Ecclesiastes chapter 2 beginning in verse 18. Let me read this for us. This is what God's Word says. I hated all my toil in which I toil under the sun, seeing that I must leave it to the man who will come after me. And who knows whether he will be wise or a fool? Yet he will be master of all for which I toiled and used my wisdom under the sun. This also is vanity. So I turned about and gave my heart up to despair over all the toil of my labors under the sun because sometimes a person who has toiled with wisdom and knowledge and skill must leave everything to be enjoyed by someone who did not toil for it. This also is vanity and a great evil. What has a man from all the toil and striving of heart with which he toils beneath the sun? For all his days are full of sorrow and his work is a vexation. Even in the night, his heart does not rest. This also is vanity. There is nothing better for a person than that he should eat and drink and find enjoyment in his toil. This also I saw is from the hands of God, for apart from him, who can eat or who can have enjoyment? For to the one who pleases him, God has given wisdom and knowledge and joy, but to the sinner, He has given the business of gathering and collecting only to give to one who pleases God. This also is vanity and a striving after winds. Amen. Let's pray together. Our father in heaven, as we seek to hear your voice in your word, would you speak to us and give to us now that wisdom and that knowledge and joy that is divine and true. and enable us by your spirit to receive it humbly by faith. We ask this in Jesus's name. Amen. Well, we come this morning to the final quest of King Solomon, who has spent the last couple chapters telling us about all the ways in which he had attempted to search for meaning and fulfillment in life. And of course, he failed to find it. And so you recall the last few weeks, we saw how Solomon tried amassing as much knowledge as he could to figure out every answer to life. But it was a futile quest that left him empty. and then he tried going after unlimited pleasures on earth at any cost with no restraint whatsoever in indulging his every desire but it turns out that those pleasures lasted only a fleeting moment and vanished like a breath and never filled the void in his heart And then he considered that maybe the purpose of our existence is in the superiority of having lived a good life as opposed to having lived a bad life, a wise life versus a foolish life. But then he quickly realized, well, that's all in vain. That's why he says it's vanity. Because it all ends in death either way. And so what we need is a hope that can be the answer for life and death into eternity. And so now, Here at the end of chapter 2, Solomon recounts how he finally tried to look for lasting fulfillment and meaning in work. Perhaps the meaning of life is found in a lifetime of hard work in whatever occupation or venture that we labored in. But of course he comes right out of the gate with this very blunt assessment. I hated all my toil in which I toil under the sun. He couldn't find fulfillment there and so trying to find it there only left him frustrated and embittered. It was all vanity. It was all a chasing after the wind. Our work, what we do for a living, the work of our hands cannot provide the ultimate fulfillment that we seek. And I find this to be particularly relevant to us in our specific context as a church in San Ramon, California. Because we live in what's called the Bay Area, which is predominantly driven by the industrial giant of the Silicon Valley. You all know that this is the technological capital of the world. But even if you don't work in the tech industry yourself, per se, regardless of what you do for a living, there is in the air of this place we live called the Bay Area, there is in the air a general milieu that is really defined by the culture and values of the big tech world, where as a whole, it's just this rat race of hustling and working this fast paced life to survive and thrive. And so our lives are primarily driven by deadlines, a competitive job market, a competitive housing market, a very high cost of living, and we're constantly huffing and puffing. And as such, our work, our career, our income, all of these things, they not only dominate our time, but it often dominates our minds and our thinking. I don't know if you know this, but We have this culture here in the Bay Area where when you meet someone new, one of the first questions we tend to ask is, so what do you do for work? And that seems normal to us, but if you go outside the Bay, people don't really care about that as much. Now, it's not a wrong question in and of itself, but the fact that this is one of the first things that we ask, and among the things that we are most curious about, it reveals that we are steeped in a culture that bases our identity and our existence on what we do for a living. In short, work is life in our eyes. Whether because we pride ourselves in our career or because we are tirelessly working the grind to make ends meet. So work is the defining thing for many of our lives. And it's to this that King Solomon says, it's vanity. That can't be what life is about. There has to be something more to life than just working and working to the bone. And that life, that true life, is a life of knowing God through Christ. The God who provides for all of our needs and relieves our every burden so that we can enjoy peace