Ecclesiastes 7:19-29 Wisdom gives strength to the wise man more than ten rulers who are in a city.

²⁰ Surely there is not a righteous man on earth who does good and never sins.

²¹ Do not take to heart all the things that people say, lest you hear your servant cursing you. ²² Your heart knows that many times you yourself have cursed others.

²³ All this I have tested by wisdom. I said, “I will be wise,” but it was far from me. ²⁴ That which has been is far off, and deep, very deep; who can find it out?

²⁵ I turned my heart to know and to search out and to seek wisdom and the scheme of things, and to know the wickedness of folly and the foolishness that is madness. ²⁶ And I find something more bitter than death: the woman whose heart is snares and nets, and whose hands are fetters. He who pleases God escapes her, but the sinner is taken by her. ²⁷ Behold, this is what I found, says the Preacher, while adding one thing to another to find the scheme of things— ²⁸ which my soul has sought repeatedly, but I have not found. One man among a thousand I found, but a woman among all these I have not found. ²⁹ See, this alone I found, that God made man upright, but they have sought out many schemes.

INTRODUCTION

Throughout Ecclesiastes the Preacher consistently described his pursuit of wisdom. He really wanted to know how to live in this world in the best possible way and he understood wisdom to be the means to that end. Sentence after sentence, paragraph after paragraph, page after page we find the Preacher in various states of progress and regress in his wisdom quest. Our passage for this morning is no different. In it, we’ll find some of wisdom’s benefits, limitations, and conclusions.

The big idea of this passage is that under the sun wisdom has both significant benefits and limitations. Its primary benefit is just what the Preacher sought: Valuable guidance for living well. And its primary limitations are that it’s very elusive and never sufficient. The main takeaway, then, is to earnestly seek the right kind of wisdom, in the right place, and to the right end.

THE NATURE OF THE INSPIRATION OF THE BIBLE

One of the questions that has ever-surrounded Ecclesiastes concerns the author: Who wrote it?

You may remember something I’ve already addressed concerning the authorship of Ecclesiastes. I mentioned the probability that there is more than one “author”. That is, it is likely that Ecclesiastes is a collection of the sayings of Solomon, compiled by a “frame narrator”. If that’s the case, it is the “frame narrator” who wrote 1:1-11 and 12:9-14 (notice the third person voice in both)—the very beginning and end.

I mention all of this here because of 7:27. It is the only other place in Ecclesiastes that the “frame narrator” explicitly “frames” the voice of Solomon.

More than a fun, trivia fact, it helps us see an important piece of the nature of the inspiration of the Bible.

When I first became a Christian, I had no real idea of what the Bible was. I knew it was important and that God was somehow involved in its authorship, but nothing was clear in my mind. At best, I understood the Bible to be God’s Word in a very, very flat sense. That is, I recall not having any understanding at all of the chronology, history, genres, cultures, human authorship, etc.

In other words, back then, I would have had no idea what to do with a book like Ecclesiastes in general (poetic, anonymous, in the voice of someone who probably didn’t actually write it, written from an almost exclusively “under the sun” perspective, etc.) or 7:27 in particular (someone other than [what I understood as] the divinely inspired author making comments in the midst of the divine inspiration).

But what would have tripped me up and made me nervous then, is a source of great encouragement and joy today.

What I now know, and what is a great source of encouragement now, is that God inspired different men, in different ways, at different times, to write in different styles and languages, to address different things and, cumulatively, to tell one grand story of His glory in the creation, fall, redemption, and restoration of His people.

In that way, I truly love the idea that God chose to inspire an anonymous narrator, to frame up the words of an anonymous author, who spoke in the voice of King Solomon. Ecclesiastes 7:27 is another reminder that God is not bound by human limitations and that His glory is most often seen most clearly when He works in ways that are beyond human limitations; in ways that defy human wisdom; in ways that are only sweet sounding to those who have spiritual ears.

THE BENEFITS OF WISDOM

With that, let’s consider the benefits of wisdom from a few non-proverb proverbs (found in vs.19-21).

Wisdom Is Valuable (19)

The first benefit of wisdom named in our passage is that it is supremely valuable. Before we consider that from v.19, I’d like to point you to a different passage in a different wisdom book. In my estimation, one of the most helpful places to go to see the value of wisdom is Job 28. (We’ll come back to Job 28 a few more times as well.)

