Our culture often wisely will emphasize the need to live a balanced life. Popular life coaches will speak to the need for not being excessive in certain areas of your life. But this is not a new idea. Rather, the need for balance in life is a biblical teaching that you find in the scriptures. The teacher is continuing to take us to the school of life. In the second part of Ecclesiastes 7, the teacher is going school us about the need for balance and what that balance looks like in our lives so that we do not waste our lives.
Showing Our Lack of Control (Ecclesiastes 7:14-18)
Notice the first balance picture in Ecclesiastes 7:14. In the day of prosperity, be joyful. In the day of adversity, consider that God has made both the day of prosperity and the day of adversity so that you will not know what will happen tomorrow. God has made the world this way so that we would stop thinking that we have control over our future. The reason for the roller coaster of life is so that we would stop believing that are in control of where this roller coaster goes. So be sure to enjoy the good days that you have in your life. But when the bad days come, and the bad days will certainly come, then we are supposed to consider something very important. You do not have control over the good and bad days. You do not know which day tomorrow is going to be. This is a balanced way of thinking that God wants us to have. One of the reasons we fail to be thankful and one of the reasons we fail to enjoy the days of prosperity is because we think that we have the control. We think we know what tomorrow is going to bring. We think we know the details of our future and have control over those details. When we begin to accept our lack of control over life, then we will trust the Lord with our lives like he wants us to do.
The second picture of balance is in Ecclesiastes 7:15-18. When you read this paragraph you might have a hard time believing that this is in the Bible. Is God saying that some wickedness in your life is acceptable? Is God saying that too much righteousness is not a good thing? We need to look carefully at this paragraph and read it in the context of what the teacher is considering. Look carefully at verse 15. You will notice that the teacher makes an observation. The righteous still die even though they live righteous lives. The wicked can live long in spite of their wicked living. You can live righteously and die young. You can live wickedly and have a long, full life.
So now look at verse 16. The point the teacher is not making is that living righteously is foolish and so you not do so. The point is this: do not think that living a righteous life gives you control over your life. Do not think that if you live righteously that this means you will have a long life. You are going to destroy yourself if your motivation for righteousness is thinking that you will always have days of prosperity and will certainly have a long life. You will destroy yourself if you think this way. There are so many people who walk away from the faith and walk away from God is trouble hits. Why? One of the primary reasons is the belief that if I serve God and live righteously, then God should not let me experience bad times. We think, “Why serve God if I am going to suffer?” This is exactly what Job’s wife thought (cf. Job 2:9). Why be righteous? Why hold on to your integrity? Just curse God and die if your righteousness does not give you a happy life. Now we should know this as Christians. Jesus lived a perfect life of righteousness but died young. The apostles followed Jesus and lived righteous lives but died young except perhaps the apostle John (cf. John 21:21-22). Righteous living does not give you control over life.
Now think about verses 17-18. Do not think that living wickedly gives you control either. Do not draw the conclusion that since my righteous living does not give me control, then living how I want to live and giving into every sinful desire will give you the control over life you are looking for. Living wickedly is not a promise for a long life either. Excessive wickedness is not the answer either. In fact, you have a good chance of dying young by your foolish and wicked decisions (7:17). Fearing God will keep your from this extreme way of thinking (Ecclesiastes 7:18). Keep both warnings in your mind and do not think that either extreme will give you the control you are looking for. The right reason for righteous living is not to control your days but for the love of God.
Showing Our Weakness (Ecclesiastes 7:19-22)
Not only does balanced living mean being shown our lack of control over life, but also showing our human weaknesses. Look at verse 19. One wise person is stronger than ten rulers. We want to believe that human strength is always the answer. But possessing God’s wisdom is stronger than human strength. God’s wisdom is the strength you need for life. But we are weak. Listen to the point in verse 20. There truly is not a righteous person on earth who does good and never sins. The person who always does good and never sins does not exist. The scriptures are clear that there is no one who is righteous, not even one (cf. Romans 3:10; Psalm 14).
So stop pretending about yourself and others. Stop being shocked when people in your family or your friends sin. Stop being stunned that someone sinned. So did you! You are not perfect either. Stop acting you are so much better than everyone else. Stop pretending that you are something that you are not. Stop acting like you have a moral high ground. You are a sinner too. All have sinned and have fallen short of God’s glory (cf. Romans 3:23). Everyone needs the blood of Christ. Everyone needs the grace of God. You do not always do the right thing either. But we want to slam and condemn other Christians for not being perfect. Really? Have you looked at yourself? Who are you to be offended at the sin of another and not look at yourself? Let the one who is without sin cast the first stone. Do not act like you are so righteous and everyone else is so fake.
Now notice the application the teacher makes in verses 21-22. Do not take to heart everything people say because you are going to hear people saying something bad about you. How should I not take this to heart? Look at verse 22. Do not take it to heart because you know you have done the same thing. Please remember that you have said slanderous words. You have gossiped. You have said hurtful things about others. You have been unkind. You have been angry. You have done the very thing that you are complaining about others doing to you. So just stop and let it go. If someone says words about you, just let it go. Don’t be all offended. Do not decide to never talk to that person again. Do not end the friendship. Don’t stop going to worship. Just let it go because you know that you have done the same thing in your heart. You have the same wicked thoughts and you are not more righteous than anyone else. The teacher is just showing our weakness. Words have been said in your marriage that you need to let go. Words have been said in your family that you need to let go. Words have been said at work that you need to let go. Words have been said among your spiritual family that you need to let go. You are weak too and God is reminding us of these weaknesses. No one is what they ought to be. All of us are works in progress as God works on us to move toward holiness and righteousness.
