August 16, 2026 | Wisdom and Watching the Wind

Wisdom and Watching the Wind | Ecclesiastes 11

Ecclesiastes 11

Cast your bread upon the waters, for you will find it after many days. Give a portion to seven, or even to eight, for you know not what disaster may happen on earth. If the clouds are full of rain, they empty themselves on the earth, and if a tree falls to the south or to the north, in the place where the tree falls, there it will lie. He who observes the wind will not sow, and he who regards the clouds will not reap.

As you do not know the way the spirit comes to the bones in the womb of a woman with child, so you do not know the work of God who makes everything.

In the morning sow your seed, and at evening withhold not your hand, for you do not know which will prosper, this or that, or whether both alike will be good.

Light is sweet, and it is pleasant for the eyes to see the sun.

So if a person lives many years, let him rejoice in them all; but let him remember that the days of darkness will be many. All that comes is vanity.

Rejoice, O young man, in your youth, and let your heart cheer you in the days of your youth. Walk in the ways of your heart and the sight of your eyes. But know that for all these things God will bring you into judgment.

Remove vexation from your heart, and put away pain from your body, for youth and the dawn of life are vanity. (ESV)

In Ecclesiastes 11, Solomon teaches us how to live wisely in a life filled with risk. Since we cannot know or control the future, we must resist both reckless confidence and fearful inaction. Instead, we should take wise risks, spread out those risks, and keep doing good without demanding immediate or predictable results. Like a farmer who continues planting because he does not know which seeds will grow, believers should faithfully invest in their relationships, work, ministry, and spiritual growth while trusting God to give the increase. We are also called to enjoy God’s good gifts with a clear conscience, remembering that both joy and hardship are fleeting. Wisdom accepts uncertainty, pursues what is good, and trusts the results to God.

Transcript of Wisdom and Watching the Wind | Ecclesiastes 11

Life is Risky

Jed Gillis: I was thinking about one word specifically as it relates to the message of Ecclesiastes. Because when we talk about control, when we talk about wisdom and omniscience, when we talk about all of these things, there's a couple ideas, and really I can think I can sum it in one word, that sits at the back of our minds and makes us have a lot of questions, and that's the word risk.

If I'm not in control of my life, it feels like that's a risk. Of course, we can talk about how much control do I really have. We can talk about God's goodness and how His control is actually far better than anything I could ever do. But we still have this word, this idea that things feel dangerous, they feel risky to us.

Last week we, talked about this where we said wisdom doesn't guarantee outcomes. In fact, wisdom cannot guarantee outcomes. You can be a wise driver and still end up in an accident. You can be a wise parent and not have the results you want from your kids. You can be a wise investor and struggle financially because wisdom doesn't guarantee the outcomes.

He used this picture in chapter 10. He says, "If you're gonna go cut down a tree, the outcome you want is that the tree would be cut down." But he doesn't say wisdom makes sure the tree falls, or wisdom makes sure the tree falls where you want it to. He says wisdom can sharpen the ax.

Does it make it easier to get the tree down? Yes. Is wisdom good? Does-- Are there many things we should pursue wisdom for? Yes, because it can sharpen the ax. It can make it easier. Or the other picture was the fool sometimes doesn't know the direction to the city he's going in. So he starts off somewhere, and he hopes it's the right way, but he doesn't know.

Wisdom doesn't guarantee you make it there. If you were to say, "I'm gonna start a road trip to St. Louis right after church today," wisdom can't guarantee that you make it there. But if you have no idea which direction St. Louis is, it's gonna be harder. That's what wisdom is for. That's the whole point.

So if you get to this point in the book, and you say, "I'm tracking with what he said all throughout. I get it. I can't control the future. I can't know the future. But that doesn't mean I'm passive, I don't do anything. It means how do I handle the fact that wisdom doesn't guarantee the outcomes? how do I pursue it?"

And in chapter eleven, he's going to give you several pictures. Again, you know how Ecclesiastes has worked if you've been here with us. He doesn't like to just give you here's one quick, easy sentence that you can put on a Hallmark card and move away and be like, "It's all good." he really doesn't do that. He doesn't give you these little phrases like, "Oh, I got it. Check. Done. I can move on with life." He makes you think, and he's going to do that.

But in the big picture, what he's doing is saying, "Since wisdom doesn't guarantee outcomes, how do I navigate the risk that I feel? What do I do with that?"

