I would like to start off {biblerama} with my recent study of Ecclesiastes. I spent all last week reading and reviewing the book of Ecclesiastes because of what my little borther pointed out to me. My journey through this book written by King Solomon was started over the subject of money!


"Did you know that in the bible it states: '...money is the answer for everything?'" my little brother said. I told him he was crazy of course, because I just would not ever think that such a statement could be true. Of course a big smile came over his face as he directed me to Ecclesiastes 10:19

"A feast is made for laughter,
and wine makes life merry,
but money is the answer for everything"

of course I had to read this for myself, and sure enough it says in the bible '...money is the answer for everything.' So I stated to him that you must always read before and after a passage to understand what the author was trying to say. He of course laughed and did not want to hear anything from me, becuase for once little brother was right!
So this is what started my week long study of Ecclesiastes. I first started with finding the meaning to the word Ecclesiastes. I found out that Ecclesiastes is a Latin word, which comes from the Greek Word Ekklesiastes, which in turn means preacher or teacher. The greek word Ekklesiastes was translated from the Hebrew word: qohelet (koheleth).
This sent some flags up, I also noted that King Solomon was the author of Ecclesiastes and that this book was written (or placed) after proverbs. Now what was striking to me, as I started to read along was the book Ecclesiastes started out with the phrase:


"Meaningless! Meaningless!" says the
Teacher.
"Everything is meaningless!"


Ecclesiastes also ends with this same phrase. Now this puzzled me, because I thought to myself how can the things we do and what we are be meaningless? So I started to read a little more into Ecclesiastes. As I went along I started to see all the things King Solomon said was meaningless: Wisdom, Pleasures, Toil, Advancement, Riches. All these things were considered to be meaningless. This includes what King Solomon said he devoted his life too: "The study and understanding of wisdom". All meaningless!
As I pondered on what all I read, and started to go a little further, I found that what he was saying to be true to me. What I valued and spent my time chasing after (for the most part) was no better than me running after the wind!

So I read a little more, and started to see were though our wisdom is meaningless, God's wisdom is what we should seek. Wisdom is always better than Folly! As I went on and on and evaluated what I strived for, I came to the 'conclusion of the matter'
Ecclesiates 12:13


"here is the conclusion of the matter:
Fear God and keep his commandments,
for this is the whole duty of man.
For God will bring every deed into
judgement,
whether it is good or evil."


This made it clear! To me what King Solomon is trying to tell us in Ecclesiastes is that the things we value and are concerned with really does not matter. We should be more concered with keeping to what God's values and rules are instead of what we value.
We should not worry about things, because God is the answer to any problem and knows better than us what we need. So we should all find happiness in what life we have. And find satisfaction in what we do have, not dis-satisfaction in what we do not have.


"even a live dog is better off than a dead lion!"



May God bless us All!

Welcome to {biblerama}! This blog is going to contain my journey through spirtual growth as a young christian male. (Age: 23) As I go along with my studies I will try my best to post them here. If you would like to comment or add to this blog please email me at: the bibleramian

May God bless us all!