Showing Our Need For Wisdom (Ecclesiastes 7:23-29)
Yet again the teacher shows us the difficulty of life. He proclaims in verses 23-25 that he will live the wise life. But it is not as easy as it sounds. The teacher recognizes and proclaims the need for wisdom to have the balanced life that God wants us to have. But the pursuit of wisdom is an endless pursuit. We would expect seeking wisdom to be challenging because we are seeking God’s wisdom which has no end. But the teacher continued to investigate the need for wisdom in our lives and he was able to draw some conclusions from his investigation.
First, he learned that we need wisdom to avoid the seduction of foolish living. The teacher describes the trap of foolish living like a woman who is trying to ensnare men. Verse 26 has a similar description to the seduction trap described in Proverbs 5-7. Now we should not be troubled by using a woman as the metaphor in wisdom literature. Wisdom is also described as a woman in the wisdom literature of the scriptures. The idea is that there is one woman who is wisdom calling to people to listen to her and there is one woman who is folly calling to people to listen to her. So the point in verse 26 is that we need to have wisdom to avoid the seduction of foolish living. The life of folly and sinfulness is appealing. There is a seduction to going down that road. But the teacher wants us to see that listening to folly will bring about a life that is more bitter than death. Your life will be ensnared with nets and chains. The person who pleases God will escape that trap but the sinner will be captured. Think about how many times people ignore wisdom and then cannot understand why life is going so badly. How many times we do not follow what God says to do regarding to how to embrace wisdom, avoid sin, and choose godliness and then wonder why life is so hard? Just because living righteously is not a promise to avoid life troubles nor the promise to live a long life does not mean that living righteously does not have great benefits. The life of folly is a life of pain. Stop making foolish decisions. Stop rejecting what God has said to do in your life. Stop going against God’s wisdom.
Now here is the kicker that the teacher drops at the end of this chapter. The concluding point he makes is good luck trying to find such a person. God has made people upright but everyone follows their own heart and goes after many schemes. Some people get thrown by verse 28. On the surface it could sound very derogatory. But it is important to read this in the context of this wise man who is looking at the world and giving his observations. Verse 28 offers a challenge. Do you know how hard it is to find an upright person in this world? Listen to how he puts it. He says you might find one upright man among a thousand, but you are not going to find an upright woman. Now the point is not to say that there are more upright men than women. Nor is the point to say that there are upright men but no upright women. He is saying this to other men like women say this same thing to other women. You can imagine one woman speaking to another woman and saying to each other how it is hard to find a good woman but it is really hard to find a good man. I cannot tell you how many times I have heard women say this. Who can find a good man these days, they will proclaim! The point is not that there are no good women on earth. But when you are looking for the opposite gender, it sure does seem hard to find. Now you can hear verse 28 where one man is speaking to another man and drawing the same conclusion. It is hard to find a good man but who can find a good woman?
Please note that this is exactly what the Proverbs writer says also. Think about how the excellent woman scripture begins in Proverbs 31:10.
Who can find a wife of noble character? (Proverbs 31:10 CSB)
Is he saying that there are no women who are excellent and noble in character? No, he is pointing out their value because they are hard to find. Why are they hard to find? Because even though God has made people upright, people do not choose that path. They choose the life of folly rather than the righteous life.
Balance
So what are the conclusions that the teacher wants us to learn? What is the balanced life that God is trying to teach us to have? First, we are to accept that we do not have control over life. Righteous living does not promise to us that we will not have days of adversity. Righteous living does not promise that we will all have long lives and everything will go well with us and our loved ones. So what does the teacher keep telling us through this book? Rejoice in the days of prosperity because you do not know what will happen next and you have no control over what is in the future. So live in balance, enjoying the good and understanding the hardships are reminding us who is in control.
Second, live in balance by understanding the weaknesses of others and the weaknesses of yourself. No one is righteous all the time. People sin. People make mistakes. You have done the same thing. So have some compassion when dealing with others. When people say things and do things, know that you have done something like that too.
Finally, live in balance by understanding the need for wisdom in life and there are few who find the path of wisdom or walk the path of wisdom. God made us upright but we follow our schemes rather than God’s direction. The life of folly is a trap and many choose to enslave themselves and cause their lives to be painful due to picking that path. Friends, Jesus came to set us free from sin. When Jesus was in the synagogue, he opened to the place in Isaiah 61 and read from it.
And the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” And he rolled up the scroll and gave it back to the attendant and sat down. And the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. And he began to say to them, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” (Luke 4:17-21 ESV)
The offer to live in balance is given to you. You can be set free from sin and folly and follow the path of wisdom and life. Give your life to Jesus and learned the balanced life that comes from seeking God.