Reading Ecclesiastes 11

Jed Gillis: And I'm gonna read beginning in verse one. I'll read the whole chapter.

"Cast your bread upon the waters, for you will find it after many days. Give a portion to seven or even to eight. For not what disaster may happen on earth. If the clouds are full of rain, they empty themselves on the earth. And if a tree falls to the south or to the north, in the place where the tree falls, there it will lie. He who observes the wind will not sow, and he who regards the clouds will not reap.

As you do not know the way the spirit comes to the bones in the womb of a woman with child, so you do not know the work of God, who makes everything. In the morning, sow your seed, and at evening, withhold not your hand, for you do not know which will prosper, this or that, or whether both alike will be good.

Light is sweet, and it is pleasant for the eyes to see the sun. So if a person lives many years, let him rejoice in them all. But let him remember that the days of darkness will be many. All that comes is vanity or, is fleeting. Rejoice, O young man, in your youth, and let your heart cheer you in the days of your youth. Walk in the ways of your heart and in the sight of your eyes. But know that for all these things, God will bring you into judgment. Remove vexation or, sorrowful frustration from your heart and put away pain from your body, for youth and the dawn of life are fleeting, are vanity."

Cast Your Bread on the Waters

Jed Gillis: So if we start at the beginning here, we have a phrase that gets used a fair amount. People say, "Cast your bread on the waters." And then if you've done any research at all into what that means, I think the main conclusion you're gonna get is people have no idea. If you go read through commentaries, literally I found at least nine separate ways people interpret it, and of course argue that theirs is right and all the others is wrong, of course.

Some of it is this is probably a, a cultural reference that we may not know everything about that cultural reference. So you have things like someone might say, "Conduct business abroad and you'll see a long-term reward." That's one way some people interpret it. "Be generous to others and they will help you in time of need."

It's one way, I thought this was interesting. Somebody said it meant, essentially offshore your investments so the government can't steal them.

Maybe, I don't know. Trust God's providence by giving up daily provision. My bread's going somewhere, but I'm trusting it's coming back either in generosity or investment. there's a whole bunch of different ones. I could keep going.

Here's the theme that I think runs through all of them: Risk something now to receive something good later.

Now, we can talk about all the applications, and some of those probably are good applications, some of them probably aren't. That's a different conversation. But the big theme, since you in your wisdom don't know the future and you can't control it, don't be so fearful of risking something now. You go, "This feels like a loss right now."

In the case of bread, if you put bread, whatever the waters represent, wherever they go, okay, but the picture is bread. That's something you need. You need food, especially in an agricultural world. They ate a lot of bread. You need bread. Be willing to risk right now, I don't have it, in order to pursue something good in the future.

Prideful Responses to Risk

Jed Gillis: In other words, don't say, "I can't know the future, so I can't risk anything now to hope that it gets better." Don't say, "I can't know the future, so I can't invest anything in improving my home or my car or my business or my life." Saying you don't know the future, that's okay. Risk, 'cause that's what it has to always be since you don't know the future, risk something now for a future benefit.

Now, we don't always do that. You can't go, "Okay, so that's what I always do. Every present benefit I have right now, I should risk it for future and hope it's better." no, because Ecclesiastes has told you repeatedly, eat and drink and enjoy God's good gifts. So if he were saying risk your bread now for something better all the time, then he couldn't tell you risk or enjoy the good gift that God has given right now. But he's saying, "Don't be afraid to risk something immediate for something better."

You say, "I wanna step into a hard conversation with a friend or a child or a spouse," that may result in some immediate discomfort. Sometimes the path of wisdom is to risk that immediate discomfort to make this better.

Or we could say this way, risk without pride. There's two ways you can risk with pride. It is pride for you to take a risk and think, "Oh, there's no risk." Right? It would be pride for you to say, "I'm gonna go start my own business, and there's no possible way this could go badly." Some of you know that doesn't work that way.

It's pride to take a risk and say, "I have no risk." Think James when he says, "We're gonna go..." He says, "Don't say we'll go to this city and make a profit." He says, "No, you say, if the Lord wills." In other words, recognize there's a risk here. I'm gonna pursue this, but I... it might not work.

But there's another way to have pride, and that is to not pursue any risk because you don't know what will happen. That's also pride. The only way I can risk myself is if I know all the outcomes. No, he's saying, "You don't know the future. Be willing to risk an immediate loss for a long-term gain."