and rest. But if work is what we make life about, if that's what we live for as the grounds of our security and purpose in life, then it will only be a weary, burdensome life that is ultimately lived in vain despite all of our blood, sweat, and tears. It'll all have been for nothing. It'll all have amounted to a waste of a life because at the basic level, whatever it is that you work for, you can't take it with you when you die. You must leave it all behind. Look in verse 18. You know, what makes work worthwhile is not the labor in and of itself, but it's the fruit of our labors. It's what our work has produced. It's a sense of accomplishment that I have worked at this very hard and my work has yielded a profitable result, whether it's a paycheck or I spent hours and hours fixing the washing machine and now it works. But if I spend hours and hours fixing it and it's still broken, then that was all a waste, that was all in vain. And so you see, it's not the work in and of itself that we love per se, but what we work for and what we're able to profit in return. It's the fruit of our labors. But no matter how much fruit we have produced from a lifetime of hard work, no matter how much income we have amassed or affluence we have secured for ourselves and our families, we will need to leave it behind for whoever comes after us. No matter how firmly we held on to it and worked for it while we were still alive, the end result is always us leaving this world empty handed of all that we held on to so hard. And so how tragic and pointless if work is what life is all about and what we live for. Now, perhaps someone might say, I already know that. I can't take it with me and I'm fine with it because my sense of fulfillment comes from, in fact, leaving it behind for my loved ones, passing down this inheritance of what I worked for because I'm such a good father and mother or I'm such a good grandfather or grandmother or a great grand... I mean, my goodness, kudos to you for living so long. And sure, that sounds very noble at first, but listen to what Solomon says in verse 19. But who knows whether he, the one who inherits it, will be a wise or a fool. Yet he will be master of all for which I toiled and used my wisdom under the sun, and this is vanity. Everything you work for must be left behind for somebody else, but you don't know if that somebody else will be wise or foolish with what's been left behind. Your heirs can be foolish with what they inherited and squander it all, all that you worked so hard for. because they will be masters of all the fruit of your labor. They will have full control over everything and thus the power to misuse and waste everything. And then what a waste all of your toil and your blood, sweat, and tears would have been. And listen, Solomon is not just saying these things in theory. He's speaking from experience. You remember Solomon? He left his entire kingdom, the kingdom of Israel, to his son Rehoboam. And this was the most powerful and prosperous kingdom on earth. But what happened in 1 Kings chapter 12? Because of Rehoboam's folly, because of his foolishness, the kingdom of Israel fractured and split. Within one single generation, Because Rehoboam acted foolishly, he lost 10 out of 12 tribes. That's an instant 83% loss. My goodness, I would not trust Rehoboam even with my monopoly money. All of Solomon's wisdom, all of his hard work that brought Israel to the heights of its glory amounted to nothing in the end, because eventually what happened? Not only did he lose 10 out of 12 tribes, but both the southern and the northern kingdom, they were eventually exiled and destroyed by foreign nations. Even if along the history, at least within the kingdom of Judah, there were some bright spots of good, wise, God-fearing kings, those good and wise kings ended up having sons who did otherwise. You just need one to poison the well. You just need one foolish generation down the line to squander everything that the wise worked for. And so, look, for those who might still object and say, but I raised my kids really well. They're not gonna be foolish. I raised them right to be wise. Okay, well, that's great, but how do you know that your great, great, great grandkids, whom you'll never meet, how do you know that they won't be foolish and destroy everything that you worked for? I mean, truth be told, It is far more common for great inheritances to eventually be lost by one foolish generation than to be perpetually preserved and grown and last through generations of human history. Because otherwise, if that weren't true, well, we'd have so many people worth billions by now, simply from wealth passed down over how many generations that have spanned humanity's existence. But despite all that opportunity to grow that wealth, at some point in one certain generation, It got lost. And then the next generation had to pick it up, the scraps of nothing, and go back to a life of toil to start all over again. It only takes one fool to throw away everything that his predecessors had worked for. And not only that, but things can happen outside your control as well in any given generations. Wars, famines, economic collapses, political revolutions. These can instantly wipe out all the generational wealth of a family. You see, the point is this. The fruit of our labors do not abide forever. Even if we work hard with the noble intent of passing it all down, What is passed down will not