¹⁵ It [wisdom] cannot be bought for gold, and silver cannot be weighed as its price. ¹⁶ It cannot be valued in the gold of Ophir, in precious onyx or sapphire. ¹⁷ Gold and glass cannot equal it, nor can it be exchanged for jewels of fine gold. ¹⁸ No mention shall be made of coral or of crystal; the price of wisdom is above pearls. ¹⁹ The topaz of Ethiopia cannot equal it, nor can it be valued in pure gold.

Wisdom is so valuable that it cannot be bought with the finest, purest gold, precious onyx or sapphire, glass, jewels, coral, crystal, pearls, or topaz. Its value exceeds them all.

In v.19 of our passage for this morning, the Preacher’s comparison is a bit more modest, but he affirms the unparalleled value of wisdom in his own way. He says that it is so valuable that one man with wisdom is stronger than ten of the most powerful men without it.

¹⁹ Wisdom gives strength to the wise man more than ten rulers who are in a city.

The simple picture the Preacher is trying to paint is that of a town that is governed by a group of capable men. In any city, that’s a significant asset. But the Preacher says that one man with the right kind of wisdom is a better, stronger ruler than ten who don’t have it. Wisdom is so valuable that it provides a ten-fold return on investment.

Kids especially, this is a good place to pause and ask whether this is how you view wisdom. Do you want to have wisdom more than you want to have fun? Do you want to be wise more than you want to be entertained? Do you want to gain wisdom more than you want to gain money or toys or candy or technology or popularity (more on that in v.21) or success in extracurricular activities?

If your answer to any of those questions (and all others like it) is “no,” then your value system is out of calibration, you are thinking foolishly, and you are destined to live a disordered and frustrated life. Wisdom’s first benefit is that it is more valuable than all of those things and we ought to ask God to help us see that and get wisdom.

Wisdom Recognizes Sin (20)

The next benefit of wisdom is found in the next verse (v.20).

²⁰ Surely there is not a righteous man on earth who does good and never sins.

This is one of the more concise statements in the Bible on the fallen nature of all mankind. The Preacher echoes this sentiment in vs.27-28 and it is right up there with Genesis 6:5 and Mark 10:18 and Romans 3:23 and 5:12.

Genesis 6:5 The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.

Mark 10:18 Jesus said …, “… No one is good except God alone.

Romans 3:23 …all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God…

Romans 5:12 …sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned…

Wisdom recognizes sin as sin. More particularly, wisdom is able to see that everyone is sinful. Not everyone is as bad as everyone else and no one is as bad as they could be, but there is no person born of Adam who is truly good either.

I promise not to get too far into the weeds on this one, but it’s worth noting here that one of the greatest causes of the current, prevalent, and dominant animosity in our culture is rooted in two competing understandings of man’s basic nature.

A good many people in our society believe mankind to be essentially good. And the rest (even if for non-biblical reasons) believe we are essentially corrupted in nature. Like I said, I’m not going to attempt to really unpack this right now, but I am going to invite you to consider the implications of each perspective for the purpose of government, the source of suffering in the word, the kinds of laws we need, the best economic system, the best education, personal responsibility, the solution to our problems, and any other big question in life.

It is my contention that the more you’re able to trace those two conflicting understandings of human nature through each of those issues, the more you’ll be able to understand why things are the way they are.

But the Preacher saw then, what we must come to terms with now: Only one of those views is rooted in wisdom. Only one is true. The other is from folly. The other is false. And the critically serious implications of getting that wrong is one more reason why wisdom is so valuable. Wisdom recognizes sin as sin and all mankind as sinners.

The good news of Christianity is that one day there was a righteous man on earth who did only good and never sinned. His name is Jesus and He came to take away the sins of the world. As we’ll come back to, trusting in this requires a different kind of wisdom, a kind the Preacher lacked, and a kind which God alone can give.

Wisdom Carefully Measures Words (21-22)

The third benefit of wisdom is that it teaches us to carefully measure words—others and ours—in order to keep us from having and causing wounded hearts. Look at v.21 to see what I mean.

²¹ Do not take to heart all the things that people say, lest you hear your servant cursing you.

From the outset, it’s important to recognize something the Preacher didn’t say. He didn’t advise his readers not to take anything people say to heart. We are not indifferent the perspective people have of us. Wisdom recognizes that other people are often a critical component of seeing ourselves accurately. Wise people offer themselves up to wise people for review. (“It is better for a man to hear the rebuke of the wise than to hear the song of fools.”)

