Sermons

Uzziah became king at sixteen and feared God. He won his battles and made the nation great and strong. But as his fame spread as far as the border of Egypt, he slowly began to change, and came to regard his success as the fruit of his own wisdom and strategy. In the end he went into the temple to burn incense himself, an offering only the priests could make. Azariah the priest pleaded earnestly with him, but he would not listen.

Pride does not arrive in a single moment. Wealth and power that can be seen, and the praise of others, gradually cloud a heart that once gave thanks to God. Refusing to heed the priest shows that the heart has already passed over to Satan. Uzziah was struck with leprosy on his forehead as judgment. He was shut away in a separate house until the day he died, unable to enjoy a king’s authority, and was not laid in the royal tomb.

However great the grace someone has received, if they forget to give thanks and grow proud, they cannot enjoy it and it is taken from them. God did not cast Uzziah aside from the beginning; it was his own choice that damaged the relationship. Those who treat the grace they have received as a debt and live in thankfulness remain God’s people to the end.

Solomon says that whoever loves silver will never be satisfied with silver. He had known every kind of wealth and power, and he speaks these words because he had learned at first hand that greed is a mire from which, once a person has fallen in, there is no climbing out.

The story of two brothers who found a lump of gold shows this. Once they had divided the gold between them, each found himself hating the other, and they threw the gold into the river. The trouble lay not in the gold but in the human heart that changes in its presence, and that greed is, in the end, something Satan plants there.

People come into the world naked and leave it naked, taking with them nothing of all they have toiled for. Whatever wealth is gained, then, must not be clutched but shared, scattered abroad and given to relieve the needy. Life’s heavy burdens, too, must be laid on Christ rather than shouldered alone, for only then is true peace to be found.

Those who go into the temple are told to guard their steps and not to speak rashly. To listen to the word is better than to offer many sacrifices, and whoever has made a vow should not be slow to pay it.

God is in heaven, and man is on earth. Words spoken in haste and vows left unkept are sin in themselves. What set Abel’s offering apart from Cain’s was not the gift that was brought but the life each had lived from day to day.

There is no cause for surprise at those who oppress the poor and trample on justice, for one higher than they is watching over them. May God’s people be those whose words and deeds agree, keeping the vows they have made.

At the end of his life, Solomon comes to realize that there is not a single person with whom he can share what is truly in his heart. He had power and wealth, yet he spent his wisdom on establishing himself and left his people in hardship, and after his death the kingdom was torn in two. David, by contrast, lived much of his life on the run, yet he still strove to keep himself from sin before God and gave himself up to protect his people.

What is amassed in this world crumbles like a sandcastle, but faith built up in walking with God, like a cord of three strands, does not break. With a faithful brother in the faith at one’s side, two can hold each other up and stand unshaken even when Satan tempts them. Whether it is wealth or position, the one who has gathered it for himself alone is left with no such brother.

Neither the king who enlarged his lands nor the king renowned for wisdom is remembered once a generation has passed. What is not forgotten is not achievement but only faith given in devotion to Christ. To build up those nearby in humility and love, forming bonds of faith like a cord of three strands, is the way an empty life becomes a life of true worth.

Though God took from Job his wealth, his children and his health, Job did not let go of his faith. Doeg, by putting to death eighty-five priests and the people of the town of Nob, took his stand on the side of the world. Rehoboam, Solomon’s son, rejected the people’s plea to lighten their heavy yoke, and so tore the kingdom in two.

Comfort offered in words alone is no comfort at all. Those who will not share what they have find no one to comfort them, and after death they come under God’s judgment. But those who, like Job and Paul, have given themselves to the gospel have the Holy Spirit with them, comforting them at every moment.

The Holy Spirit is a protector stronger than any power in this world, and he gives a true comfort that not even parents can give. Solomon, for all the wealth and power in his grasp, looked back with regret on a life spent with an anxious heart; yet those who go through life with wealth in one hand and faith in the other leave Satan no foothold at all. Only a life of faith lived today will leave no regret at its end.

At death a person is cut off from the world entirely. There is no coming back to finish what was left undone, and nothing more that can be done for one’s family. Beast and human alike draw breath and return to the dust, but they differ in this: the spirit of a person goes up to God, while the spirit of the beast goes down into the earth.

If someone who bears a holy spirit lives like a beast, that sin will be judged when they meet God. Hezekiah was given fifteen more years after a mortal illness, and the son born to him in that time was Manasseh, who set up idols in the temple and committed the evil of making his children pass through the fire. In the story of the rich man and Lazarus, too, the rich man who had lived in luxury on earth begged in hell for a single drop of water, while Lazarus, who had gone hungry, forgot every earthly sorrow in Abraham’s bosom.

