For those who may wish to ‘study’ this chapter, the following simple resources are provided for you. Each passage has a four-Part approach to help you take in and think further about what you have read.

Passage: Eccles 5:1-7

1 Guard your steps when you go to the house of God. Go near to listen rather than to offer the sacrifice of fools, who do not know that they do wrong.

2 Do not be quick with your mouth,
    do not be hasty in your heart
    to utter anything before God.
God is in heaven
    and you are on earth,
    so let your words be few.
3 A dream comes when there are many cares,
    and many words mark the speech of a fool.

4 When you make a vow to God, do not delay to fulfil it. He has no pleasure in fools; fulfil your vow. 5 It is better not to make a vow than to make one and not fulfil it. 6 Do not let your mouth lead you into sin. And do not protest to the temple messenger, ‘My vow was a mistake.’ Why should God be angry at what you say and destroy the work of your hands? 7 Much dreaming and many words are meaningless. Therefore fear God.

A. Find out :

1. How were they to approach God’s house? v.1a
2. What were they to do? v.1b
3. What further did he counsel? v.2
4. Who speaks many words? v.3
5. What are we to be careful about? v.4-6
6. What should be our view of God? v.7

B. Think:  

1. Why do you think he first of all counsels listening rather than doing?
2. How do words reflect the heart?
3. How can words lead us into sin?

C. Comment:

Solomon now turns to consider our activities before God. For the Jews the house of God was the Temple , but today our bodies are the temple of the Lord and there is no physical “house of God”, but the truths are the same, meaning whenever we draw near to God.

God doesn’t want meaningless sacrifices, he says, that are offered by people continuing to sin. No, when you draw near to God, listen to God that He may show you your wrong. Don’t go to God full of words of your wonderful commitment to him unless you have carefully thought through what you are thinking and feeling and are completely sure you mean it. Jesus said (Matthew 12:34) that the mouth speaks what the heart is producing therefore when we come to God we need to check our hearts out first so that foolish or careless words don’t just pour out, for what we say God will hold us to.

What if we have made a foolish and wrong vow? Judges 11:30-40 tells of a most terrible and misguided wrong involving a vow. What should have happened there was that Jephthah should have confessed that he had sinned in making the vow and sought God’s forgiveness rather than fulfil it. Jesus Christ died for every sin of ours, even making foolish vows we can’t keep.

D. Application?  

1. Don’t be casual in approaching God, check your heart and words.
2. Jesus died for all sins.

Passage: Eccles 5:8-20

8 If you see the poor oppressed in a district, and justice and rights denied, do not be surprised at such things; for one official is eyed by a higher one, and over them both are others higher still. 9 The increase from the land is taken by all; the king himself profits from the fields.

10 Whoever loves money never has enough;
    whoever loves wealth is never satisfied with their income.
    This too is meaningless.

11 As goods increase,
    so do those who consume them.
And what benefit are they to the owners
    except to feast their eyes on them?

12 The sleep of a labourer is sweet,
    whether they eat little or much,
but as for the rich, their abundance
    permits them no sleep.

13 I have seen a grievous evil under the sun:

wealth hoarded to the harm of its owners,
14     or wealth lost through some misfortune,
so that when they have children
    there is nothing left for them to inherit.
15 Everyone comes naked from their mother’s womb,
    and as everyone comes, so they depart.
They take nothing from their toil
    that they can carry in their hands.

16 This too is a grievous evil:

as everyone comes, so they depart,
    and what do they gain,
    since they toil for the wind?
17 All their days they eat in darkness,
    with great frustration, affliction and anger.

18 This is what I have observed to be good: that it is appropriate for a person to eat, to drink and to find satisfaction in their toilsome labour under the sun during the few days of life God has given them – for this is their lot. 19 Moreover, when God gives someone wealth and possessions, and the ability to enjoy them, to accept their lot and be happy in their toil – this is a gift of God. 20 They seldom reflect on the days of their life, because God keeps them occupied with gladness of heart.

A. Find out :

1. How is injustice seen? v.8,9
2. Why is wealth not the answer? v.10-12
3. Why also is it meaningless? v.13-15
4. What does this produce? v.17
5. What is the best man can hope for? v.18
6. Where does contentment come from? v.19

B. Think:

1. Why does gaining riches never satisfy?
2. How is poverty NOT a viable satisfactory alternative?
3. What therefore is the hope of man?

C. Comment:

At the end of chapter 3 Solomon had spoken of the pointlessness of a life of work, but concluded there that we have to work and the best we can hope for is to find satisfaction in it with God’s help. In this passage he treads similar ground.

First he observes that injustice is seen in the form of the rich getting richer at the expense of the poor. From there he notes that the rich who seek after riches are never satisfied and not only that, they have to leave it all to someone else when they die. In other words he covers virtually the same ground as before but from a slightly different angle, that of wealth gain. His conclusion again, is that the best we can hope for is some sense of satisfaction in our toil and an ability to be content with what we achieve, and that can only come from God.

Solomon was clearly in the position to be able to speak about such things, as he had achieved much in his life-time, but in the course of it he had moved away from the Lord (1 Kings 11:4) and he then felt that he had lost all real meaning in work. The warning for us is quite clear! In a day when striving for achievement is rampant we must realise that without the Lord it is, truly, all meaningless!

D. Application?

1. Riches in themselves are not wrong, it is the absence of the Lord that is wrong.
2. Can I be content with what I have, now?