Ecclesiastes 1

Order of Service

• Call to Worship — Psalm 145
• Hymn — O God Beyond All Praising (#660)
• Prayer of Invocation
• Psalm Reading — Psalm 17
• Hymn — O God Our Help in Ages Past (#30)
• Pastoral Prayer
• Sermon
• Hymn — This Is My Father's World (#111)
• Benediction — 2 Corinthians 13:14

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Sermon Title: Uncovering Reality Under the Sun

Scripture: Ecclesiastes 1:1–11

I. The Proper Place of Our Reality

A. The phrase "under the sun" situates mankind in a fallen world marked by death, disease, and decay B. All people — believer and unbeliever alike — experience the devastation of this fallen place C. Mankind's foolish response is to construct illusions that escape rather than reckon with this reality D. The preacher echoes Mark 8:36–37: there is no surplus gain from all our toil; everything returns to dust

1. Jesus' words in Mark 8 likely echo Ecclesiastes 1:3 — what does it profit a man to gain the whole world?
2. The call is to face the fallen place honestly so we can receive the proper antidote: Christ crucified E. Ecclesiastes is a gospel book — it dismantles the illusion so we may die to life under the sun and live to life above the sun in Christ

II. The Proper Period of Time of Our Reality

A. "Under the sun" conveys not only place but time — the sun marks seasons, days, and years (Genesis 1:14) B. "Vanity of vanities" is best translated as breath, vapor, or mist — conveying the fleeting nature of life

1. Psalm 39 — all mankind stands as a mere breath
2. Psalm 144 — man is like a breath; his days are like a passing shadow C. Culture's response to time is the grand illusion that we can control it — acting young indefinitely, avoiding talk of death, perpetuating a lifelong mid-life crisis
3. Social media promotes "fake it till you make it" — posting adventure and excitement to construct an illusory life
4. Our cultural role models are the young, who have not yet experienced the cruelty of time D. The proper response to time is an eternal perspective
5. Time is on loan from the eternal God; each moment is a gift, not something to be mastered
6. When we are absorbed in the Timeless One, we are freed from anxiety about time and open to enjoy each season as God's gift
7. We are defined not by time but by the eternal One who has come to us in Christ

III. The Proper Patterns and Rhythms of Our Reality

A. Ecclesiastes 1:4–11 answers the question of verse 3: there is no gain in all our toil under the sun B. A threefold pattern in creation (Ecclesiastes 1:5–8) mirrors the pattern of man's existence

1. The sun, the wind, and the streams all return to their place in endless cycles
2. Man (Adam) is made from the ground (adamah) and correlates to these rhythms
3. Man's voice, eyes, and ears are each full of weariness — nothing seen, said, or heard fully satisfies C. There is nothing new under the sun (Ecclesiastes 1:9–10) — not meaning no new inventions, but that nothing new can break the cycle and satisfy us (Gibson) D. There is no lasting remembrance (Ecclesiastes 1:11) — people and the creation itself forget us; we return to dust as do all things E. The conclusion is not despair but liberation — embrace the rhythms and patterns; stop the futile rat race
4. C.S. Lewis: the pleasure of novelty is most subject to the law of diminishing returns
5. Make new discoveries as creature in the Creator's world, not as a would-be creator inside a self-made illusion
6. True contentment and peace come only when we live within the reality of our creatureliness before the sovereign Creator F. The freedom to fail — knowing the world will go on as it always has gives courage to pursue, discover, and try without the crushing weight of ultimate stakes G. Gibson's summary: the preacher shows us what we should and should not expect from life — there is no gain to be had under the sun, and therefore none need be sought; and there is freedom in that