Old Groans and New Songs / Being Meditations on the Book of Ecclesiastes

by Frederick Charles Jennings

This meets—meets fully, meets satisfactorily—the need. Now none will deny that this need is deep,—real. Hence it can be no mere sentiment, no airy speculation, no poetical imagination, no cunningly devised fable that can meet that need. The remedy must be as real as the disease, or it avails nothing. No phantom key may loosen so hard-closed a lock as this: it must be real, and be made for it. For suppose we find a lock of such delicate and complicated construction that no key that can be made will adapt itself to all its windings. Many skilled men have tried their hands and failed,—till at length the wisest of all attempts it, and even he in despair cries "vanity." Then another key is put into our hands by One who claims to have made the very lock we have found. We apply it, and its intricacies meet every corresponding intricacy; its flanges fill every chamber, and we open it with perfect facility. What is the reasonable, necessary conclusion? We say—and rightly, unavoidably say—"He who made the lock must have made the key. His claim is just: they have been made by one maker."

So by the perfect rest it brings to the awakened conscience—by the quiet calm it brings to the troubled mind—by the warm love that it reveals to the craving heart—by the pure light that it sheds in satisfactory answer to all the deep questions of the spirit—by the unceasing unfoldings of depths of perfect transcendent wisdom—by its admirable unity in variety—by the holy, righteous settlement of sin, worthy of a holy, righteous God—by the peace it gives, even in view of wasted years and the wild sowing of the past—by the joy it maintains even in view of the trials and sorrows of the present—by the hope with which it inspires the future;—by all these we know that our key (the precious Word that God has put into our hands) is a reality indeed, and as far above the powers of Reason as the heavens are above the earth, therefore necessarily—incontestably—DIVINE!

This brings us to the concluding words of our book. Now who has been leading us all through these exercises? A disappointed sensualist? A gloomy stoic? A cynic—selfish, depressed? Not at all. Distinctly a wise man;—wise, for he gives that unequivocal proof of wisdom, in that he cares for others. It is the wise who ever seek to "win souls," "to turn many to righteousness." "Because the preacher was wise, he still taught the people knowledge." No cynic is Ecclesiastes. His sympathies are still keen; he knows well and truly the needs of those to whom he ministers: knows too, how man's wretched heart ever rejects its own blessing; so, in true wisdom, he seeks "acceptable words": endeavoring to sweeten the medicine he gives, clothes his counsel in "words of delight" (margin). Thus here we find all the "words of delight" that human wisdom can find, in view of life in all its aspects from youth to old age.

For whilst it is certainly difficult satisfactorily to trace the order in detail in the book,—and perhaps this is perfectly consistent with its character,—yet there can be no question but that it begins by looking at, and testing, those sensual enjoyments that are peculiarly attractive to youth, and ends with the departure of all in old age, and, finally—dissolution. There is, evidently, that much method. We may also, further, note that the body of the book is taken up with such themes as interest men who are between these two extremes: occupations, business, politics, and, as men speak, religion. All the various states and conditions of man are looked at: kings, princes, nobles, magistrates, rich and poor, are all taken up and discussed in this search for the one thing that true human reason can call absolutely "good" for man. Further method than this might perhaps be inconsistent with the confusion of the scene "under the sun" he is regarding, and his own inability to bring order out of the confusion. There would be thus true method in the absence of method, as the cry of "Vanity," doleful as it is, is alone in harmony with the failure of all his efforts. Yes, for whilst here he speaks of "words of delight," one can but wonder to what he can refer, unless it be to something still to come. Thus far, as he has taken up and dropped, with bitter discouragement, subject after subject, his burdened, overcharged heart involuntarily has burst out with the cry, "Vanity of vanities, all is vanity!" Words of delight! Find one in all that we have gone over that can be to a guilty sinner's ear a "word of delight"—such as it can really take in as meeting its needs; for this seems to be the force of the word here translated "acceptable": so perfectly adapted to the needs of the heart it addresses that that heart springs joyfully to embrace it at once. We have surely, thus far, found none such. A Judge has been discerned in God; but small delight in this surely, if I am the sinner to be judged.

