All right. How are you doing today?
Crossing Church? Really?
All right. It is good to be in the house.
Little Lord. It is good to be with the people
of the Lord, across all of our locations and we welcome all of
our locations, all across this region.
We also welcome everyone that's inside and online.
So thankful for each and every one of you and it is it's good
to be able to look at your smiling faces.
It's beautiful outside and beautifully.
More beautiful inside because all of us are here together and
we have the opportunity to be in this Fellowship together in
fellowship with God. That's a great investment.
So, you remember Easter, when we were doing this series, we
weren't in the series, but we defended a one-off called
chasing Shades. And we had those lights up here
that everything was monochromatic and it was like
Clayton was going from black and white to color.
ER and back to black and white. How many of you remember that?
Yeah. It was pretty awesome, that that
affect, right? And that was actually supposed
to be the part of a series but we put a different Series in
between but we're kind of coming back to that and so we're in a
new series called chasing Shades and it's based on exploring a
study in the Book of Ecclesiastes in the Old
Testament. I don't know how many of you
have ever really done a Deep dive into Ecclesiastes.
You're probably going on. I don't know if I'm gonna like
this or not. So so why would we do that?
Why would we take you to this Old Testament book with this
giant named? It's because the writer of The
Book of Ecclesiastes is the all-time grand champion of
chasing shades. His name is Solomon.
Now, the author in the book when you read Ecclesiastes, he does
not identify himself by name but by his family and by his title.
So you can figure out who he is by what he says.
And he doesn't in the first verse, let's look at it.
Ecclesiastes 11. The words of the teacher, son of
David, David, the king of Israel.
So he was a child of David and the king in Jerusalem.
There's only one person that Fits both of those descriptions,
and that's Solomon. So that's how we know who it is.
Okay. Now, who is Solomon?
Solomon is the second child. That was born to David and
Bathsheba, you know, that David had multiple wives and just
because listen, just because the Bible says, a person does a
certain thing. It doesn't mean that what they
did was the right thing, the Bible tells you the truth about
people. And and sometimes people say
well, If it's in the Bible, it must be right.
Well, no, it's not right. And David with Bathsheba is a
whole lot of wrong and some of you may remember a story about
an affair that David had with a woman that he saw taking a bath
on a rooftop. When he was up on a rooftop, a
higher rooftop, and it was actually the wife of one of his
best friends. And he has this affair with her.
It produces a pregnancy. He wants to cover up the
pregnancy. And so he asks his friend
through the generals that are out fighting a battle, to allow
his friend to come back home. So that he'll think that the
child is his, but he will not dishonor, the, his fellow
soldiers on the field by even going into his own house.
And actually living out what he had been taught by David and yet
David's trying to cover this the sin up.
And since you can't cover it up by making his friend, think that
it was his child. He actually puts him, has he put
in the place in the battle Will hill?
Where he'll certainly died? And he dies in battle and then
after he dies in battle, David takes his widow to be his own
wife. So no one would know, except for
God now. And a prophet came and tells
David. What he's done.
So try to understand. That Solomon doesn't come with
the best reputation in his past about the child that was
produced from that. Adulterous relationship died was
stillborn after the affair after the murder of her husband, and
the cover-up by King, David Bathsheba.
But then she became pregnant a second time and that second son
was Solomon. So that's his that's his family
history. And he was 19 years old when
King David died and then he became the new king of Israel at
19. Now, the beginning of Solomon's
Reign, when you read about it in First Kings, it's really marked
with a lot of violence. A lot of idolatry and marrying
for political gain. People would marry just to be
able to, you know, produce more for their own kingdom.
And it was also a time when he built a Alice for himself, and
he began the project of building a temple to God.
Now, all of that money had already been procured by his
father David, but it's interesting, isn't it that he
decided to build his Palace first and then he would build a
temple. Yeah.
Yeah, and he really wasn't living a great life as a young
king, but it was during the early stage of this rain, that
this event happens, where he does this sacrificing and gods.
Speaks to him. You need to read this because
this gives you the background you need to stand on to
understand what I'm going to be talking about today.
The king that Solomon went to gibeon to offer sacrifices for.
That was the most important high place in Solomon.
Offered a thousand burnt offerings on that altar at
gibeon. The Lord appeared to Solomon
during the night in a dream. And God said, ask for whatever
you want me to give you. How many of you like to hear
that from God? Ask for whatever you want.
And what would you say? That might be right there.
Your whole sermon. What would you say?
Solomon answered. You have shown great.
Kindness to your servant My Father, David because he was
faithful to you. And in many ways he was and
righteous and upright in heart. He pursued God, you have
continued this great kindness to him, and have given him a son to
sit on his throne to this day. This very day.
Now, Lord, my God, you have made.
Serving King in place of my father, David, but I am only a
little child and did not know how to carry out my duties.
So there's a lot of humility there in that in that prayer.
Your servant is here among the people.
You have chosen a great people too numerous to count or number.
So give your servant a Discerning heart.
