Last week we went over the first four words in the Bible, “in the beginning God…“ I explained that in addition to the historical story of God, creating the world, this is also a foundational worldview. If you look at life through the lens of “In the beginning, God”, it will make sense. If you look at it through any other lens, it will be foolishness.
Those first four words, are a foundational piece to this men’s group. At the very end of group last week, I introduced another verse that I referred to all the time. Ecclesiastes 3:11.
Since there are brand new people here and people who have not been in the group that long, I wanted to go over this other foundational verse because I refer to it all the time.
First question: Do you have or have this feeling in your gut like there’s gotta be something more? What is that feeling?
What is eternity?
What does it mean when it says God wasn’t created, he always was?
We can’t answer these questions, because we can’t even understand them. It’s kind of a catch 22. In order to understand what eternity is, you need to get into eternity.
Your earthly body is going to die. Everybody dies. But this earthly body is not who you are. You are a spirit created for God.
Genesis 2:7 – NIV
7. Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.
Our body physically is made up of elements and minerals that can all be found in the Earth. When we die, our body will disintegrate back into the Earth. But what makes us different is God taking our body looking at his face-to-face and breathing life into us.
Proverbs 20:27 – NIV
27. The human spirit is the lamp of the Lord that sheds light on one’s inmost being.
John 4:24 – NIV
24. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”
The Bible says that the Holy Spirit in us prays for us. Because he knows what we need, even if we don’t. This says you must worship in spirit and in truth. What is the truth? John 14:6
John 3:6 – NIV
6. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit.
Here Jon is talking to Nicodemus, who is asking him how to get saved. Jesus explains that you must be born again to enter the kingdom of heaven.
So what does it mean the we are spirit?
Explain Earth suit – used to interact in this world of 5 senses.
__________________
Ok, so we are spirit. So what?
Psalm 23:6 – NIV
6. Surely your goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.
You will live forever… where?
Ecclesiastes 12:7 – NIV
7. and the dust returns to the ground it came from, and the spirit returns to God who gave it.
Remember the image of God breathing life into your body. The minerals go back to the earth.
2 Corinthians 5:8 – NIV
8. We are confident, I say, and would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord.
What does he mean “at home?”
What does knowing your future is secure help you with?
Matthew 25:46 – NIV
46. “Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.”
Read that last verse again. I asked “Ok, so we are spirit. So what?”
So what is a pretty big deal… where you spend eternity…
Can anyone think of the verse or at least its message from all of this?
The verse I refer to often is Ecc 3:11
Ecclesiastes 3:11 – NIV
11. He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end.
What does Ecc311 mean?
Ecclesiastes 3:11 says: “He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end.”
This verse tells us at least three things:
God created this world very beautiful for you to enjoy right now.
Psalm 19:1-4 – NIV
1. The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. 2. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they reveal knowledge. 3. They have no speech, they use no words; no sound is heard from them. 4. Yet their voice goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world. In the heavens God has pitched a tent for the sun.
Psalm 139:14 – NIV
14. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.
Luke 12:27 – NIV
27. “Consider how the wild flowers grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you, not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these.
This is a very small sample of verses that tell of God creating beauty.
But he also created you as an eternal being. He made it “built-in“ to your soul. You know that this is not all there is. You know there’s something else beyond this life. You can search and search, but you will never be satisfied until you take a leap of faith and believe what Jesus himself said in his holy word.
This is the part that we focused on above…
It also says that man cannot fathom everything that God has done from beginning to end. He’s not going to explain it to you, so you can reason it out. He is making you trust him without all the facts. He is making you take a leap of faith…
Psalm 8:3-4 – NIV
3. When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, 4. what is mankind that you are mindful of them, human beings that you care for them?
How big is space? So that means that God must be bigger… and he cares for us?
What is your reaction to that? Think about it next time you look at the night sky.
Psalm 147:5 – NIV
5. Great is our Lord and mighty in power; his understanding has no limit.
Can we understand eternity? Can we understand the trinity? Can we even understand women?
Our understanding has limits. God’s has no limit.
Job 38:4-8 – NIV
4. “Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundation? Tell me, if you understand. 5. Who marked off its dimensions? Surely you know! Who stretched a measuring line across it? 6. On what were its footings set, or who laid its cornerstone— 7. while the morning stars sang together and all the angels shouted for joy? 8. “Who shut up the sea behind doors when it burst forth from the womb,
Is God talking smack?
Isaiah 45:18-19 – NIV
18. For this is what the Lord says— he who created the heavens, he is God; he who fashioned and made the earth, he founded it; he did not create it to be empty, but formed it to be inhabited— he says: “I am the Lord, and there is no other. 19. I have not spoken in secret, from somewhere in a land of darkness; I have not said to Jacob’s descendants, ‘Seek me in vain.’ I, the Lord, speak the truth; I declare what is right.
Isaiah 55:8-9 – NIV
8. “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord . 9. “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.
Who is Solomon and what is he known for?
The book of Ecc up to the point is all about Solomon trying different earthly pleasures and finding out that they are all folly under the sun. He was the richest, wisest, most popular off all time. He had money, women, parties, and found no fulfillment.
As Solomon amidst his vast gardens and building projects, we must conclude that contentment and joy will only be found in pursuing our divine assignment on a daily basis. All other pursuits and ambitions will fall incomplete and unfulfilled at the end of one’s life. We must find our joy today as we serve the Lord.
So that built in longing for “something” is Jesus. Unless you have a saving relationship with Jesus, you will never be satisfied. That is Ecc311…
____________________
In C. S. Lewis’ autobiography, Surprised by Joy, he tells of experiencing an other-worldly joy ─ a specific Joy that defies our modern understanding. This idea of Joy is not a satisfied desire but a unsatisfied desire ─ a deep longing for God, a hungry pursuit of God’s heart that never ends and is more satisfying than any earthly happiness.
Lewis recalls three seemingly trivial and disconnected events with a common thread: he experienced a sudden, piercing pang of longing ─ a bittersweet ache and yearning for something far-off, other-worldly, and unnamed during each event.
He would later recognize these sudden aches of longing: a deep spiritual hunger for God ─ not just for an intellectual knowledge of God, but for a real relationship with Him. These deep longings in Lewis’ life ─ these stabs of Joy ─ worked as flashing sign-markers pointing him down the path toward Christ.
How to Act on This
True Joy, as Lewis presents it to us, is the ache for something beyond this world. The Holy Spirit uses this restlessness to awaken spiritual hunger. When little moments of life ─ like the way the light falls on a summer evening ─ stir you with a deep longing that’s hard to define, don’t look to earthly pursuits to fill the void. Instead, allow the ache to push you deeper into your relationship with God. Pursue Him. Allow that longing for Him to become the hottest fire in your heart.
Romans 1:20 – NIV
20. For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.