scripture does speak to the civil magistrate that the delayed execution of sentences incites And the swift execution of such serves as a deterrence. Our society could hear this. I mean, listen to it. The sentence against an evil work, because it's not executed speedily, this is God's Word. Therefore, the hearts of the sons of men is fully set on them to do evil. Yes, the proper execution of justice is a deterrence. I mean, you hear so much lies and so many lies in that respect in terms of the criminal justice system and sociologists who say, well, nothing is really a deterrence. Of course it is. I mean, this hit me again. I was watching in more recent times, I've been watching some of the older films, films from the 30s and 40s. And it's very interesting how people regularly say, if we If we do this, we're going to fry. They're going to put us in the electric chair. I mean, it should seem like a deterrence. I mean, if you know that you're not going to have 30,000 years of appeal, but you're going to be executed for murder, it is a deterrence. That's nonsense. The Bible says it is. And it says not executing such a sentence causes the sons of men to fully set their hearts on evil. Well, we have here in general, you see, the perplexity expressed in other places in the wisdom literature. We have that expressed here in verses 12a and verse 14. 12a speaks about a sinner doing evil a hundred times and prolonging his days. And then verse 14 is the very heart of this perplexity. There is a vanity, he says. It's meaningless. What? They're just men. to whom it happens according to the work of the wicked. There are wicked men to whom it happens according to the work of the righteous. And again he says, it's meaningless. Well, this is a common refrain, and of course you can understand it. I mean, the pastor prayed and rightly so, and thank God that we're not under persecution. I mean, this was such a real part, has been historically such a real part of people's lives, to see the wicked prospering, to see those who oppose the church running over the church and seeming to have lots of blessings, and the church being small and poor and persecuted. And it still is that in many places. But we read this not only here, but Psalm 73. We read that together. That's exactly what the psalmist is saying there. How and why does the wicked prosper? Why? There's this perplexity. Why do the wicked prosper? Why do God's saints languish while they so suffer? And so we see here, that sinners grievously sin again and again, verse 12a, and prolong their days, both prospering and appearing to prosper. And in Psalm 73 and verse 14, this can make us in the flesh cry out, what's the use of righteousness? What's the use? Hey, the bad guys, the sinners, appear to be doing pretty good. Let's just throw in our lot with them. I mean, that's the temptation in the flesh. Let's throw in our lot with them. Why suffer so, especially for being righteous, when it doesn't pay? Since the righteous evidently suffer, verse 14, as well as the wicked prospering. This can lead to the question, why bother with righteousness if it only gains you the reward of the wicked, troubles and suffering. That's what the wicked are supposed to have, he's saying. Troubles and suffering. And the wisdom literature itself tells you that. I mean, Job's friends had this, you see. They come to Job and they see him suffering. And they're saying, Job, repent. You've done horrible, wicked, terrible things. And Job said, no, no, you misunderstand. And they said, no, we don't misunderstand nothing. You wouldn't be suffering if you were righteous. And you know what? Job cries out to the Lord, why am I suffering? Because he makes the mistake at that point of really agreeing with the friends. He agrees. He says, you're right, I wouldn't... So why am I suffering, Lord? I mean, my friends are right, I'm only supposed to be suffering if I'm wicked. And since I know I'm not, I mean, they don't believe me. The friends say, it's cut and dry. You're wicked, that's why you're suffering. And Job says, you're right, it is the wicked who are supposed to suffer. So Lord, what gives? And we see that here. The psalmist despaired of an answer until he went into the temple and saw the true end of the wicked, until he got reoriented. And this is reflected in the next point. God's work not only perplexes, but also encourages the saints. And it's all here in this one passage. Just like, of course, in Psalm 73, there's kind of a very logical movement. from the psalmist being at his wit's end to recognizing as he comes into worship, as he reorients his thinking, as he comes into the presence of God, draws near to God by the Word and all the appointed means. And I think, again, the pastor keeps anticipating. You said something about the fog lifting or something like that. Well, the fog lifting and the mist clearing. That's what happens in worship. I mean, all we can get very confused. We come to worship. We come corporately to worship. We come privately to worship. And that's what we, you know, we're like, wow, why are the wicked prospering? I don't know. Let me try CBS. No, I mean, OK, Fox News. No, that doesn't have the answer. They don't have the answers. Come to the Word. Here's the answer. God, Yeah, His work perplexes us, but it encourages us. This is because faith Faith has an answer to these perplexities. As we see in verses 12b-13 and 15. These problems of 10 and 11 and 12a and 14. This perplexity. And it's all mixed together. You might say, why is it mixed together? I mean, why is the perplexing of us as we look at things and the answer mixed together? Because isn't that the way it is in our lives? I mean, my point is you sit here and you're like, yes, yes, I need to hear this. Preach it. And it's not as if you're going to leave here and you're never again going to be perplexed. I mean, a little bit of bad news for you in that respect. You will. You're going to have to keep coming here. You're going to have to live here. You're going to have to park it here. Stay there. Stay in that Word. Stay there. So, we say here, the conclusion of verse 12 seems to reverse the kind of despair and perplexity we've just seen. Verse 12a says, Though a sinner does evil a hundred times, his days are prolonged. You can feel that angst. Yet! I surely