withstand the passage of time and all these things that will happen outside of our control. And this realization is what made Solomon feel the hopelessness of his work. Verse 20 says, So I turned about, he's saying, I was writhing in agony at the thought of this. And I gave my heart up to despair over all the toil of my labors under the sun. Because sometimes a person who has toiled with wisdom and knowledge and skill must leave everything to be enjoyed by someone who did not toil for it. And this also is vanity and a great evil. You could have been the most hardworking and successful man or woman who lived wisely and maximized every talent and ability given by God, which would naturally result in reaping much fruit for your efforts. And this would describe many wealthy people today who attained great wealth due to a combination of the wisdom of work ethic and the giftedness of inborn skill. But for all of that, you end up having to leave it for somebody else to enjoy who didn't work so hard for it as you did. Something is very wrong about that. And that's what he means that it is a vanity and a great evil, that it's not good and it's right. Well, simply because it's rudely interrupted by death and you have no choice but to pass it down. But if you think about it, because of that, it's as if you worked for someone else that entire time. It's as though you had lived the life of a slave. because you worked so hard and yet you're not the one who gets to enjoy all the fruit of your labor because you won't be around for it. Again, even if you're happy to have your family or descendants enjoy the fruit of your labors, you still don't know whether those who enjoy it will be wise or foolish and it's very possible that down the line a fool will spend it all like the prodigal son. And then it will turn out to be even worse that you had worked so hard in life as a slave of a fool. No matter which way we slice it, we run into the same issue. This is what is so in vain that we spend our lives toiling and striving only to end in death. And what do we have to show for it? And toil is such an apt word to describe what it's like to work in this life. look the word toil it's not just a synonym for work but toil means exhausting work hard weary burdensome labor that doesn't go smoothly And it says Solomon describes in verse 22, This is what work is like in this world. It's hard and it's wearisome. Why? because we live in a sin-cursed world. You see, God originally created work as good. Work is not a consequence of the fall, okay? Paradise and Eden, I'm sorry to some of you young folks especially, it was not just playing video games all day and eating Doritos on the couch. God created us for work, even before the fall. Genesis 2.15, the Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and keep it. Man was made for work and it is good. And you know, it's interesting. This is why people who win the lottery or have a very, very successful early retirement, you know what they end up doing many times? They end up starting a business because they get too bored because they want to work. There is a joy and fulfillment inherent to work because that's what we were made for. But ever since sin entered the world through the human heart, all of creation was cursed by sin, even the ground on which we walk and the ground on which we must work. And part of that curse was this. By the sweat of your face, you shall eat bread. And that's what work is like for us now. We need to sweat and exert ourselves until we're spent in order to put food on the table and make a living. In other words, things don't come easily. Fruit isn't produced so effortlessly ever since the fall. You try to grow some crops and the squirrels come and eat it. I don't know, locusts or whatever. Weeds grow and overtake the field. Rain doesn't come on time and so the harvest is weak. Circumstances don't play favorably for us. This is the curse of sin at play. Work has become arduous and it is met with adversity. Or to put it in today's terms, we work so hard at our job, but we end up not getting the bonus. Or we are underpaid and overworked because everything's understaffed. We're faithful at our jobs, but the unfavorable economic circumstances lead us to getting laid off. We studied so hard in school, striving to get good grades, and we graduate with that good and sound college degree, but we're still searching for a job months or even years later. And so our days are full of sorrow and vexation or frustration. And if we do have a job, again, we must be overworked many times. We must suffer long days of work, day and night. Even at night, our heart can't rest because we're thinking about all that needs to be done tomorrow. This isn't just because your company culture is bad, maybe it is, but this is all stemming from the ripple effect of sin's curse. In the Garden of Eden before the fall, it was an environment marked by overabundance and plentitude. The soil was fertile and moistened with living water. Because, I mean, it was the paradise of the presence of God, who is the source of all life and being. Overabundance, a garden teeming with life. But by sin, that garden was turned into what? A wilderness. And so in this fallen world of the cursed ground, as we live east of Eden, the soil is dry. Resources are limited. Yield is slow. and so everybody needs to be stretched thin and you have to squeeze out results hence the long hours the heavy weight