Don't Put All Your Eggs in One Basket

Jed Gillis: But verse two, 'cause you have to take one and two together, verse two, "Give a portion to seven or even to eight, for not what disaster may happen on earth."

All right, we got this down in folk wisdom already. Don't put your eggs in one basket. That's what he's saying. Don't put all your eggs in one basket. Don't risk everything on one risk. Diversify. Don't sit here and say, "Here's the risk I'm willing to take. I have no idea if it's gonna work out, and if it doesn't work out, everything is gone. It's crushed." Divide to seven, divide to eight. Diversify what you're doing. Spread out your risk.

In other words. this is just something if you go to a financial advisor We have a few of those in the room. If you go to a financial advisor, they're probably going to tell you some concept of diversify.

If you go with, "Hey, I've got this great penny stock and I'm gonna invest all my savings in it," they're probably gonna tell you that's not a good idea. Because of this same thing. You don't know what's going to happen. You don't know the future. So how do you handle risk?

First, be willing to risk an immediate loss for something that could be better, but also diversify your risk. That's the first two. This is this tension that he says you need to hold both of these. You should take bold and wise risks, but you should also diversify.

So what's that look like? And I want you to take a minute and think about yourself. Probably most of us tend towards one or the other. We tend to be, "I will be bold and take all the risks," or, "I'll take none."

Okay, neither one of those is what Solomon is telling you to do. Said you need wisdom about how you take bold risks. You also need wisdom about not being passive. Think about yourself. Think about your money. I know you think, "I don't wanna think about my money." Think about your finances. Are you willing to take bold and wise risks?

I mean, it's true all the time, right? If you go and you buy a used car, anybody felt the risk of that? Sure. But then of course, we do these things, we talk about, but my car is breaking, and here's how much I'm spending to repair it, and maybe I should just bite the bullet and go buy a new one, or a used one or whatever.

Right? How do I handle that risk? Are you willing to take those kinds of risks? Are you willing to invest? You say, "I want my life to look different. I wanna pursue a different career." Are you willing to invest in the training and the experience to get there? That's a risk, right? You might pursue it and decide, "I actually hate this."

You might say, I've, heard of people doing this, "I'm gonna go into the medical field." And they start the training, and they finally get out to clinicals, and they realize they pass out when they see blood. It's not gonna work. And then, oh, was that a waste of time? Maybe not. Because you didn't know the future. You don't know why you're there. What you know is you took a risk, didn't work out the way you wanted to. Okay. We take risks all the time.

Are you willing to do those kinds of big steps, career change conversations, training? Are you willing to risk something now to pursue a good goal? But not only that, it doesn't have to be so huge.

It could just be something as simple as, am I willing to honestly pay my debts when that feels risky right now? It's hard. 

We can run into these things where I don't wanna risk that. Solomon says you're never gonna know the future. Risk some things now, looking at what is truly good, looking at a, a future payoff, if you will. Be willing to risk. What's it look like?

Now, maybe you run the other direction, verse two. Maybe you tend to not diversify so much, and you fixate everything on one opportunity. You go, "I want good friendships with people, so I'm gonna make sure that person is my absolute best friend." That doesn't always work out, does it?

Sometimes they're not interested in pursuing that friendship the same way. And by fixating on one, you go, "I'm not diversified. There's risk. I don't know what happens." Maybe they move away, maybe they're... Whatever it is, we lose the wisdom of don't put all your eggs in one basket.

Diversifying Your Risks in Various Areas of Life

Jed Gillis: So in your life, what does it look like to take wise, bold risks while spreading risk out to say all the things, I know this gets uncomfortable, all the things that you want to see happen in the next five years. You don't know if they will happen. Every single one of them, other than God will be faithful but we don't know all the details of what that looks like.

You don't know And yet for those things to happen, you're going to have to take some steps in risk. So Solomon says be willing to risk something right now, risk losing something right now in the present so that you can pursue something that's good.

How about in your relationships, your marriage, your children, your friendships, your coworkers? I used this example before, I'm gonna come back to it. It might mean you pursue the hard conversation that feels like a huge risk right now, but produces the bigger payoff. It might mean showing love to your spouse when you're afraid they'll take advantage of it. It might mean serving your sibling. Those of you who are, especially my young front row and my back row, and wherever else young people are right now. It might mean serving your sibling when it feels like you won't get anything from it. That's a risk. That's a real risk. I know it feels that way to you. It is. It's a real risk. But in, but what Solomon tells us is be willing to take those kinds of risks to pursue what's good.

