Is it ok to have wealth and to have possessions or should we be living out in the woods? The lesson of Ecclesiastes 5 & 6 is that money is a great enigma of life, for while it is the source of many evils it can also bring joy and comfort and yet also bring anxiety and restlessness.

And so what we have then this morning is a little less of the depressing hopeless message he’s been delivering thus far, and yet we may not like what the Teacher has to say to us instead, for he finds us in his crosshairs. This passage teaches us that Our lives suffer and our worship suffers when we become too focused on ourselves than on God. We must take God seriously and engage in who He is and what He is doing.

And so as you see in your outlines this morning, the Teacher essentially raises four points of contention, four things to him about this world that just don’t make sense. Therefore, by exploring these things with him this morning we are able to see that The regular circumstances of life can lead us to question the meaning of life and whether there is any meaning to be found. Only in a complete biblical worldview can we have faith to see God’s control and our purpose in all things.

And so what we’re going to do this morning, friends, is we’re going to stand with the Teacher and ask alongside him, “What is the best use of the times?” Does God indeed have a purpose for our days and, if so, what is it and how may we know it?

What’s the point? Right? There doesn’t seem to be any point. This morning we see that Observation of the world suggests there is no point in this life, regardless of one’s religion. A faithful application of the Bible, however, shows great purpose to be found in all created things.

Many look for meaning or joy from the things of this world. While those things are good as created by God, they ultimately cannot fulfill apart from using them in the fear of the Lord.

If you want to know how to find purpose and fulfillment in your life, what you have here this morning is an example of how not to do it! And so our lesson is simple: Everything in life has meaning so far as it is found and engaged in the fear of the LORD.

Ecclesiastes addresses the perplexity and vanity and enigma that is this so-called life. And so as we begin this quest with Qohelet in Ecclesiastes 1, this morning, he shows us that As human beings we want and need there to be meaning to our lives and yet simple observation of the world seems to suggest there is none.

As Paul concludes his letter to the Philippians we see, this morning, that We are to live and enjoy all of God’s creation in a way that is informed, balanced, and guided by the realities of the City of God rather than the City of Man.

This is an update on how the Albania Mission trip went.