Ecclesiastes 6:1-12

Ecclesiastes 6:0

I. Throughout this sixth chapter the Preacher is speaking of the lover of riches, not simply of the rich man; not against wealth, but against mistaking wealth for the chief good. The man who trusts in riches is placed before us; and, that we may see him at his best, he has the riches in which he trusts. Yet because he does not accept his abundance as the gift of God, and hold the Giver better than His gift, he cannot enjoy it. "All the labour of this man is for his mouth;" that is to say, his wealth, with all that it commands, appeals to sense and appetite: it feeds the lust of the eye, or the lust of the flesh, or the pride of life; and therefore "his soul cannot be satisfied therewith." That craves a higher nutriment, a more enduring good. God has put eternity into it; and how can that which is immortal be contented with the lucky haps and comfortable conditions of time? Unless some immortal provision be made for the immortal spirit, it will pine, and protest, and crave till all power of happily enjoying outward good be lost.

II. Look at your means and possessions. Multiply them as you will, yet there are many reasons why, if you seek your chief good in them, they should prove vanity and breed vexation of spirit. (1) One is that beyond a certain point you cannot use or enjoy them. (2) Another reason is that it is hard, so hard as to be impossible, for you to know "what it is good" for you to have. That on which you had set your heart may prove to be an evil rather than a good when at last you get it. (3) A third reason is that the more you acquire, the more you must dispose of when you are called away from this life; and who can tell what shall be after him?

These are the Preacher's arguments against love of riches. If we can trust in God to give us all that it will be really good for us to have, the arguments of the Preacher are full of comfort and hope for us, whether we be rich or whether we be poor.

S. Cox, The Quest of the Chief Good, p. 181.

References: 6 C. Bridges, An Exposition of Ecclesiastes, p. 122; J. H. Cooke, The Preacher's Pilgrimage, p. 89. 6-8:15. G. G. Bradley, Lectures on Ecclesiastes, p. 93.Ecclesiastes 7:1 . Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxvii., No. 1588; J. Hamilton, The Royal Preacher, p. 159; H. W. Beecher, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxi., p. 204.Ecclesiastes 7:1-4 . W. Simpson, Ibid., vol. x., p. 286. Ecclesiastes 7:1-10 . R. Buchanan, Ecclesiastes: its Meaning and Lessons, p. 221.Ecclesiastes 7:1-14 . T. C. Finlayson, A Practical Exposition of Ecclesiastes, p. 151.Ecclesiastes 7:2 . J. Morgan, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xix., p. 379. Ecclesiastes 7:2-5 . J. Bennet, The Wisdom of the King, p. 336.