know that it will be well with those who fear God, who fear before Him. It will not be well," next verse, "...with the wicked, nor will he prolong his days which are as a shadow, because he does not fear before God." So, I mean, here's the answer of faith. It's all in there together. And again, the pastor has been saying, It seems more lately, maybe he said this a lot and I just didn't catch it. I mean, sometimes my wife will say, you know, she'll say, oh, something was said or she, you know, I said that a lot. Well, I just now got it. But maybe he's been saying this a lot. I just now got it. What a mixture we are. He's been using that language particularly. Well, we are. And you see it here beautifully in a passage like this. We're a mixture. We struggle and we have questions and perplexities and yet faith has an answer. You could say this seems to flatly contradict. All is vanity because the wicked prospers and the righteous suffers, says the voice of perplexity, particularly verse 14. No, says the voice of faith in verse 12b and 13. No, it will be well with those who fear the Lord, but not with those who don't. Well, how to figure? Well, a couple of things. Proximately, this is one way to understand it. Proximately, things are perplexing, but ultimately faith sees the outcome. Do you get what I'm saying? Proximately, things are kind of confusing often times. But ultimately, you see, this is what every time we come into worship, we think about ultimate things, not just what's in our face, but our problems. That's the way our problems are, aren't they? They're like this. I mean, think about it. My hand, this hand right here in my face blocks a great deal of my vision. Now, if someone, if I were to ask Matt to put his hand, which is, it may be bigger or it's not that different in size. If I ask him to put it up against that wall, It's not going to block much of my vision, it's just going to block our little dinky portion of the wall. But you see the difference, it's a matter of perspective. When we have our problems right here, we are perplexed. We're perplexed and that's often the way it is. It's certainly that way when we're not walking. in the Word, in prayer, in fellowship and communion with God as He is in the light, walking in the light, as 1 John talks about, and fellowship with each other. It's in that fellowship, it's exercising those means of grace, drawing near to Him and each other, that we're able to clear it and to move that hand away from our face and put it in the proper perspective. Just as in Psalm 73, when we come into God's presence by preaching and prayer and the sacrament into public worship, into our family times, into private times in the world, the fog clears and the mist lifts. No, the wicked don't really, even here, prosper. When we're thinking right, we reckon. They don't really even hear Prosper! They're miserable! I mean, we just get all... Oh, the world! We pant after the world! Oh, the world! The world! They have it so wonderful! Yeah! Please, I don't say this with any animosity. But tell that to... Well, you can't tell it to Anna Nicole Smith because she's dead. But I mean, what a terrible thing. I mean, she pursued wealth. Look what she pursued. I mean, now I realize that some people that pursue that don't end up this way. But that's what you see in her tragic life. It's tragic. It's tragic. It's sad. But that really is just in a little microcosm where it all leaves, truly. There are people who tell themselves, you know, there are a lot of people who look at her and despise her. See, they think they're so different, they think they're better. The world, I mean, we're the ones, you know, they say, you're a hypocrite. Christians truly are the ones that, no, we're not any better than anybody else but for the grace of God. It's the world that thinks they're better than these people over here. We laugh at her. What a fool she is. Let's make fun of her. Because we're so different. No, you're not. No, really. And people would be very offended. Her? That white trash? I'm a lot different than her. No, you're not. Maybe you're different in this or that way, but you're not really. We lie to ourselves. We want to think we're so much better. Well, he knows it isn't true. God's Word knows it, but it's His grace that makes us to differ. We all need the same thing. He, the grace of God. And even in all of our suffering, just like the wicked don't really, even here, truly prosper, even God's people and all their suffering, we really, as we saw this morning, can rejoice. As Paul in the whole book of Philippians, I mean, there's many instances, but Philippians is as good an example of that as you find in the Bible. the epistle of joy and rejoicing, in prison, in whatsoever state, say, I'll be a drink offering. And I'm happy to do it. To be an accompanying offering to the sacrifice and service coming from your faith. Paul says that. Well, think even of the gospel, to take it just a step further here, think of the gospel implications of verse 14. There is a vanity which occurs on earth, that there are just men to whom it happens according to the work of the wicked. Again, there are wicked men to whom it happens according to the work of the righteous. Under the sun, down below, that makes no sense. You see, that's vanity. But think about this from the perspective of faith. A just man to whom it happened according to the work of the wicked. Our sins. Adam's sin and ours were imputed to Christ, a just man, to whom it happened according to the work of the wicked. He had done no wrong, nor was there deceit found in His mouth. He was holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners. It was all we like sheep who had gone astray, but the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all. So we want to talk about injustice. Injustice. Injustice. I don't know. It's danger. Danger. But anyway, injustice. Injustice. Well, Jesus taking the penalty that was ours. And what's an injustice? Don't mistake what I'm saying here. That's justice being fulfilled. That's justice being met. Justice is met so that He might show mercy. But there's a just man. And the righteous, well, He paid the penalty for our sins. The righteous one who knew no sin becoming sin for us. 2 Corinthians. He who knew no sin became sin for us so that we