That's his prayer. To govern your people and to
distinguish between right and wrong for who is able to govern
this great people of yours. The Lord was pleased that
Solomon asked for this. So God said to him, since you've
asked for this and not long for long life or wealth for
yourself, nor of asked, for the death of your enemies, but for
discernment in administering Justice, I will do what you have
asked. I will give you a wise and
Discerning heart so that there will never have been anyone,
like you listen to this, nor will there ever be another?
There's never been and there will never be anyone as wise as
this King because that's what God Said.
Moreover. I'll give you what you have not
asked for both wealth and honor, so that in your lifetime, you
have will have no equal among Kings.
Wow. Wow, so that resulted in
Solomon, having this uncanny ability to be worldly successful
in literally, every way a person could be successful.
And if you really want to know how successful he was, you need
to read First Kings 10, 14 to 29.
I'm not going to read that for you now, but it's amazing.
What? What?
He amassed now. There's a website called wealth
result.com. And it lists the top 10 all-time
wealthiest people in the world. Now if you put Elon Musk on that
list, and he's the wealthiest man on Earth right now, he would
presently be between number four and five on that list based on
his net worth. But guess who number one is?
Number one, all-time all cultures richest man via net
worth on that app. Solomon, Solomon's net worth is
estimated to be at two point one trillion dollars.
That's nearly 10 times. Elon musk's present net worth.
Wow, because of this gift that God gave him of wisdom.
Solomon was able to have virtually unlimited money.
I mean, he used gold for Mortar. He had unlimited access to
pleasure. He had unlimited power.
He had unlimited influence. He could live out every dream,
every desire, and every fantasy that anyone could ever imagine.
And with all of that. Wouldn't you think that he'd be
happy or satisfied? And then we read Ecclesiastes
chapter 1 verse 2, where only two verses in look what it says.
Meaningless meaningless says the teacher.
Utterly meaningless. Everything is meaningless.
Let me ask you a question. Does that sound like a man who
is fulfilled? Because this is written later in
his life. What does this sound like a man
who's frustrated and unfulfilled?
You spend some time in this book with me and you'll find a man
who is lost. Who is cynical, who is virtually
hopeless, a man full of answers, but missing the most important
one. In my opinion, a man more to be
pitied than to be applauded. Why.
Because his search? Was confined to the lower story.
Now, for those of you who don't know what I'm talking about,
when I say that. Let me explain the difference
between the lower story and the upper Story.
The lower story is the place where you and I live.
It's where we deal with life. It's where we grind it out.
It's where you have to pay the bills at the end of the month.
It's where you go to the grocery store.
It's where you experience the challenges and, and the pain and
the difficulty. And the joys of this life.
That's the lower story. But there's also, the upper
Storey the upper. Ori is the place that God calls
you to. It's the place where he doesn't
do you harm, but good, it's where you find a purpose and a
plan for your life that he has provided for you.
It's where that relationship is. That's the upper story.
And that's why you we need to understand that Solomon's search
was confined to the lower Storey.
Look at Ecclesiastes 13 through seven.
It says, what do people gain from all?
Are laborers at which they toil Under the Sun Generations.
Come and generations. Go?
But the Earth remains forever. The sun rises and the sun sets.
And hurries back to where it rises the wind, blows to the
South and then turns to the north.
Round and round it goes. Every turning on its course,
streams flow into the sea. It's he's never full to the
place. The streams come from there.
They return again. Now, the phrase that really
struck me in that passage. Is that part in verse 6, where
it goes round and round it goes? And it's true.
That's kind of life. Isn't it?
Made me think about a personal story?
Okay, because when I was a little kid my parents, it was a
cheap, it was a cheap thing to do on the weekend would take us
with load us all up and take us in the car to the drive-in
theater. Okay.
I need to see a show of hands at all of our locations.
How many of you have personally experienced going to a drive-in
theater. Raise up your hands.
Okay. A lot of you have.
How many of you never experienced a drive-in theater?
Raise your hand. If you've never experienced,
that's so sad. It really is because drive-in
theaters are just great and there's so many great things
that we experience in a dress that you experience in a
drive-in theater. First of all, the the sound of
the movie is terrible because it's coming out of this little
aluminum speaker that you hang on your door, you window area,
right? But you do have surround sound
because everybody's got one of those and some of you that went
to the drive-in remember that you didn't sit in your car, you
backed up your truck and you put Lawn chairs there.
How many you did that? Oh, yeah, and I'm not going to
ask how many of you tried to sneak in your friends in the
trunk of a car. Because that happened a lot to.
And you know, I remember the chocolate malts that you would
get that were frozen like rock hard and you start working on
the outside with a wooden spoon to try to actually get a bite.
And how many of you remember orange push-ups?
Oh, Where do you get those today?
I don't even know. Right?
So there's lots of great things about drive-in theaters.
But the thing I like the most at the to drive-in theaters, my
parents would go Lafayette Road in Indianapolis and Westlake.
Those were the two theaters. Both of them had something at up
front just underneath the screen.
