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Speaker: Jerry Cisar
For who knows what is good for a person in life, during the few and meaningless days they pass through like a shadow? Who can tell them what will happen under the sun after they are gone? (Eccl. 6:12)
On the heels of this last week, one might well be able to relate to the question posed in 6:12, “who knows what is good for a person in life, during the few and meaningless days they pass through like a shadow?” It’s a question that in the midst of—well, take your pick: the pandemic, or injustices, or anything from the daily news cycle—seems pertinent: Who knows what is good?
It’s also the question that the Preacher of Ecclesiastes asks and then proceeds to answer in 7:1-14 in what appears to be a funeral sermon. Not just a funeral, but the funeral of someone whose death seems meaningless, senseless, wrong, unjust! Sadly, this is an all too common experience of life.
Imagine arriving at a funeral for the husband and son of a woman in her early 30’s who were killed by a drunk driver; or for the selfless servant in the community who was actively involved in the big-brothers big-sisters program. Maybe it is for a child as a result of a school shooting or the child just down the street from us who, a few weeks ago, was killed when he found his father’s gun and accidently shot himself. The list could go on.
Like any good preacher, this Preacher of Ecclesiastes doesn’t miss an opportunity through which he can give vital instruction to his congregation. So too we find ourselves listening in this week to a funeral sermon which speaks relevant instruction for our present experience.