Maybe your problem though is the other way, even in your relationships, and you don't diversify. So what could that look like? Have you ever known the person who wants to only have the hard conversations? It's like, "No, I'm serious about this relationship being good, so we have to deal with that problem and that problem. So fixated on one. We just had this past Friday, we had Grace Marriage, and the conversation was on having fun within your marriage. That's good. That's good for the health because instead of just saying, "Okay, we've gotta work through this. This is difficult," to say, "Hey, let's connect relationally in some other ways, too." Let's go enjoy spending time together.

If you wanna build deep friendships, don't just think, "I've gotta get with somebody and have a good hard conversation." Sometimes it's just, "Hey, how is it going, and how was the game the other night?" Have fun together. Diversify. Recognize that things don't always happen exactly the way we think they will, but you can take risks to pursue something that's truly good.

Studying God's Patterns Is Still Helpful

Jed Gillis: We get to verse three, "If the clouds are full of rain, they empty themselves on the earth. And if a tree falls to the south or to the north, in the place where the tree falls, there it will lie." In other words, there's patterns that are predictable as a whole, right? We can all basically know there's a weather front coming, there's going to be rain somewhere. But predicting exactly when and exactly where gets a lot harder, doesn't it? I mean, we have this whole stereotype where we say, "What is-- what do you call someone who's wrong 80% of the time and keeps their job? A weatherman."

We, w- we all know this stereotype, and yet none of us sits here and go, "Those are completely useless. I never look at any weather forecast," right? There are general patterns that happen in our world. They exist. Rain clouds come, and they drop rain. Sure, there's patterns, but that doesn't mean you can control and know exactly when and exactly where those things will happen.

The same thing's true in your life, in your relationships, in your world around you, in your family. There are general patterns. A soft answer turns away wrath. That's a wise general pattern that happens. And yet we've probably all seen a moment where somebody was mad, and the other person gives this great calm answer, and they didn't just instantly go, "Oh, I'm fine." It's a pattern. It's a real pattern that you can trust, but it's not instant control of your circumstances.

That's true of a whole lot of patterns. He uses this, "When a tree falls, it stays there." We can predict some things, but we don't know when it's gonna fall. We don't know which direction it's gonna fall. Hopefully, if you're cutting it, you do know, but maybe not.

We know certain things. If you lose your job, you'll probably need another way to provide. That's a pattern. If your car breaks, you're probably gonna have to replace it or work on it or something. We know certain patterns. When your friend is struggling spiritually, they need someone to help. There are patterns that we can know.

Now, when you look at rain falling, when you look at trees f- falling, those aren't bad things. It depends on what you're trying to do, right? If you have a garden, you want your rain to fall. If you're trying to go out and go for a hike, maybe you don't want it to rain. Sometimes we cut down trees 'cause we want them to fall, and other times we just hope we're not under them when they do fall. These- he's not really trying to say, "Hey, this is good, this is bad. Rain's good, rain's bad. Trees are good and ba-" He's not trying to make a good and bad. He's just saying there are patterns that exist. There are reliable patterns in this world of wisdom that aren't inherently wrong, that aren't foolish, but they can create issues for us because of a lot of different things. The tree might fall on us, to use the picture. There's a risk.

Don't Limit Doing Good Because of Risk

Jed Gillis: Another thing that might happen, which he goes into in verse four, is we might look at these patterns, and we might not pursue something good because we're looking at the pattern. In other words, "He who observes the wind will not sow, he who regards the clouds will not reap."

It's like somebody who says, "I wanna be a gardener," and they look on the weather forecast around about the time when they know they need to plant their cucumbers or whatever, and they go, "It's time to plant cucumbers." And they look out, "Eh, it's kinda windy. I'm not sure it's the right time." They look out and go, "Oh, looks like rain. I probably shouldn't plant them right now. Maybe I should wait. Oh, the weather forecast for tomorrow looks like rain. Maybe I won't do that either." Next thing they're three weeks later, and they're past the time to plant the cucumbers. He who watches the wind and says, "Hey, here eventually is gonna be the perfect moment," never actually goes and plants the crop

An example of that kind of thing to say, "Solomon, what are you... cool. Planting, I don't plant. What are you talking about?" An example, we all know housing markets go up and down. Maybe you've heard people talk, like this. I have. People who say, "I really wanna buy a house." You don't have to buy a house, that's not the point. But if you say, "I really wanna buy a house. Oh, I know the housing market's gonna drop," every once in a while that does work because we know housing markets drop.

