Ecclesiastes 8:10-17 – a verse by verse devotional commentary

Main Reading: Ecclesiastes 8:10-17

To put it simply, this section of Ecclesiastes is going to talk about how the Fear of the Lord is better than the wisdom of the world.

v. 10 — “Then I saw the wicked buried. They used to go in and out of the holy place and were praised in the city where they had done such things. This also is vanity.”

Let’s get real honest with each other here…have you ever thought so low of someone else that you wished they’d just go ahead and die already? Maybe their actions were tormenting you. Or you were aware of some of the damage they’d been causing and you couldn’t help but think: “man, this sure would be a lot easier if they were out of the picture…” I’m sure there were many who rejoiced when Nero, Genghis Khan, or Hitler died.

What I’m trying to say is, when a really wicked person dies, we all kind of breathe a sigh of relief…Except, sometimes, really bad people are celebrated when they die…In fact, when some people die, we tend to romanticize their life and redefine who they really were…We act like they were some saintly friend or parent, when everyone who knew them for real would say the opposite…Maybe you’ve sat through a funeral where the person you heard described was nothing like the one you knew....

But the death of the wicked isn’t so comforting when everyone seems to be celebrating them…

And that’s exactly what Solomon has on his mind here. He had seen evil men do terrible stuff in a town and be praised in that same place regardless!

And there’s a man in Solomon’s life who fits this description to the T... The guy’s name is Joab—he was King David’s nephew (so Solomon’s cousin) and he was heavily involved with the family business—which was, in this case, holding power. He was a company man—willing to do whatever the job required,

even if it meant getting his hands dirty or bloody. He was extremely involved in all of David’s military conquests, so I’m sure he was a high-ranking well-respected man among the people. But eventually Joab did some things that came back to bite him…When given the opportunity, he killed 3 guys—Abner, Absalom, & Amasa—for personal & political reasons. Once Solomon became king, he sought to serve Joab justice for his crimes and planned to execute him. But Joab had a strategy…he went to the holy place—the temple—to hide out. Great plan—I mean, no one’s going to kill you in church, right?

Well, Joab wasn’t at the temple to worship…he was there for political reasons…So Solomon actually told his men to go kill Joab in the temple anyways (1 Kings 2:28-34)! And Joab is then one of the prime examples of a guy who died a wicked, but celebrated, person who had involvement in the temple—the holy place.

v. 11 — “Because the sentence against an evil deed is not executed speedily, the heart of the children of man is fully set to do evil.”

If you’ve ever wondered why evil people are so evil, Solomon has a suggestion…He says it’s because judgment—or “the sentence” [legal language]—is delayed so people get comfortable committing crimes and think that justice will never catch up to them. Jesus told a parable about people who think this way…"But if that wicked servant says to himself, 'My master is delayed,’ and begins to beat his fellow servants and eats and drinks with drunkards , the master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he does not know and will cut him in pieces and put him with the hypocrites. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth" (Matthew 24:48-51). In other words, when punishment is delayed people grow arrogant—thinking they’ll never get caught.

Now, as Christians, we are givers of mercy—we are patient people. We forgive. And we do this because we have a God who forgives and is patient. " The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance " (2 Peter 3:9). But when God, or Christians, delay exposing sin to allow time for people to repent, often times they don’t repent…sometimes their wickedness gets worse! Ironically, we sin against the very thing that saves us: God’s patience. We use the time He gives us to sin more! "Do you suppose, O man—you who judge those who practice such things and yet do them yourself—that you will escape the judgment of God? Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance? But because of your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God's righteous judgment will be revealed." (Romans 2:3-5).

So, this is one reason why Christians and the world still need the Law. On this website, I like to talk about how Christians are not under the Law but under grace. [We looked into this quite a bit while going through Galatians]. But there is still a need for the Law in this world…

We need the Law—in the Bible and from the government—to curb sin, or slow it down.

• "If a malicious witness arises to accuse a person of wrongdoing, then both parties to the dispute shall appear before the LORD, before the priests and the judges who are in office in those days. The judges shall inquire diligently, and if the witness is a false witness and has accused his brother falsely, then you shall do to him as he had meant to do to his brother. So you shall purge the evil from your midst. And the rest shall hear and fear, and shall never again commit any such evil among you " (Deuteronomy 19:16-20).

• "For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad . Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval, for he is God's servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain. For he is the servant of God, an avenger who carries out God's wrath on the wrongdoer" (Romans 13:3-4).

• "Now we know that the law is good, if one uses it lawfully, understanding this, that the law is not laid down for the just but for the lawless and disobedient , for the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy and profane, for those who strike their fathers and mothers, for murderers, the sexually immoral, men who practice homosexuality, enslavers, liars, perjurers, and whatever else is contrary to sound doctrine," (1 Timothy 1:8-10).

Ideally the fear of earthly & eternal punishment makes people stop and think twice before they sin. But, nevertheless, people still do it and they still seems to get away with it…

v. 12-13 — “Though a sinner does evil a hundred times and prolongs his life, yet I know that it will be well with those who fear God, because they fear before him. But it will not be well with the wicked, neither will he prolong his days like a shadow, because he does not fear before God.”

Everything we’ve said being the case, Solomon still knows that for the wicked, things will not end well.

It may be fine for them in the moment, but they will have Hell to pay, for lack of a better phrase…

Right now, it seems like the wicked are prospering. They seem to be enjoying success with no end in sight. Just like your shadow can look a whole lot bigger than you on the sidewalk, the wicked people in the world seem to be expanding their territory and extending their life.