might become the righteousness of God. So that we who are wicked might have it happen according to the work of the righteous. I mean, that's what happens in justification. We who are wicked have it happen according to the work of the righteous. Brother Duggan, I conspired, and that's why He chose not what my hands have done. We didn't really. But not what... Because it isn't what my hands have done that saves my guilty soul. It's what He did. Jesus paid it all. You notice all the hymns sort of point that way? The hymns don't say things like, Jesus paid a fairly good bit of it, but I paid the rest. Or, you know, kind of what my hands have done. I mean, no. They don't sing that. He did it. Not just because we don't have a piano, we don't sing that period. You see, we see in Him, as Psalm 85, 10 says, mercy and truth have met together, righteousness and peace have kissed, and because we know that there is justice because it's established in the death of Christ for our sins, we can here and now enjoy life. Verse 15. Yes, the Christian life is service involving suffering, even as we saw this morning, but it's not without much enjoyment. God gives us richly all things to enjoy, and verse 15 says that we should enjoy them. You see, so many people misread this. They think the preacher, Solomon, just kind of despairs. He's back and forth, and he's got the answer, and then he doesn't have the answer, and then he gets the answer, and then he doesn't have the answer, and he's just like, Oy vey! He comes to verse 15, and he just says, drink and be merry. I don't know. No. No. He's saying, under the sun, let us content ourselves. This is a trusting heart. This eat, drink, and be merry here is not eat, drink, and be merry because, you know, whatever. No. Rather, he says, I commended enjoyment because a man has nothing better under the sun than to eat, drink, and be merry. This will remain with him in his labor all the days of his life which God gives him under the sun. Well, all that having been said, God's work, which perplexes us, which also encourages us because of faith, remains an enigma to the saints. So we do come back to that in verses 16 and 17. In verse 16, Solomon said that when he employed all of his faculties without rest, ceaselessly so, looking at all of God's work, verse 17, he can't find it out or he can't discover certainly the answer from an under-the-sun perspective. Much that we see the last part of verse 17, we'll never hear. be able to see how it fits together and what it all means. We will not be able here to figure it all out. This is because God is wise in all His ways and He is incomprehensible. That's His expression here of God's incomprehensibility. That means that we cannot grasp all that God knows and understands. We cannot grasp what His own self-knowledge is. He understands it all. It all makes perfect sense to him. But we don't have the capacity to grasp that. He knows what he's doing, though we can't fathom it. I don't know why my mother went just as she did. I've been perplexed all along and I don't have it figured out yet. There are many facets of the way things went at the end of her life that still perplex me. Don't I know God gets the glory? Yes. Don't I know that it was His will? Yes. Don't I know that she was His and He took her to be with Him? Yes. But I can't just say, well, I know exactly what was going on there. I mean, I can lie and say that. Why not say, I can trust Him? I can trust Him. Faith doesn't mean that I've got God in all His ways figured out. That will never happen here and even there. I'll never know Him in His ways as only He does and can. I'll never have the perfect knowledge of Him that He has in Himself. That's what it means that He's incomprehensible. You see, because even in the new heavens and the new earth, we're going to be perfected. But we're going to be finite still. We're not going to be infinite. We're not going to become God. We're going to be our truest selves, our fullest selves. So we say, I can't fully grasp Him in His ways, but I can lean on Him. Rest in Him. Flee to Him. Trust in Him. Faith. Faith is that to which I'm called. Is your attitude, unless I can figure it out, I'm miserable? You know, I mean, I've counseled Christians where sort of that was a big part of it. That's often a part of our difficulties. If I can't figure it out, I'm miserable. No. Trust, and a little bit of a different twist here. Yes, trust and obey, but trust and enjoy. As one commentator said. As Jay Adams said in a little piece that I read. Jay Adams has got, if you read Table Talk, in this month's Table Talk, it's about the wisdom literature. And he's got a little short article summarizing the book of Ecclesiastes, and it's a very good short summary of the book. And when you're saying, I can't figure it out, what the preacher is saying here is, trust God and have a good meal. Have a steak and glory in God. And stop fretting because you're not Him. Accept your place. If Solomon can't figure it out, how are you and I? If the wisest man that ever lived says, I really, really study this, and it perplexes me, what are we going to say? I mean, Solomon, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Solomon, idiot! Is that what we say? No. They don't know anything. Let me at it. OK, go ahead. I'll go have the steak and you can come to the restaurant and meet me there when you get a headache. It's not because I've got it figured out, but because I'm resting in him who does. Faith says God will work it out. and it looks to him in trust. Now we say a wise man with all his ceaseless labor will not be able to find out God and His ways. Solomon couldn't. But he can learn to trust Him who alone is wise. In fact, true wisdom means looking to Christ alone and whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. Come to Christ in all of your perplexity, being encouraged by faith Knowing that all the mystery and enigma that remains should just that much the more call us to trust in Christ. Amen. Our Father, you are perfect in all your ways. We acknowledge that as an article of faith. Does it mean we understand it? And forgive us, Lord. We so often demand that we do. We so often demand sight, even, at a time when we're called not to walk by sight, but by faith. Help us to do so, Lord. In Jesus' name, Amen.