Since no one knows what tomorrow will bring, all a person can do is live today in goodness and honesty. No one should wound those close to them for the sake of their own feelings and pride; while there is still life, they must love, forgive and share. Whoever fills today with faith in this way has no fear of death, and even on this earth tastes beforehand the peace of heaven.

There is a time for everything. For people, each day brings something new, but God has governed that recurring course from the very beginning. Solomon envied those who had lived with joy of heart in God, for all that they lacked, more than those who had enjoyed riches as he had.

A life that treated the world as nothing more than a place to eat and drink stands as far from a life that used the world to prepare for entering the Kingdom of God as heaven is from earth. That there is an appointed time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to pluck up, shows how much it matters that people live in step with the right time. Because that time is set not by people but by God, putting off the moment to share the gospel because it feels awkward or troublesome is pride as well.

In season and out of season, the seed must be sown with prayer for the salvation of souls. The wisdom to discern when to hold on and when to let go is not human wisdom; it is gained only by being born again in God. Those who use the passing years as fertilizer for bearing fruit become God’s faithful servants.

Saul and Solomon both wanted to hand everything down to their children. Saul tried to kill David, and Solomon, never sure of his son Rehoboam, had to watch the kingdom fall apart.

The harder one clutches at things, the emptier life becomes. Blessing is not measured by how much or how little a person owns; the blessed life is one at peace in God alone, even in poverty. For all the wealth and glory he enjoyed, Solomon came to envy the peace of the poor in spirit.

God’s gift is not wealth or success but the salvation received through faith. Because a person’s place after death is decided by the faith held now, life must be lived in readiness, with a heart willing to go whenever he calls.

Solomon killed his brother to secure the throne and came to possess wisdom, wealth and power in full. Once he realized how great that power was, he began to live for himself alone; even after building the temple and the palace his heart remained unsatisfied, and he went after women, wine and pleasure.

Because selfish people make themselves the center of life, they pay no heed to the hearts of others and so grow ever harder, and the more wealth and power they gain, the unhappier they become. The more they try to fill the heart with the things of this world, the emptier it grows, for sin becomes a habit until even the inner struggle first felt fades away and the thought of turning back no longer arises.

Only when he had grown old and lost his strength did Solomon kneel before God, realizing that though he had enjoyed every kind of riches and glory, the grace of God alone gives true happiness. No one should wait to stand at the edge of a cliff before seeing the danger, or to fall before knowing the pain; the moment sin is recognized, it must be turned from without delay, so that life may be lived without regret.

The prodigal son took his share of his father’s estate, went off to a far country and squandered it all. When the money ran out, people abandoned him and he ended up among the pigs. Only then did he long for his father and set out for home, and his father was already waiting with open arms. Solomon, too, once he had been given wisdom, wealth and power in abundance, came to think he could live without God, and he brought in foreign gods and idols.

Solomon swelled with pride as he watched people serve him as though he were a god, yet within, his soul had no peace. He had to guard his own life and power by himself, and the only things around him were idols and people who meant to use him. The wealth and power that could be seen had made the unseen grace of God look worthless.

To keep his promise to David, God did not withdraw his favor as he had from Saul, but led Solomon to repentance in his old age. Solomon realized that he could not straighten his crooked life by his own strength, and, lamenting that all is vanity of vanities, he returned to God. The message is that those who have sinned must not simply stay where they are, full of regret, but must leave that place while Christ is waiting for them.

Solomon lived in such abundance that he had no one to envy, yet late in life, looking back over his years, he lamented that all was vanity of vanities. He saw people who served God and were content even in poverty and hardship. From them he came to understand that wealth does not make anyone happy, and that reigning as king does not satisfy either.

The vanity Solomon speaks of is wind that cannot be grasped, or a hollowness like something left empty. He had enjoyed the wisdom, riches and honor God gave him. Yet to hold on to his wealth and power he took in foreign gods and turned away from God. From that moment his life became like an empty vessel, and the emptiness of his soul was never filled. As the sun rises and sets and the rivers run to the sea, the world only goes round again. One generation goes and another comes while the earth stays as it is, and human sin stays as it is too.

So Solomon urges others not to live as he did, turned away from God, but to receive Christ and live. An arrow that has left the bowstring cannot be called back, and neither can time that has passed. And so, he says, the blessed life is one that worships God through these few short years and fills that vanity with joy and hope.