of stress and sparse opportunities this is the hard life of toil in this world we have to work so hard to produce the fruit of our labors and all of that only to eventually leave it behind hand it over to someone else and probably end up being lost down the road by some foolish generation. Listen, if this is what we live for, then we will have toiled the life of a slave with nothing to show for it in the end. And you see that slavish spirit in many today. People work and work and work and they are just exhausted all the time. And their lives are driven by the fear that it's not going to be enough or plagued with frustration that it's not going as well as they expected. It is a life of exasperation and a life of groaning, which is exactly what the people of Israel were like in Egypt. They were groaning in slavery. This is why Solomon says, you end up leaving everything behind for someone else to enjoy it. It's not because Solomon thinks that nobody spends a dime of what they earn on earth. No, we do. And yes, you can enjoy your Starbucks or yeah, you can go on vacation and all. But it's that you're not able to truly enjoy life with peace and with rest. because you're so busy being stressed out in life, tirelessly working the grind, and your days are filled with weariness and restlessness. I mean, is this it? This is the purpose of our existence? Huffing and puffing until we can't huff and puff anymore and then we just drop dead? What a waste then. It ends up being nothing but a joyless life of slavish toil. And this all begs the question, is there any way to escape this vain existence? And the answer is yes. Because right here in our text, as Solomon concludes, recounting all of his quest and searching for meaning, we are given the first spark of hope in verse 24. He says, there is nothing better for a person than that he should eat and drink and find enjoyment in his toil. This also I saw is from the hand of God for apart from him who can eat or who can have enjoyment? Early in verse 21 Solomon said this is a great evil that we're not able to enjoy this life of toil. But now Solomon tells us there is a way to live through this burdensome life of toil under the sun and be able to have enjoyment. And where does this ability come from? It says it comes from the hand of God. Man does not have the ability and capacity within himself to be able to have this enjoyment. Because the only thing that man has the ability to do is stress himself out and fill his empty heart with only sorrow and frustrations. And so, this ability to enjoy life and work and everything, it is something that must be given from above. Okay, but how can someone receive this? And what exactly is this secret ability to have joy? Well, the answer is in first understanding who can access this? To whom does God impart this secret ability? Look in verse 26. It says, Well, sounds like we're toast. Because the Bible clearly tells us that there is no one good before God. No one is righteous. Not even one. No one is pleasing in God's eyes because we are all guilty sinners before God who is holy. But that's not all that the Bible says. It tells us that no one is good and no one is pleasing in God's eyes. But that there is a Savior for sinners who is perfectly good and pleasing in God's eyes. holy and unstained from sin, and by faith in Him, we can be united to Him, Him who is the beloved Son of God with whom God is well-pleased. And so by acknowledging our sinfulness and putting our trust in Jesus Christ as our Savior who came to be for us what we could never be or do for ourselves, we can be reconciled to God through Christ and become beloved sons and daughters of God who are pleasing in His sight because we are one with Christ, the beloved Son of God. Which means that in Christ alone, we can live a life with God, with Him no longer being the righteous judge against our sin, but Him as our Father in heaven who loves us and is pleased with us because He can find no speck of sin in us anymore to displease Him because He nailed those sins onto Jesus Christ on the cross and fully punished Him for us. This is the one who pleases God. Those who have trusted in Him for mercy and salvation. It's the gospel. And no, we're not just reading the Gospel too much into the text of Ecclesiastes. Because you don't even need to go to the New Testament to see all this. It's plain and simple. Because first of all, even within the Old Testament, this whole, there is no one good, no one righteous, that's not an invention by Paul in Romans chapter 3. But in Romans chapter 3, Paul is quoting the Psalms. Psalm 14 and Psalm 53. No one is good, no one is righteous. And yet, it's the same book of Psalms that tell us Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good. Psalm 34. We are not good, but he is good. Okay, well, where does that leave me? I'm still not good. Well, there's good news because if you keep reading, oh, taste and see that the Lord is good. Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him. Fear the Lord, you, his saints, for those who fear him have no lack. Those who find shelter in the one who is good are blessed. And so Psalm 147 tells us clearly who pleases God. That the Lord takes pleasure in those who fear him. In those who hope in his steadfast love. Those who hope in the promise of God's grace which we know on this side of the cross is revealed in the personal work of Jesus Christ. Those who fear Him are those who know that God is holy and that we are not. And so they have to hope in His grace and mercy toward them. And those who have done that, what do they receive? Psalm 103, verse 13. As a father shows compassion to his children, so the Lord shows compassion to those who fear Him. Those who fear Him and put their faith in His grace to save them from their sin, they can know God as Father. This is all within the Old Testament. And that is where the God-given ability to enjoy life comes from, from knowing God as Father. Notice how verse 26 says, And that is the only thing that can give us supernatural joy even through a life of toil in this cursed world. How so? How does knowing God as Father give us this joy and this ability to enjoy? Well, Jesus explained it perfectly in Matthew chapter 6. Don't be anxious saying, what shall we eat? What shall we drink or what shall we wear? For all the nations seek after these things and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness and all these other things will be added to you by your Father in heaven who watches over you. Work is hard in this life. It is a weary toil in which we must toil under the sun. Life is ridden with anxieties about paying the bills, financial uncertainties, overworking at your job to ensure you'll survive the next round of layoffs, or making sure that your kids are set up for college and beyond. But Christian, you have a Father in heaven who knows that you have all these needs. They do not escape Him. Even before a word is on your tongue, He knows it all together. The unbelieving world does not have this Father in heaven, but you do because you are in Christ. And He who did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up for us all, how will He not also with Him graciously give us all things? You see, Knowing God as our Father and living life under the shadow of His wings. This is the only thing that can liberate us from a life of fear that comes from the burden of needing to be our own ultimate provider. That is where the toil comes from. It is, in many ways, the logical conclusion and the logical consequence of sin. Because sin has convinced us to walk away from God and be our own God. And what does that get us? Only much panic and fretting because that's not what we were made for. This is why people choose to work a hundred hours a week over two, three jobs. And they make their life all about work because they're afraid that they won't have enough otherwise. They don't know what tomorrow holds, much less eternity. And so it's all driven by fear. And in all this, what's the result? We lose the ability to eat and drink and find enjoyment in each day, in each moment, and to be able to give thanks, to be thankful for everything that God has provided for us each and every day. The eyes of all look to Him, and He gives them their food in due season. It is this knowledge of God as our Heavenly Father that gives us the peace to be able to live in the present instead of fretting about the future. When we are consumed with anxiety about tomorrow, we will lose both our todays and our tomorrows to needless angst and sorrow. Therefore, Do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble, Jesus said. Only under the care of our Father in heaven, before whom we are of far more value than the sparrows he watches over or the lilies that he so clothes in the field. Only under his care can we have rest in a restless life of tiresome toil. Turn with me to Psalm 127. Psalm 127. You know that King David wrote many of the Psalms in Psalter, but if you didn't know, King Solomon wrote a couple of the Psalms, two of them, and Psalm 127 is one of them. As it begins in Psalm 127, a song of a sense of Solomon. And notice what Solomon, who wrote Ecclesiastes, also writes here in Psalm 127 in verse 1. Unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labor in vain. It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil, for he gives to his beloved sleep. This is the positive lesson of our passage in Ecclesiastes chapter two. You want to know what's the most godly thing you can do when you come to the end of a day and you feel discouraged that you couldn't do everything you set out to do and you feel overwhelmed with everything that still needs to get done for the week. The most godly thing you can do is gather up all of your concerns in one heaping pile Dump it at God's feet and go to bed. Go sleep. Leave it to Him. He gives to His beloved sleep. Unless God is at work, what we do is in vain anyway. So trust Him to give you the grace sufficient for tomorrow and close the chapter in peace for today, no matter how today went. And this is how in Christ our toil can be redeemed and restored into work. Because we know that our Father in heaven has lifted the burden that we all once carried in life of having to provide for ourselves as we wandered foolishly in life as our own gods. But now we are under His sovereign care and authority. And so we can work without the burden of meeting our own needs. and the fear that we can't. And by faith, we can start to see work, even our secular jobs, as a gift from God without all the baggage. That we can see it as an opportunity to exercise our skills and to learn new things and to work heartily as unto the Lord not unto men. Or to be a living testimony of the gospel with the people that God has placed around us. And to see it as the means by which God provides for you and for your