What he does say, though, is not to take to heart everything (“all the things”) others say about us. In particular, we’re not to take to heart the things we hear from them that we were not meant to hear.

The Preacher’s wording is a bit tricky to follow, but his main, two-fold point is pretty straight forward. First, from the second half of the verse, we learn the basic principle that wisdom is careful about listing in when others are talking about us.

One of the commentators I read this week reminded me of a scene from C.S. Lewis’s The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. The Dawn Treader, a Narnian ship, made land on the Island of the Voices and things were clearly off right from the beginning. It turns out that the island was inhabited by a group of *people* who had magically made themselves invisible and needed help becoming visible again.

Lucy agreed to try to find a reverse spell of some sort in the book of magic found in a house on the island. As she was looking through it, “she came to a spell which would let you know what your friends thought about you.” Folly got the better of her and she said the words on the page. The result was that she immediately saw two of her school friends speaking together on a train.

“Shall I see anything of you this term?” said Anne, “or are you still going to be all taken up with Lucy Pevensie.” “Don’t know what you mean by taken up,” said Marjorie. “Oh yes, you do,” said Anne. “You were crazy about her last term.” “No, I wasn’t,” said Marjorie. “I’ve got more sense than that. Not a bad little kid in her way. But I was getting pretty tired of her before the end of term.”

Predictability, Lucy was hurt, angered, and wished she hadn’t heard her friends cursing her.

That’s the first bit of wisdom the Preacher: No one is meant to know everything that others think about them. For all kinds of reasons that’s not healthy. Grace, be careful with your ears; with what you allow yourself to hear.

The second aspect of the Preacher’s point is that if you do hear someone say something about you (especially something that you weren’t meant to hear), don’t take it too seriously. We shouldn’t, but as the Preacher observed, fallen people talk about fallen people. And we tend to do so in particularly flippant ways when they’re not around that we’d never do in their presence. We mean what we say, but not totally, and the “not totally” part is often lost in the unguarded way we say it to others.

The Preacher’s proof of this is a mirror. He invites us to consider ourselves, “²² Your heart knows that many times you yourself have cursed others.” In other words, if you hear someone say something about you that hurts, before you let it sink in too deeply, remember the last time you did the same thing. You shouldn’t have said what you said, but you didn’t mean it the way it probably would have been taken (and neither does the person who spoke of you).

As true as all that is, let me give you a few more above the sun reasons why you ought not take to heart all the things that people say about you.

1. You’re worse than they realize. The specific thing they said might not be entirely true, but the truth about you is worse still. There is not a righteous man or woman on earth who does good and never sins.
2. They aren’t as knowledgeable about you as they think they are. A great piece of advice I received as a newer pastor was to not take criticism overly seriously, but to not take compliments overly seriously either. For neither are rooted in complete understanding.
3. God alone knows the full truth about you. Therefore, His judgment of you alone matters.
4. Gossip and slander are foolish and sinful. Why would you take seriously the opinion of someone who speaks out of such sin and folly?
5. Your worth is established by something entirely different than their opinion of you. You are who God says.

The bigger application for all of us—even though the Preacher doesn’t mention it—is not to talk trash in the first place. Never say something about someone in their absence that you wouldn’t say in their presence. And never say something in their presence that is corrupting or non-grace giving. A verse to this effect that I’ve been spending a good deal of time on lately is Ephesians 4:29.

Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear.

Cursing others (in this sense) is to belittle them, to account them as small and insignificant. And that is corrupting talk. May there be none of that among us.

THE LIMITS OF WISDOM (23-25)

We’ve seen from Ecclesiastes 7:19 and Job 28 that wisdom is virtually invaluable. At the same time, however, the Preacher has been clear on the fact that wisdom also has limits. In our passage he lists another: Wisdom is elusive. As we saw earlier, its value is through the roof, but so too is the difficulty in getting it. The Preacher tried and tried and tried, but in many ways he came up short.

²³ All this I have tested by wisdom. I said, “I will be wise,” but it was far from me. ²⁴ That which has been is far off, and deep, very deep; who can find it out?

In the next verse, the Preacher continued on with that theme, “25 I turned my heart to know and to search out and to seek wisdom and the scheme of things.”

In other words, the Preacher was still on the same quest in chapter 7 as he was in the very beginning, “I applied my heart to seek and to search out by wisdom all that is done under heaven” (1:13).