But there is good news about wicked people being like shadows…Shadows disappear when the Sun goes down…& wickedness will disappear in the light of God’s judgment. We think the days are long in this world…it seems like evil is getting away with it forever…Even a week of suffering or a month of unfairness can feel like an eternity…But we need to realize that there actually is an eternity, and that evil will be punished then. Those days will be much longer than what we now experience. So, just because somebody—or even yourself—got away with something wicked the last time, that’s no guarantee you’ll have the same luck the next time…

Besides all that, I want you to notice something here, and I also want to shift our focus away from always identifying “the wicked” as the bad people out there and also see that we can be wicked…Solomon doesn’t say: “it’ll be bad for the wicked people but the good people will have it nice…” Those aren’t the two groups of people in the world…it’s not wicked people and good people. All people have become wicked…Solomon mentioned this earlier. But there are wicked people…and there are people who fear God—those are the 2 categories.

So, what does it mean to “fear God”? You might’ve heard that phrase before…Now, I’ll go ahead and tell you that some people fear God meaning that in the back of their minds, they are so terrified that He might actually exist and so every now and then, they worry what will happen when they die … that’s not what we’re talking about… Other people might fear God by being literally scared of Him, so they’d rather pretend that such a being doesn't exist. They run away from God, but the right fear of God actually draws you in closer. Think of a campfire. That could be a scary thing if it gets out of control…But instead of people staying away from a fire pit, they gather around it! And our fear of what an unattended fire can do causes us to stay close by. Or think of a time when you met someone who was important to you; a musician, an author, a mentor, etc. The nerves or fear you had when meeting them is not a sign that you wanted to avoid them…that’s actually a sign of how badly you wanted to meet them! Other people fear God as if they’re in prison and He's the jailor or the warden…But I think a more biblical view would be that you’re a prisoner and a powerful earthquake has just opened the doors and freed you. You’d be afraid to witness such power, but you would be oh so grateful for it.

Isaiah 8 describes the Fear of the Lord as having no fear of others and whatever they might try to do… Fearing God means knowing He is in control regardless of what the wicked might try. To "fear" the Lord is to be stopped in your tracks by the Creator of the universe. To have the profound realization that He is all-powerful and all-knowing and that He personally has forgiven your sin! It’s the fear you have when someone does something unbelievably good to you. In other words, “fearing” the Lord is what we Christians call worship—awe, reverence.

v. 14 — “There is a vanity that takes place on earth, that there are righteous people to whom it happens according to the deeds of the wicked, and there are wicked people to whom it happens according to the deeds of the righteous. I said that this also is vanity.” Well, isn’t that the most relatable observation you’ve ever heard? Bad things happen to good people, and good things happen to bad people…

Well, Solomon’s message from earlier is “woe to you if you’re getting all the victory, praise, & ease of life

now…if that’s how it’s going for you, you might just be the wicked person the Bible speaks of…”

Either way, you are wicked in at least one sense. You have broken God’s Law. You do have guilt. But…God has graciously made it so that we, as wicked people, experience the blessings of the righteous. And He did this Himself by being the righteous person who experienced what it was like to be wicked. He faced the consequences of the wicked—He was “counted as a transgressor” Isaiah says. Do you remember the story of Jesus being put on trial? Pontius Pilate reminded the people that they had a tradition of setting one prisoner free… "But you have a custom that I should release one man for you at the Passover. So do you want me to release to you the King of the Jews?' They cried out again, 'Not this man, but Barabbas!' Now Barabbas was a robber" (John 18:39-40).

From the earliest moments of Jesus’ trial and crucifixion, we see the righteous person suffering and

the wicked one going free—emblematic of what was happening there altogether. We talked about God’s patience tonight and how some people disregard it or take advantage of it. So, as one of my final thoughts, I wanted to have you think about this: God is so patient with those who sin and rebel and pay Him no mind at all… so just imagine how much more patient, kind, & receptive He is to those who acknowledge and fear Him!

v. 15-17 — “And I commend joy, for man has nothing better under the sun but to eat and drink and be joyful, for this will go with him in his toil through the days of his life that God has given him under the sun. When I applied my heart to know wisdom, and to see the business that is done on earth, how neither day nor night do one's eyes see sleep, then I saw all the work of God, that man cannot find out the work that is done under the sun. However much man may toil in seeking, he will not find it out. Even though a wise man claims to know, he cannot find it out.”

We have divine permission slip to enjoy simple gifts (eating, drinking, gladness) without guilt—God knows our endless striving under the sun leads only to frustration, so He gives joy as a merciful gift for sinners.

The limits of human wisdom expose our inability to “figure out” God’s ways or fix life; the answer isn’t more effort or insight but resting in what we KNOW Christ has already done for sure.

No matter how hard we toil or search, we can’t grasp all God’s work. This drives us from self-reliance to trust in the King who fulfills what Solomon only shadowed.

No amount of toil or insight lets us “find out” God’s work. True life isn’t found in unraveling divine mysteries but in receiving the ordinary (food, drink, gladness) as pure gifts God delights in our enjoyment of His good creation. Food and joy aren’t distractions but gifts of grace in a broken world. The limits of wisdom free us from the burden of playing God—we don’t have to (and can’t) control or fully explain everything.

When faced with the mystery of God’s work, the proper response is not anxious toil but joyful feasting—a foretaste of the marriage supper of the Lamb