Verses 11-14. Wisdom's words are not known by quantity, but quality. Not many books, with the consequent weary study; but the right word—like a "goad": sharp, pointed, effective—and on which may hang, as on a "nail," much quiet meditation. "Given, too, from one shepherd," hence not self-contradictory and confusing to the listeners. In this way Ecclesiastes would evidently direct our most earnest attention to what follows: "the conclusion of the whole matter." Here is absolutely the highest counsel of true human wisdom—the climax of her reasonings—the high-water-mark of her attainments—the limit to which she can lead us: "Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man. For God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good or whether it be evil."

Who will deny that this is indeed admirable? Is there not a glorious moral elevation in this conclusion? Note how it gives the Creator-God His rightful place; puts the creature, man, in the absolutely correct relationship of obedience, and speaks with perfect assurance of a discriminative judgment where every single work, yes, "secret thing," shall be shown out in its true character as it is good or evil in His holy sight: where everything that is wrong and distorted here shall be put right.

It is truly much, but alas for man if this were indeed the end. Alas for one, conscious of having sinned already, and broken His commandments, whether those commandments be expressed in the ten words of the law, as given from Sinai, or in that other law which is common to all men, the work of which, "written in their hearts," they show—conscience. There is no gleam of light, ray of hope, or grain of comfort here. A judgment to come, assured, can only be looked forward to, with, at the best, gloomy uncertainty, and awful misgiving—if not with assured conviction of a fearful condemnation; and here our writer leaves us with the assurance that this is the "conclusion of the whole matter."

Who can picture the terrors of this darkness in which such a conclusion leaves us? Guilty, trembling, with untold sins and wasted years behind; with the awful consciousness that my very being is the corrupt fountain whence those sins flowed, and yet with a certain judgment before in which no single thing is to escape a divinely searching examination: better had it been to have left us still asleep and unconscious of these things, and so to have permitted us to secure, at least, what pleasure we could out of this present life "under the sun," without the shadow of the future ever thrown over us;—yea, such "conclusion" leaves us "of all men most miserable."

I would, beloved reader, that we might by grace realize something of this. Nor let our minds be just touched by the passing thoughts, but pause for a few minutes, at least, and meditate on the scene at this last verse in the only book in our Bible in which man at his best and highest, in his richest and wisest, is heard telling us his exercises as he looks at this tangled state of affairs "under the sun" and gives us to see, as nowhere else can we see, the very utmost limit to which he, as such, can attain. If this sinks down into our hearts, we shall be the better prepared to apprehend and appreciate the grace that meets him there at the edge of that precipice to which Reason leads but which she cannot bridge. Oh, blessed grace! In the person of our royal Preacher we are here indeed at our "wit's end" in every sense of the word; but that is ever and always the place where another hand may lead us, where another Wisdom than poor feeble human Reason may find a way of escape, and "deliver us out of our distresses."

Then let us turn our ear and listen to another voice: "For we must all appear before the judgment-seat of Christ, that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad." But stay. Is this the promised grace of which even now we spoke? Is this the deliverance for which we hoped? A judgment-seat still?—from which still no escape for any: and a "reception" according to the things done, whether they be good or bad! Wherein does this differ from Solomon's "conclusion of the whole matter"? In just two words only—"Of Christ." It is now the "judgment-seat of Christ." Added terror, I admit, to His despisers and rejectors; but to you and me, dear fellow-believer, through grace the difference these two words make is infinity itself. For look at Him who sits upon the judgment-seat;—be not afraid; regard Him patiently and well; He bears many a mark whereby you may know Him, and recognize in the Judge the very One who has Himself borne the full penalty of all your sins. See His hands and His feet, and behold His side! You stand before His judgment-seat. Remember, too, the word He spake long ago, but as true as ever, "Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that heareth my word, and believeth on Him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but is passed from death unto life"—and as we thus remember both His word and His work, we may be fully assured, even as we stand here, that there must be a sense, and an important sense, in which judgment for us is passed forever. I may not be able to harmonize these Scriptures; but I will cleave, at least, to that which I clearly understand; in other words, to that which meets my present needs (for we only truly understand what meets our need); afterward, other needs may arise that shall make the other scriptures equally clear. He bore my sins—the judgment of God has been upon Him, cannot, therefore, be upon me—into that judgment I shall never come.