But I've also known people who sat and watched housing markets go up and up, and they finally dropped a little, but nowhere near where they started, and they kept going up and up You could say he who's watching the market never buys. Does that mean it's always the right time to buy? No. But the principle is this. If you look and say, "Here are all these patterns. If I can just find exactly the right moment, then I'm gonna jump into it." It's like, be wise. Be wise when you step into things like that. But you don't know the future, and you're never gonna know the exact right moment.

If you regularly go to, Sam's Club or Walmart And you see an item that just went on sale. I don't know if anybody else does this. My wife is wonderful at this. You see an item that just went on sale and you're like, "It's not quite low enough, but if you wait a couple weeks, I bet they'll drop it again." And then you go in a few weeks, oh, they dropped. I bet they're gonna drop it again. Now, if you keep waiting for them to keep dropping it, what happens? You go in one week and you're like, "Man, I should've gotten it last week," 'cause it's gone. It's the same principle.

He who observes the wind, these regular patterns happen, but if all you do is look at the pattern and go, "Oh, I know the future. This one's... There's a better chance it's coming up. I'm gonna jump in then. Oh, nope, it dropped a little. I'm gonna jump in when it gets a little lower," you'll never actually go sow. Be willing to take that risk.

Keep Planting Seeds, Because You Don't Know the Future

Jed Gillis: Now, he continues with the planting metaphor in verse six. Before that, he uses an illustration. He says, "Just like you don't know how the human spirit comes to a baby in the womb of a woman, you don't know how that works, so you don't know all of the work of God who makes everything." In other words, he's just reiterating what he said throughout the book. You don't know the future. There are days of adversity and days of prosperity, and you don't know how all of those work together. He just says, "You don't know all of that." So therefore, verse six, "In the morning, sow your seed, and at evening withhold not your hand, for you do not know which will prosper, this or that, or whether both alike will be good."

So here's his picture. If you're sitting in your house going, "I don't know. It looks like it might rain today," go plant some seeds. If it starts raining and chases you inside, come back inside. And then you get to the evening, go plant some more seeds. you don't know which seeds are gonna grow, so plant more seeds and plant more seeds. Opportunity to do good. That's really his overall point in this picture.

Now, what's the danger in planting in the morning and planting at night? we could talk about agricultural details probably that he didn't intend, but here's one. You risk being inefficient, right? If you know the seeds I plant on the evening of April 2nd, they're gonna grow and they're gonna be wonderful. Then of course you're not gonna plant the other times. You're gonna wait.

But you don't know that. So you might plant some seeds on, let's say April 5th, that don't grow. That feels pretty inefficient. I, wish I hadn't planted that other time." He's like, "You don't get...

in other words, because we don't know the future, you don't get to be perfectly efficient. That's part of the risk. Risk being inefficient in order to pursue good.

Now put this... I used agricultural metaphors. We can all go, "Yeah, sure. What's that have to do with me?" Okay, so put it into your life. You say within your marriage, say, "I would be glad to do whatever it takes to give me a fantastic marriage. Just tell me exactly what it is and I'll do it."

No. Plant good over and over again. You're like, I don't know if that good's gonna grow into a good plant or not." I know. Keep planting good. Galatians says something about that, right? Don't grow weary in doing good, for in due season you will reap if you faint not. We, have to risk being inefficient in order to do good because I don't know the results of all my actions, so I need to pursue good in as many ways as I can. That might be inefficient. You might plant in the morning, and that's not the seeds that come up.

You pursue faithful business in your job. You say, "I'm gonna be a godly worker. I'm gonna pursue this project, and I'm gonna do it to the best of my ability." And you think, maybe this is the one I get noticed, I get the promotion, I get all those things." Maybe. Maybe it's not that one. Maybe it's a different project.

You don't know, so what do you do? You can say, "I wanna be really efficient. I'm gonna put my effort in the one where I get the promotion." It doesn't work like that. You can't just be a good worker when the boss is around and expect for that to work.

