Ecclesiastes – Meditations (2)

 

“All that my eyes desired I did not refuse them. I did not withhold my heart from any pleasure, for my heart was pleased because of all my labor and this was my reward for all my labor.” Ecclesiastes 2:10.

 

The “heart” is our center of gravity, the sun of our inner solar system. It informs and influences all that is within us, indeed, it also, in partnership with the mind, directs and affects our bodies. When we “set our hearts” on a thing, on a goal; when we fill our hearts with a passion; when we enlist our minds in a pursuit, we become transformed into the image of our pursuit. Absent the lordship of Jesus Christ, our pursuits become our idols and we reflect their images, we speak their language; these idols become the arbiter of our lives – we submit our decisions to them. Because our idols are the most valuable things in our universe, our decisions are made in light of their perceived worth.

 

For the Christian, and for the professing church, this is one reason why it is sin to allow anything, anything other than Jesus Christ to be the arbiter of our lives, anything but His glory to be the center of our gravity. I have said more than once in a Sunday sermon, in our nation (the U.S.A.) we might as well stop kidding ourselves and replace our crosses with a large dollar bills in our churches, for it is the dollar we look to rather than the Cross. We look at most things in terms of money, not in terms of the lordship of Jesus Christ.

 

Now, to be sure, those who have little in material things are often the most thankful and the most content. But once we enter the economic strata of consumerism, that consumerism defines our identity, it consumes our hearts and minds – within and without the professing church. Media, in all its various forms, has now reached its tenacles into our telephones, so that that which was once used for two-way communication, is now often used to feed the image of the beast (consume, consume, consume) into our souls.

 

I once knew a man who had a plaque on his office wall which read, “He who dies with the most toys wins.” Perhaps this was Solomon’s attitude during part of his life, perhaps this is what the above verse reflects. Solomon’s heart was all about consumption – he denied himself nothing. Yet elsewhere, at some point in his life, Solomon wrote, “Watch over your heart with all diligence, for from it flow the springs of life” (Proverbs 4:23).

 

What our hearts desire matters. Will I allow my heart to become polluted with the images of the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the boastful pride of life (1 John 2:16)? Or will I seek to love the LORD my God with all of my heart and soul and mind and strength; and love my neighbor as myself (Mark 12:28 – 31)?

 

Do we want to know the will of God? Then let us hear His Word to Micah, “He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, to love kindness, and to walk (live) humbly with your God” (Micah 6:8). Our Father and Lord Jesus desire to fill our hearts with themselves, so that out of our hearts Living Water will flow to others, the Water of Life in Jesus Christ. We are not called to become consumers, we are called to be producers in Jesus Christ, to be fruitful vines (John 15), to be fountains of Life for others to drink from.

 

Can we say with David, “Whom have I in heaven but You? And besides You, I desire nothing on earth. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever” (Psalm 73:25 – 26).

 

Will I learn to deny myself so that I will not deny Jesus Christ?