And the main point is that wisdom has never been right there to be easily grasped by anyone who wants it. The Preacher’s heart had to turn (away from seeking pleasure to seeking wisdom). He had to search for wisdom (because it wasn’t easily found). He had to seek it out (because it is elusive in this broken world).

But what does such a turning, searching, and seeking look like? How hard is it? For an answer to that, we’ll return to Job 28. The passage begins with a description of the treacherous mining practices of the ancient world. Consider what it took to extract silver, gold, and precious stones from the earth.

Job 28:1-28 “Surely there is a mine for silver, and a place for gold that they refine. ² Iron is taken out of the earth, and copper is smelted from the ore. ³ Man puts an end to darkness and searches out to the farthest limit the ore in gloom and deep darkness. ⁴ He opens shafts in a valley away from where anyone lives; they are forgotten by travelers; they hang in the air, far away from mankind; they swing to and fro. ⁵ As for the earth, out of it comes bread, but underneath it is turned up as by fire. ⁶ Its stones are the place of sapphires, and it has dust of gold.

⁷ “That path no bird of prey knows, and the falcon’s eye has not seen it. ⁸ The proud beasts have not trodden it; the lion has not passed over it.

⁹ “Man puts his hand to the flinty rock and overturns mountains by the roots. ¹⁰ He cuts out channels in the rocks, and his eye sees every precious thing. ¹¹ He dams up the streams so that they do not trickle, and the thing that is hidden he brings out to light.

We’re meant to be surprised by this description—how hard it was to get silver and gold and the fact that men were willing to go to those lengths to get it, to satisfy their desire for wealth. And then, as Job continues, we’re meant to be even more surprised to find that there is something immeasurably more valuable and elusive than that.

¹² “But where shall wisdom be found? And where is the place of understanding? ¹³ Man does not know its worth, and it is not found in the land of the living. ¹⁴ The deep says, ‘It is not in me,’ and the sea says, ‘It is not with me.’ … ²⁰ “From where, then, does wisdom come? And where is the place of understanding? ²¹ It is hidden from the eyes of all living and concealed from the birds of the air. ²² Abaddon and Death say, ‘We have heard a rumor of it with our ears.’

As valuable and hard to come by as is silver, gold, and stones, wisdom is tenfold, a hundredfold both. The Preacher was able to observe both of those things and he wrote this passage, in part, to help his readers—to help us—learn his hard-won lesson: Folly is everywhere, but under the sun wisdom is exceedingly hard to come by. It’s worth seeking despite its high price, and as we gain it, we’re better able to navigate life in this vain world, but it is harder to come by than we realize.

At the same time, however, and more importantly, under the sun wisdom has a far more significant limitation than its elusivity. As we’ve already seen in Ecclesiastes, its greatest limitation is its inability to lead us to the solution to our greatest need. I’ll come back to that in a bit as we turn our attention to the Preacher’s final thoughts.

THE CONCLUSIONS OF WISDOM

We’ve considered wisdom’s benefits (its value for under the sun living, its recognition of sin as sin, and its warning to carefully measure words). We’ve also considered its limits (primarily its elusivity and insufficiency). And now, finally, we’ll consider its conclusions.

Once again, of wisdom, the Preacher said, “²⁵ I turned my heart to know and to search out and to seek wisdom and the scheme of things, and to know the wickedness of folly and the foolishness that is madness.”

We’re right to wonder what he found after all the turning, searching, and seeking.

The Preacher came to three conclusions, each indicated by the same word: “found”. He found enticing women, the rarity of anyone walking in wisdom and virtue, and man’s responsibility for man’s corruption.

Enticing Women Capture and Constrain (26)

First, enticing women, “²⁶ And I find something more bitter than death: the woman whose heart is snares and nets, and whose hands are fetters. He who pleases God escapes her, but the sinner is taken by her.”

By applying the beneficial and elusive wisdom he did discover, the Preacher’s first conclusion is particularly surprising/fascinating. He concluded that life under the sun contains something even worse tasting (more bitter) than death: women who are like traps. Women who capture and bind unexpecting men.

We’re not sure exactly what the Preacher had in mind, but as one speaking in the voice of Solomon, it’s hard not to have passages like Proverbs 5 ringing in our ears, “the lips of a forbidden woman drip honey, and her speech is smoother than oil, ⁴ but in the end she is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword. ⁵ Her feet go down to death; her steps follow the path to Sheol …⁸ Keep your way far from her, and do not go near the door of her house …”

That which is more bitter than death, most likely, is the seductress. It is the temptress whose heart is snares, nets, and fetters. The Preacher’s wisdom led him to conclude that she is ever-present under the sun and able to capture (snares and nets) and constrain (fetters) the sinner. She takes him at her will and to his surprise.