No, instead, plant in the morning, plant at night. Keep doing good over and over. The contrast between verse two and verse six could be stated this way. Verse two says diversify your risk because you don't know when disaster happens. Verse six says diversify your good efforts because you don't know what will be fruitful.

Keep planting your seed. Risk being inefficient to pursue so much good so that when the seeds come up, you're just rejoicing that God had them be fruitful. Sow good seed over and over.

Again, the same picture actually as verse one, same principle, not the same picture, but the same principle. Pursue what's good in front of you without expecting a controllable immediate return. When you plant seeds, that's what you do. You plant 100 seeds. Do you get 100 plants? Probably not. Maybe, but very often not. When you plant seeds, do you get plants the next minute? No. Do you get plants the next day? No. So pursue what's good in front of you without expecting to get an immediate return, without expecting 100% efficiency. I did this good thing, I got all the good I wanted out of it.

Paul gives us this picture too. He uses different words. He says, "One man plants and another man waters, but God gives the increase." God gives the growth. Plant good things over and over because you don't know which one of them becomes an oak tree.

Parents, you do this all the time. Grandparents, you do this all the time. Grandparents especially, I'll use that example. When, you talk to your grandkids, and you love them, and you're just having fun with them, and you have a conversation about God with them, and you share with them how you love God, and you share all of these things, and you say, "I'm not with them all the time. How much influence do I really have?" You have no idea. We think we can control that stuff. Yo, you have no idea which conversation, which seed, which word, which thought becomes a tree. You don't know.

Parents, you don't know that either. That's why you don't only have the parenting conversations you know are going to work. You have a million of them, and sometimes you're like, "They seem to not hear any of it." And then two years down the road, you're like, "Wow, I think they were listening somewhere." You ever gone back, you're like, "Which conversation made that happen?" You can't tell. You can't do it with you either.

Somebody says, "Who really influenced you to be godly?" They did. how? Which conversation did it? Most of the time you're like, "I don't really know." Maybe you have one. There are some I could point to. But many times, even after the fact, you say, "Which seed brought that plant? I don't know. That's why our job isn't to say, "I'm gonna plant this seed and I'm sure 100% of them give this plant." It's to plant.

Keep pursuing good. Even if it means you're inefficient and you pursue some good that doesn't happen. Keep pursuing good.

Pursuing Good Is a Work of the Ministry

Jed Gillis: We could talk about how this looks in your life. We could talk about these principles in broad terms. Risk something now for something better later. Spread out your risk. Risk being inefficient in pursuing good because you don't know which good is going to be ultimately fruitful. Pursue good all the ti- we could talk about these principles, we could talk about each of these different situations, and there's a million things that we could apply these to.

One passage I wanna draw our minds to is from Ephesians chapter 4. I was having a good conversation with, the high school principal, Brad Neal, earlier this week. He was sharing his vision for the school, for the students here, and how he wants to see each of those students realize that they, in their work at school, should be pursuing what Ephesians calls the work of the ministry.

If you're a believer, that's what you're supposed to do. You're supposed to be strengthening those around you, bearing their burdens. You're supposed to be loving them as you love your neighbor as yourself. You're supposed to be caring for them in practical ways, in spiritual ways, encouraging, comforting, all of these things.

Could be counseling, it could be as we sing to one another. All of these things are work of the ministry from Ephesians 4.

So here's what I wanna do to tie that thought of work of the ministry and all believers are supposed to be ministering God's truth to one another, and in the morning sow your seed, in the evening sow your seed.

Think in terms of your relationships with other believers in the body around you. Take risks without knowing the future payoff.

Some of you work with kids in Awana, and you have no idea what they'll turn out to be in 30 years, and you have no idea which conversation will grow to help them to be godly young people. Take that risk. You don't know.

Some of you get together with one another and you have these conversations where you're encouraging y- each other, you're comforting each other. And you go, "That's kind of a risk. I take some of my time, and I don't know how it's gonna turn out." Take bold, wise risks without knowing the future payoff. Plant good seed over and over again.

When you talk to a friend or, a brother or sister, you get to know somebody new within the body and you say, "I tried. It didn't seem to work out the way I wanted to," does that make you go, I'm just gonna withdraw and not try to connect with anybody"? Or do you say, "No, I wanna plant my seed over and over again 'cause I don't know which seed is going to grow"?

