Read Ecclesiastes 9-10 at Bible Gateway.
Go, eat your bread with joy, And drink your wine with a merry heart; For God has already accepted your works. Let your garments always be white, And let your head lack no oil. Live joyfully with the wife whom you love all the days of your vain life which He has given you under the sun, all your days of vanity; for that is your portion in life, and in the labor which you perform under the sun. Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with your might; for there is no work or device or knowledge or wisdom in the grave where you are going. Ecc 9:7-10
White garments implies righteous deeds or way of life; and oil on the head implies anointing, or the Spirit. Solomon as king and Messianic type was prophesying that the purpose of man is to live righteously by the power and anointing of the Holy Spirit within us.
When we read Ecclesiastes, there is a pervading sense of doom and futility that kind of seeps into the bones. Ecclesiastes is not a popular book of the Bible. But, that futility and that doom is wisdom, because it shows that the works of man are futile. His righteousness, his wisdom, his labor, his wickedness, his legacy, all alike do not change his destiny of death.
We need to know this, to know that we desperately need God to save us and give us life! How many people do we know who trust in themselves, no matter in what arena? Men trust in knowledge, or power, or wealth, or righteousness, or their name that they make for themselves, or in any number of things, and they spend their lives and their fortunes in pursuit of something that will not make a hill of beans of difference! Mankind needs the wisdom of Ecclesiastes in order to come to Jesus to be made new!
And the fact of the matter is, there was knowledge deeper than the knowledge which Solomon knew. We have a destiny beyond this life that man could not hope for until Jesus came and broke the power of sin and death over mankind!!! There is no work or device or knowledge or wisdom in the grave, but the grave is no longer our destiny, in Messiah Yeshua!!!
Dead flies putrefy the perfumer’s ointment, and cause it to give off a foul odor; so does a little folly to one respected for wisdom and honor. A wise man’s heart is at his right hand, But a fool’s heart at his left. Ecc 10:1-2
A dead fly in a sweet smelling perfume, even though it is small, overpowers the sweetness with stench. So a little foolishness in a heart of wisdom overpowers the heart. This is why we eat unleavened bread every year: to remind us that a little leaven leavens the whole lump. We must be on guard against that little.
Even when a fool walks along the way, he lacks wisdom, and he shows everyone that he is a fool. Ecc 10:3
Walking along the way is a Hebrew idiom which means, living according to the way, the path, that the LORD has set in front of us. Walking in the LORD’s ways and in the LORD’s paths that He has revealed in Torah as the way to live. Solomon is saying that if the heart is wrong, even doing the right thing cannot prevent the rottenness in the heart from coming forward and making itself known.
He who digs a pit will fall into it, And whoever breaks through a wall will be bitten by a serpent. Ecc 10:8
Digging a pit and breaking through a wall are euphemisms for planning or doing harm to someone else. A pit is a trap that someone can stumble into and get hurt, and breaking through someone’s wall is like trespassing or leaping someone’s fence. The people who do these things might as well be digging the pit for themselves. No good will come of it.
Do not curse the king, even in your thought; Do not curse the rich, even in your bedroom; For a bird of the air may carry your voice, and a bird in flight may tell the matter. Ecc 10:20
I always wondered where the phrase, “A little bird told me,” came from, but here is its origin, Ecc 10:20!
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