Video Transcript: Major Messages and Worldview Implications

As we continue our study of the wisdom literature of the Old Testament, those books,  primarily poetry, which express the values and expressions of religious life for Israel, and of  course, continuing into the Christian era in the Christian tradition. We've looked already at Job and Psalms and Proverbs. And it's time to take a deeper look into Ecclesiastes not so much  now in terms of what's happening. But what are the implications? When we began to study  has suggested that there were three major ways in which the book of Ecclesiastes  understands the possibilities of the world in which we live, call these worldviews call them,  perspectives on life, perspectives on how the world functions, but the world view options are  basically three and all of world religions and philosophies of life are taken from or derived  from these three. First of all, there's the closed system option in which the world itself is a  complete entity unto itself. There's no God outside the system, there's no power of  intelligence that drives the system other than the simple laws that are inherent to the system. Human life is part of that accidental development of actions and activities, and it has no more meaning than any other object. And in that context, the Bible could be understood as an  attempt to give meaning to something that is inherently meaning less. The Bible is simply  another human product that's attempting to provide some guidance or some help along the  way, but does not linger with any connection to a higher power. And this is one of the things  that the writer of Ecclesiastes is responding to throughout the book, the writer of Ecclesiastes  is saying that, if that happens to be true, or if that happens to be our perspective on life, then  there truly is not any meaning ultimate meaning or daily meaning because even the day to  day activities of our lives, have no larger purpose, we exist and we do these things. But we  could not do these things. And in fact, we could not exist and things would not be any  different. So there is no inherent long term or even immediate meaning from the closed  system perspective. Now, the book of Ecclesiastes doesn't probe deeply the idea of what I call impersonal intelligent design. But it does infer some things about this. The impersonal  Intelligent Design is a perspective on life and the realities that we find around us in which  they are themselves a living entity, there is transcendence but not transcendence outside the system, like a Creator God. It is the system itself, which is somehow alive with meaning or  purpose, whether it's highly intelligent, whether it is intuitive or not. But there is a drive or a  purpose or existence and a life force to the system. And it's usually seen in that combination  of life and time we, we can't really explain what life itself is, but we know where it is and  where it doesn't appear to be. We can't explain time, but we know that we move through time and that time is sort of the regulator that keeps us all on track doing things in concert with  one another. These are the creative edges that shape existence in the closed system. In this  way of looking at things human life is meaningful insofar as it plays out its intended role to  support or participate in the life of the system. We do not have meaning as individuals, we do  not have meaning as entity bearers ourselves. But we are rather important insofar as we  participate in the life of the whole. And in fact, it is our lives that are insignificant to the point  where eventually our lives must be lost, in the same manner as any virus or bacteria in our  bodies, if it were to take on a will or a design of its own would be harmful to the body as a  whole. In fact, we must lose our individual identity in order to participate in the greater good  and so you have in various religions like Hinduism and Buddhism, that insofar as we are  aware of our individual identity, we are removed from our ultimate destiny. And when we  arrive at our ultimate destiny, having shed ourselves of the karma that accretes, to those who have not lived appropriate to the system, we ultimately lose our individual identity and merge back into the oneness of all being. In other words, if we try to have meaningful purpose of our own significance, we actually lose whatever the system believes our purpose to be. And only  when we lose our sense of self, do we participate in the whole, the Bible, in this way becomes  a record of and reflection upon a design that is larger than ourselves and in which we ought to participate. Now, of course, you can see things from the closed system and the impersonal,  intelligent design system that reflect in the various religions of our world, for instance,  scientific naturalism, which simply says things exist, because they exist, there's no God. And  things go along in an evolutionary changing manner, according to rules that are in the  system. We don't know why they're in the system, but they simply are in the system. And the  ultimate value is survival. So species survive when they adapt. It's not as much important 

