You are listening to a pulpit lesson presented by Jacob Brunjes on 11/09/2008.  File will take a few seconds to load and play. 

Thesis

• Last week we considered the "Christian Experiment."
• Today, we will consider the "Human Experiment-The Vanity of Vanities."
• I have entitled this sermon the "Human Experiment" because all humans share a similar experience.
• We all are pursuing some form of happiness. We all are aspiring to some goal and purpose which we have deduced is valuable.
• There is a hole, or a void in our souls which we desperately, and obsessively try satisfy and fill.
• Every human naturally and subconsciously employs the scientific method find the key to life.
• Deep in our being we sense uneasiness, and instability.
• We hypothesize then a plethora of possibilities which might fill the abyss.
• We say, "If I only had (Money, sex, wisdom, fame, power, pleasures, possessions) I would be happy."
• And so begins the tireless pursuit.
• Every human being comes to an age when they begin to formulate a philosophy of life.
• We all set out to achieve what we believe has value.
• Whether, we are teenagers wanting to be cool and popular.
• Or whether we are adults desiring success and riches.

Ecclesiastes - the Data of Solomon’s Experiment

• Ecclesiastes is a quest and an experiment.
• Solomon leads us on a quest for the chief good?
• He does so through natural reason. By the scientific method.
• "What does man profit by all the labor at which he toils under the sun?" (1:3)
• What brings satisfaction?
• What purpose should I pursuit in life?
• What is the chief good?
• Every human being comes to an age when they begin to formulate a philosophy of life.
• It begins in adolescence and ends at the grave.
• "I applied my heart to seek and search out by wisdom all that is done under heaven." (1:13-14)

Solomon-the Scientist

• Solomon was the most gifted and qualified man to search out the chief good of earth Life.
• He had unlimited resources of wealth and wisdom to test his hypothesis.
• He reigned in a time of peace and personal pursuit.
• "The words of the preacher, the son of David, King in Jerusalem."

(Ecclesiastes 1:1)

• "I said in my heart, ‘I have acquired great wisdom, surpassing all who were over Jerusalem before me, and my heart has had great experience of wisdom and knowledge."

(Ecclesiastes 2:16)

• "So I became great and surpassed all who were before me in Jerusalem."

(Ecclesiastes 2:9)

3 Hypotheses Tested.

• The Emptiness of Wisdom.
• (1:16)
• (2:12-17)
• (7:23)
• People believe, If only I can figure life out, put the "Rubik’s cube" together, then I will be happy.
• Wisdom carries you down the road to the Mind of Christ, the Logos of God.
• It leads us out of, and beyond the miry dead ends of Pride, prejudice, self-righteousness and self-glorification.
• Wisdom is not an end in itself; it is a means to an end.
• The Vanity of Self-indulgence.
• (2:1-11)
• Our society has swallowed this.
• The Vanity of the pursuit of Riches.
• (5:10-16)

Conclusion of the Human Experiment

• Enjoy Life.
• (2:24)
• (3:12)
• (5:18-20)
• We all die.
• (3:18-22)
• (9:1-6)
• (12:1-8)
• Fear God.
• (12:13-14)
• "For apart from him who can eat or who can find enjoyment?"
• Ecclesiastes teaches us above all else the emptiness of everything apart from God.
• A life lived for this world alone is empty.
• This book would wean us from love of the world.
• It says, "Love not the world…" (I John 2:15-17)
• It says, "lay not up for yourselves treasures on earth" (Matthew 6:19-21)
• It says, " Set your affection on things above; not on things on the earth" (Colossians 3:2)