family and even your church as you now have the means to support your family and even support the work of the gospel in your local church. Our father takes the toil out of work and restores it into a stewardship in which he calls us not to bear the weight of the responsibility that we cannot bear, but he simply calls us to be faithful for as long as he has assigned it to us until the next thing, whatever it may be. He is telling us that He bears the full responsibility and weight of making sure that our needs are met. What a peace we have in God, our Father. I know it was Mother's Day last Sunday, but better late than never. Let me say something for the moms. It sure feels like a toil sometimes, doesn't it? Whether you have infants and young children, or you are responsible for teenagers, three things are certain in life, death, taxes, and worried moms. But what a peace it is to know and to daily confess that you are not the ultimate provider for your children, nor their protector. You do not have the power to make them into what you think they need to become. Remember, they were in your womb, but it wasn't even you who knitted them together in your womb. Those things were happening while you were asleep. It was He who formed their inward parts, and His eyes saw their unformed substance. Your children don't ultimately belong to you. And that is meant to give you peace. But God has so graciously blessed you by stewarding them to you. And so you just need to be faithful for what's been allotted to you for this day. And tomorrow will require tomorrow's faithfulness, not today's worries. And despite all your worries, Your child will grow before your eyes while they are asleep and while you are asleep. They will grow into whatever man or woman God is making them to be. And He is telling you to loosen your grip and rest your heart in Him. You see, herein lies the secret knowledge of joy in an anxious and troubled life. We eat the bread of anxious toil in vain, but we can rest in the one who builds and labors and never sleeps nor slumbers for the sake of those whom he loves. But as verse 26 also mentions, for to the one who pleases him, God has given wisdom and knowledge and joy, but to the sinner, He has given the business of gathering and collecting only to give to the one who pleases God. The sinner, that is, the one who remains in his sins and does not find refuge in the grace of God through Jesus Christ, for them, life can only be nothing but that unhappy, pointless business of gathering and collecting in vain, only to end up giving to the one who pleases God. What this means is everyone will have to leave everything behind for someone else to pick it up. But only the one who pleases God, only a child of God who is beloved by his father has the wisdom and knowledge to be able to enjoy anything left behind by earlier generations. And they will enjoy life and all of the good gifts that God has given with thankfulness and praise to him. And when it is over, they will also happily leave behind everything for another generation of those who are wise into salvation in Christ. But those who remain in their sins and do not come to God through faith in Jesus Christ, they won't have that ability and life will be in vain. And if this describes you today, living through life, just gathering and collecting only to leave empty-handed with nothing to show for it. Jesus tells you, do not labor for the food that perishes. What a waste to live like that, chasing after the wind with nothing to show for it. Do not labor for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you. What is this food? My flesh is true food and my blood is true drink. It is what Jesus did on the cross in giving up his body and spilling his blood unto death to save sinners from their sin so that through him you might be reconciled to God. and come to Him. No one can come to the Father except through the Son. And this you don't have to work for. You can never work for it. But receive by faith the work that God has done for sinners like you and me and offers to you all of it as a free undeserved gift of grace. And when you do, you can come to know the God who made you. You can come to know the one who formed you in your mother's womb and knows and has numbered the hairs on your head. And you can live a life under His loving protection and authority and know the peace and joy that comes from Him. Let's pray together. Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come and your will be done on earth and in our lives as it is in heaven. Father, would you give us each day our bread for the day. Teach us by your spirit to rest in your perfect provision that is sufficient for the day. Teach us to trust your loving will and so enjoy how well it is with our souls, wherever our lot may be. Thank you for sending your son for us to adopt sinners like us as your precious children whom you love. And so help us to walk and to think like your children. Protect us from ourselves. our needless pain caused by our fears and anxieties, and help us to enjoy by faith the security and rest that we have being in your loving hands. And as we take the Lord's Supper now, would you renew our minds of the true food that we have already tasted and received by faith? How good you are to us. and remind us of this food that endures to eternal life and peace with you each and every day unto eternity. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.