that individuals survive. But there is some of that too, but ultimately, you and I have no great  significance. And that's the lament of the writer of Ecclesiastes early on, nothing has meaning in and of itself. And also the impersonal intelligent design where time becomes one of the  markings of the intelligence of the system. Well, that's not exactly the case either, says the  writer of Ecclesiastes, because it is not in time that our meaning is found. If it were in time,  then we would stay in time and be bound to time in a in a delightful way. But after in  Ecclesiastes, three that listing of the variety of things that are coming to us in time, the writer of Ecclesiastes, Ecclesiastes, steps out of the system of time and says God has set eternity in  the hearts of men. And the meaning there is that even just participating in the system itself is not sufficient to give us ultimate purpose, meaning or identity. And that's where the third  worldview option comes in the biblical worldview option, it's shared by other monotheistic  religions, each of which explains it in its own way. There's the Israelite religion, which  becomes Judaism. There's Islam, monotheistic religions, which understand there to be a  creator god who creates the system in which we live and continues to live in connection with  the system, each religion explaining the dynamics of that relationship in slightly different  ways. But from an Israelite Christian perspective, there's a Creator who created the world and the universe in which we live, and not only created these things, but planned and intended  things to be as they are. That doesn't mean there can't be any change, or the changing  evolutionary changing within the system that is part of the slowly unfolding of God's greater  designs. But we can't talk about evolutionism and the creator creation open system in the  same value. It is not that the system creates itself but a God who creates the system. Human  life is honored, honored, because this is what God intended that the world's would be the  place where humankind would live. And humankind is uniquely responsive to God. Now  humankind has been compromised. That's part of the Freedom allowed to those who can  respond like God in love choices of love within toward one another. But also, human life is  redeemable. And here's a great thing that is found within the Christian context within the  Israelite Christian context that even when mistakes, errors, sins, and intentional wrong things  happen. God stands above and beyond that, and that becomes part of the great hope of the  writer of Ecclesiastes. The Bible, in this sense, is part of a divine human redemptive link in  which we, who have lost our ability to understand these worldview options and tend on our  own to move toward one of the first to the closed system or the impersonal intelligent design, we are reminded again that they are incomplete or incorrect and there's something larger and better and bigger at stake here and that is that God seeks an ongoing relationship with  humankind. Even though humankind may not necessarily show It's a worthiness of that God  intends for us to be in relationship with God. And that brings us to the outline of Ecclesiastes  once again and the overview of the whole thing. That prologue up front expresses one of the  other worldview options that apart from the Third World View option, everything is indeed  meaningless because by ourselves, we carry no permanent significance. And whatever we do  is lost over time, and we fade away and we're forgotten and we're gone. And there are a  variety of meaningless things that the writer of Ecclesiastes explores wisdom, pleasure, folly,  oppression, toil, friend lessness, political advancement, unfulfilled vows to God and amassing  wealth, all of those things we've taken a look at. There's that sense that time somehow keeps  regulated. But notice when we read in Ecclesiastes three about the regulatory nature of time  that only when we find ourselves stretching for and reaching for something beyond time, do  we begin to find ourselves connecting with the truth and so the teacher gives us proverbs to  stay wise, to stay sane in the changing fortunes of our lives, and to call us to reach beyond  his ultimate observations are that the meaning of life must be found beyond life in God alone, all of life is progressing toward a common end. So we have to enjoy life while we have it, and  be wise and what does wisdom mean in the book of Ecclesiastes, it means to live boldly, that  is not to fear the things that are resident in our world, even though they may not in and of  themselves carry a sense of meaning to live joyfully because there is a purpose and we are  not left to evil designs that will ultimately overthrow us and to live godly because if in fact  there is meaning it has to be found in a God who is outside the system. And that's what the  book is all about. So over against the other worldviews. The assumptions in Ecclesiastes are  these that the universe is in fact the kingdom of God against evolutionary naturalism or 

against pantheistic historicism that the earth is specially prepared as a domain for humanity  made in the image of God to share creative stewardship and relational love, that humanity is  in rebellion against its creator. That's why things are wrong, and why there's oppression and  

folly and toil and all of those kinds of things, at least in part because of the unique  characteristics of humankind, the sense of us being the imagers of God loving as God loved  us and having the capacity for three free choice in love. The Creator has chosen not to  annihilate this world as someone might throw out something that was mistaken or bad, but  rather to work with this world and with us as humans to redeem this world. And the  redemptive initiative is the divine mission explained and interpreted in the Bible. That's why  Ecclesiastes is part of this worldview system. And the Bible has an authoritative hold on our  lives, because it is the voice of God to us, as well as our voice of participation through the  covenant back to God. And so we become part of a larger divine purpose not only to be  redeemed, but to participate in seeking to share this message of redemption with others,  which is why the book of Ecclesiastes exists so that others may understand the true values of  life, and then come to that redemptive purpose to being reconciled back to full communion  with the Creator. That's why the writer of Ecclesiastes ends remember your Creator, in the  days of your youth, there are two strategy or strategies for that redemption, in the Bible, of  course, through ancient Israel, so that the other nations may come and see what's going on.  And then in the New Testament, when Jesus fulfills all of God's intentions for humankind, then  also the community itself is spread to the ends of the world seeking to draw it all back to to  God at its face value. Ecclesiastes is certainly rather dark and depressing, especially in those  opening sessions because the immediate message we get gained from it is almost screams in our faces. All we do is and everything that happens is ultimately meaningless and has no  lasting value. But as we begin to spend time with the writer of Ecclesiastes with the wise  teacher and preacher, the more moderate message comes to play, life goes on. So let's make  the best of it and be more wise than foolish about it. And if we spend time with the writer of  Ecclesiastes, on an extended period and try to put ourselves in his shoes and see the world  through his eyes, the ultimate reflection is this kind of thing. Life can only mean something if  there is a God who sets the values, for instance, for time and morality in place, and gives us a link to eternity which confirms our right to exist. That's why God has set eternity in our hearts. So even among the individually meaningless actions of day to day living, we stretch and  reach for something which only God can supply, an eternity that set in our hearts. Now that's  a great message. And that's essentially the big picture of the book of Ecclesiastes. One filled  with wisdom more on these things you can find in my book, Covenant Documents Reading the Bible Again For the First Time.