Part of the work of the ministry is helping each other fight sin. When you talk with someone and go, "They're struggling with a sin issue," and you talk with them, and you encourage them, and you pray with them, and then you find out they, they fell in that again, you're like, "Ah, what was the point of all that? It's so inefficient." No, it's planting seeds, asking God to give the growth. You don't know which one's gonna grow.

So don't grow weary in doing good. Even though wisdom doesn't guarantee outcomes There are these patterns for us. Take risks. Don't grow weary in doing good. Spread out your risk.

Enjoy Good

Jed Gillis: There's wisdom all around. If you were to take these principles that Solomon gives you and you put them in any area of your life, you'll find paths you can walk down. You'll find wise paths to pursue. But in all this talk, so we can hear diversity, risk, wisdom, you can be like, "Oh man, so I'm basically just supposed to try and do good and hope that it's not all terrible. I'm supposed to risk immediate loss now for future good, so do I just live, a miserable life now and hope it works out?"

No. Thankfully, we get to verse seven And he says, "Light is sweet and it is pleasant for the eyes to see the sun." As simple as it is, he says, "Enjoy the good things." Enjoy what's really good.

There's a lot of darkness. There's a lot of adversity. There are times you plant seeds and they don't grow, but there are times you plant seeds and they do, so enjoy that. There's times you walk outside and you go, "The sun feels really hot." Like yesterday if you were sitting outside. You're like, "I don't know if I really want to see the sun at this exact moment." Sure. But there are also times you walk outside, it just feels good.

Hardship Is Fleeting

Jed Gillis: Solomon doesn't tell you the way to be wise is to not enjoy anything, to be like Ebenezer Scrooge. Okay, I think we probably all know that reference. Scrooge counts all his money but never does anything with it. He's freezing cold in his shop. He's mad if his shopkeeper burns an extra candle. He's never generous. You go, he's trying to accumulate all of this stuff by avoiding risk as much as possible. But he doesn't just enjoy what's good.

That's not the kind of wisdom that Solomon is pointing us to. He says, "Enjoy these good things." The world you have moves up and down. You have good days, you have bad days. Is it easier to remember that the good days are fleeting than to remember that the bad days are fleeting? I find it easier. When you're in the middle of here's a really great time, isn't it easy to be like, "Everything's going really right now, but man, I know tomorrow won't be this good. I know the other shoe's gonna fall."

But we often don't do that the other way and go, "things are really terrible right now. That's okay, I know it's about to get better." Usually not the way we're bent. Normally, we like to think the good stuff is fleeting, the bad stuff's probably here forever.

Notice what he says in verse eight, "If a person lives many years, let him rejoice. Enjoy the good things, but let him remember the days of darkness will be many." Enjoy the good things, but know there's gonna be bad days. And then his summary statement, "All that comes is fleeting." That's what this vanity, it's hevel, it's like a breath.

When you go through the worst seasons of your life, which I know this room represents many very bad ones at times. When you go through the worst seasons of your life, at the very least, we can say the sufferings of this present time aren't worth comparing to the joy that is to come. At the very least, we can say this whole life, even if it is my whole life, it's fleeting compared to eternity.

But even within our lives, most situations that are really bad, they don't last. Most of them. Solomon says, "Enjoy the good that's there." Verse nine, "Rejoice, O young man, in your youth, and let your heart cheer you in the days of your youth. Walk in the ways of your heart and the sight of your eyes." He just says, "Look, enjoy."

When you're young and your body works exactly the way you want it to, go enjoy it Because as some of that's fleeting Solomon says, "That's good. That's wise. Enjoy it. But know that for all these things, God will bring you into judgment." In other words, you can't just say, "I'm gonna go enjoy what I have now, and I'm the moral judge, so I can just decide to do whatever I want."

He goes, "Look, you need to enjoy what God gives you, but enjoy it knowing that your God has told you what is good." That's the overall purpose when he says, "Plant seeds," when he says, "Cast your bread on the water." He's saying, "Don't worry about the outcomes. Pursue and enjoy what's good." God's given that to you.

There's Always Risk. Do Good Anyways.

Jed Gillis: So I wanna ask you when you think about these principles. This is how we live as people who are not omniscient. You don't know the future, and you can't control it. That means there's always risk.

