I’m sharing snippets from Ecclesiastes, words to get our attention and make us think.
Here’s chilling thought from chapter 4, right after the value of partnership that I shared yesterday:
Better a poor and wise youth than an old and foolish king who will be admonished no more. (Ecclesiastes 4.13, NKJV)
NLT has it:
It is better to be a poor but wise youth than an old and foolish king who refuses all advice.
Don’t get past receiving admonishment! Don’t be the person who “refuses all advice.” Said positively:
The ear that hears the rebukes of life will abide among the wise. He who disdains instruction despises his own soul, but he who heeds rebuke gets understanding. (Proverbs 15.31, 32, NKJV)
Back to Ecclesiastes:
He who loves silver will not be satisfied with silver; Nor he who loves abundance, with increase. This also is vanity. (Ecclesiastes 5.10, NKJV)
A good word. There’s a parallel passage in Proverbs:
Don’t wear yourself out trying to get rich. Be wise enough to know when to quit. (Proverbs 23.4, NLT)
The solution?
Here is what I have seen: It is good and fitting for one to eat and drink, and to enjoy the good of all his labor in which he toils under the sun all the days of his life which God gives him; for it is his heritage. As for every man to whom God has given riches and wealth, and given him power to eat of it, to receive his heritage and rejoice in his labor—this is the gift of God. (Ecclesiastes 5.18, 19, NKJV)