On the other hand, the Preacher’s wisdom also led him to conclude that “he who pleases God escapes her”. Does that mean that God graciously grants escape to those with whom He is pleased or does it mean that it is those who escape her that please God? Most certainly, the answer is: Both!

Wisdom calls you, ladies, to flee from being a seductress. Don’t set traps in anything you do. Whatever benefit you may get from it is fake. It’s as much as a trap for you as the one you’re laying for others.

And wisdom calls to us, men: flee from the seductress. Don’t go near her. Avoid her every hiding place. You know where she’s found, take the long way around to avoid her. She will destroy you. She promises the sweetness of honey but she can only give the bitterness of wormwood. She promises happiness, but she will cut you to pieces.

If you’re currently in her snare, confess, repent. There is forgiveness and healing in Jesus and help in this church.

Wisdom and Virtue Are Rare (27-28)

All mankind is sinful and wisdom is elusive. The Preacher’s second wisdom conclusion, therefore, should be no surprise: Wisdom and virtue among mankind is exceedingly rare.

²⁷ Behold, this is what I found, says the Preacher, while adding one thing to another to find the scheme of things— ²⁸ which my soul has sought repeatedly, but I have not found. One man among a thousand I found, but a woman among all these I have not found.

The Preacher looked around and saw the temptress capturing foolish sinners everywhere. So, where were those who pleased the Lord in their wisdom and virtue? They were, in his lifetime of observation, nowhere to be found. Among two thousand men and women carefully watched by the Preacher, he only fund one person among them who was genuinely wise and virtuous.

Oh, Grace Church, may we humble ourselves before the Lord. May we recognize the ease with which we can encounter folly and wickedness and the gift it is every time we find wisdom and righteousness.

Mankind Is Responsible for Mankind’s Corruption (29)

Third and finally, in his wisdom the Preacher concluded that mankind is responsible for mankind’s corruption.

²⁹ See, this alone I found, that God made man upright, but they have sought out many schemes.

Echoing Genesis 1-3, the Preacher saw that while God made man good, man almost immediately sought out corruption. Any good in us is from the Lord, even as our sin is our doing.

God’s conclusion in Job 28:28 sums this up well, “…Behold, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom, and to turn away from evil is understanding.”

At the end of the day, when all we have in the way of wisdom is what our senses and reason can find, this (Job 28:28) is about the best we can do. Creation is sufficient to conclude that God is real and the image of God in us is sufficient to convict us of our sin against Him. Fear God and stop rebelling against Him.

CONCLUSION

True as that is, once again, the Preacher’s wisdom leaves us with a clear diagnosis of the problem without any real solution. Under the sun wisdom is worth having as a means of living well on earth. But in spite of millennia of mankind’s best efforts, it has never been sufficient to devise a means of rescuing us from our sin.

We need the Word of God to know a fuller measure of wisdom. For that, and in conclusion, we’ll turn one more time to Job 28.

²³ “God understands the way to it, and he knows its place. ²⁴ For he looks to the ends of the earth and sees everything under the heavens. ²⁵ When he gave to the wind its weight and apportioned the waters by measure, ²⁶ when he made a decree for the rain and a way for the lightning of the thunder, ²⁷ then he saw it and declared it; he established it, and searched it out.

The fact that wisdom is as valuable and as this elusive as we’ve seen, coupled with the fact that under the sun wisdom is enough to reveal our condemnation but not our salvation, helps us to see how praise-worthy it is that God has all wisdom! He has perfect wisdom of our fallen condition as well as the means of our rescue!

Jesus is the wisdom of God and the salvation of mankind. He is both for all who have been graciously brought to understand that we cannot discover, earn, reason out, work at, or otherwise acquire either on our own. Jesus is above the sun wisdom and eternal salvation for those who recognize their sin and God alone as sufficient to save.

The big idea of this passage is that under the sun wisdom has both significant benefits and limitations. But the big idea of the rest of God’s Word is that above the sun wisdom is what we truly need. The main takeaway, then, is to earnestly seek the right kind of wisdom (above the sun), in the right place (in Jesus Christ, the wisdom and word of God), and to the right end (the glory of God and the salvation of our souls). May it be so today, Grace.