We risk failure, so we observe the wind and we say, "No, I'm not gonna plant right now." Why? Because if I plant right now and a big storm comes, it'll be a failure. We risk failure.

We might risk immediate loss for something to be better in the future. We might risk inefficiency because I'm gonna plant good all the time.

But in wisdom, risk doesn't mean you should run from it. Pursue good and enjoy good with a clear conscience. Enjoy meaningful good steps, planting seeds of good without...

A- and two things we, we do. We try to do good, but we're afraid it won't work out, so we have fear. Or we do good, and we criticize stuff that we did in the past. In other words, we'll sit here and say, "I tried to do really good in whatever situation, but it didn't turn out like I wanted it to, so I must have been terrible."

That's not true You don't control your outcomes. If you say, "I tried to be a good godly parent and my children did not end up where I wanted them to be," That doesn't mean you need to go beat yourself up about it. You planted seeds. Did all those seeds grow? No that doesn't mean it wasn't wise. It means you're not God.

How We Can Apply Solomon's Wisdom on Risk

Jed Gillis: So I want to ask you, and maybe you already have enough principles to say, "I know where to start." Maybe you don't. So if you want step one, how can I be a doer of the word and not a hearer only? I'll give you three, three things to think about.

First, this week, pick one thing that you know is good, but it might not pay off right now. That could be your relationships, that could be in your training, that could be in your knowledge and your learning, that could be in your education, that could be in all kinds of different things. Pick one thing you know is good that might not pay off right now, and that you'd be tempted to not do it because it might not pay off, right? Pick one thing, then I'm gonna step into that. I'm gonna plant seeds, and I'm gonna keep planting seeds. That might be a relationship, a friendship you want to grow. That might be in your marriage, in your children, in your job, in your finances, any number of things. God's Spirit can lead us to exactly what that is. Pick one thing that you know is good that might not pay off, and pursue it just because it's good.

Second thing, pick one pattern that feels risky and push past that fear to do good. So I'm gonna give a specific example to my younger people in the room, but I think we could translate it. Some of you have siblings, and some of you know that your siblings aren't always perfect, possibly. So you know a pattern. You know if we do this, we get into this kind of fight. So what I want you to do, you say, "I'm afraid. I don't want that kind of fight." What I want you to do is say, "Now, there's a pattern that I want to avoid." You say, "How do I pursue what's good?" My sibling might fight me. Sure. How do you serve them? How do you love them? How do you do something good? How do you push past a fear, this pattern keeps happening, to say, "I'm gonna pursue good anyway"?

It might look like that when you're younger. It might look like school for you guys, and you go, "When I try really hard to think about school, sometimes I still mess up. Sometimes I struggle to understand and pay attention." And so then you might be tempted to go like, forget it. I'm just gonna goof off, because when I try, it doesn't work well either." Hey, no, there's a pattern. I'm afraid I'm gonna fail. Okay pursue what's good anyway. I want to pay attention. I want to learn. I want to grow.

That might look like that for this group. It might not look like that for you. It's gonna look similar. There's a pattern. Clouds bring rain, trees fall. Oh, no, I don't wanna do what's good because this pattern might happen. Probably most often it's in our relationships, our closest relationships. When I try to pursue something good, I get accused of this. Maybe I just won't pursue what's good at all.

Pick one thing. You can't pick all of it. Nobody has enough mental energy to do that. Pick one pattern that you know this is good, but it feels risky. Pursue that anyway.

And then third thing, pick one joy that you're tempted to overlook and enjoy it on purpose this week. One joy you're tempted to take for granted. And say, "If a person lives many years, let him rejoice in them all. Rejoice, O young man, in your youth." And by the way, he's not saying if you're older, don't rejoice. Rejoice in the good that you have.

Pick one thing you know is good that might not pay off, pursue it this week. Pick one thing that feels risky but you know it's good, and push past that fear to pursue it. And pick one joy you're tempted to overlook, and enjoy it on purpose this week.

Part of how we walk in wisdom, even though you don't know the future, you can't control the future. Take risks to pursue good. And your God who loves you, who gives the increase, loves to bless and make His people fruitful.

Invite you to take a moment and just respond in prayer. Do business with God. If you need to jot down some things so that you can come back to them later and do business with God, this is a good time to do that as well. We'll just take a few moments to be silent, spend time in prayer.