That was amazing. I called it a merry-go-round,
some of you might call it a carousel.
You know what I'm talking about when I say carousel.
Yeah, there's still some of them around I found out in the Green
Room this week that the one that was at.
The White Oaks Mall in Springfield is gone now, but
they used to have one there and it was actually a double decker,
like it had stairs and had two levels.
There's one in St. Louis at the aquarium.
And probably, if you've ever been to a county fair, you've
been able to get on one kind of a cheaper version, but you've
been able to experience one. So, let's just take a ride for a
moment. What does that look like?
What is it? Like?
This is what it's like right here.
This is like riding on a Carousel and just a few things
to understand. You have all these different
animals and their on this mechanism that makes you go up
and down and then there are some of these animals or to the
benches. If you're the lane person that
wants to sit on a bench. Right?
And then there's the center part and there's the mirrors all the
way around. The let you see yourself.
While you're riding, whatever you're riding and a calliope in
the middle that's run on. On air steam, right?
It has a special sound. And you know, some of those
characters move. Some of them don't and you buy
your ticket, right? And like Solomon says, round and
round. You go.
That's how it works with a carousel.
And that's how it works in the lower story, your life and my
life. It's like a carousel.
It's like a merry-go-round. It looks so inviting.
It sounds so happy. It sounds so fun, and you have
these different animals that you can ride in all these different
experiences that you can choose from.
But eventually what happens after you've spent your quarter,
your 50 cents or whatever. It is now, five bucks.
I don't know. The ride is over and you have to
get off. Let somebody else get on the
ride. Now.
You can go buy another ticket and you can write a different
animal, but eventually It'll stop again and you'll have to
get off the ride again. Now, maybe some of you.
You're not a merry-go-round person.
You're not a carousel person. Maybe you're a ferris wheel
person. You're a total Daredevil.
You like that idea of being way way up in the air you get this
incredible view, right? And you have the thrill of being
so high. Some of you are just terrified
at that. But other of you that is you
just love that, right, but eventually, what happens you
have to come back down, don't you?
Hopefully slowly? But you have to come back down
and have to get off the ride. And then there's some of you.
You're not Ferris wheel people, you're not Carousel, people your
teacups people. And if you're a teacup person at
the end of my sermon, we're going to have an invitation time
and you need to come up and just repent of that.
Because I mean you're you're strange because you know, what a
tea cup is, Right? Tea cups are like they're like
round and round squared. So you sit in it around.
Teacup and you have this round thing in front of you and before
the ride even starts, you can start doing this and you start
spinning like this, and then they start to run.
It and you're spinning like this, while you're spinning like
this and then you vomit. That's why you need to accept
Christ at the end of this sermon because that's you just need to
be delivered from that. I don't know, but all I'm trying
to say, is there different ways to describe going round and
round, right? But the fact of the matter is,
none of those rides ever, really goes anywhere.
Just back to where you started, only, you have less money in
your pocket, then you did before because you paid for your ticket
and that is the way. Is in the lower story even at
its best, you never really get anywhere and sometimes the price
of that ticket is extraordinarily and staggeringly
high. It was high for Solomon and it's
recorded in First Kings chapter, 11, verses 1 to 13, King
Solomon. However.
Loved many foreign women besides Pharaoh's daughter.
I mean, he had so many wives you had to categorize them by
nationality. Moabites ammonites edomites.
I do nians in Hittites. They were from Nations about
which the Lord had told the Israelites.
You must not intermarry with them, because they will surely
turn your hearts after their gods.
Nevertheless. Solomon held fast to them in
love, you know, God told him not to do that.
God told him to be the husband of one wife.
God told him not to store up wealth, like gold silver or
horses and he's known for his wives.
He's known for his Stables. He's known for his wealth.
How many he had 700 wives of Royal birth.
That's princesses. And 300 concubines and his wives
led him astray. As Solomon grew old, his wives
turned his heart after other gods.
And his heart was not fully devoted to the Lord, his God, as
the heart of David. His father had been, he followed
a stirreth the goddess of the sidonians.
And Molech, you know, Molech was an idol.
That you sacrificed little children alive by burning them
alive. I'm not gonna try to paint this
as any kind of a pleasant picture and that's why he's
called the detestable, god of the ammonites.
So Solomon did evil in the eyes of the Lord.
He did not follow the Lord completely as David, his father
had done on a hill east of Jerusalem Solomon, built a high
place for Chima. Same kind of sacrificing, the
detestable, God of Moab, and for Molech, the detestable god of
the ammonites. He did the same for all of his
foreign wives who burned incense and offered sacrifices to their
gods. The Lord became angry with
Solomon because his heart had turned away from the Lord, the
god of Israel who had appeared to him twice.
Although he had forbidden Solomon to follow other gods
Solomon did not keep the Lord's command.
So the Lord said to Solomon since this is your attitude.
You have not kept my Covenant, my decrees, which I commanded
you. I will most certainly tear the
kingdom away from you and give it to one of your subordinates,
nevertheless for the sake of David.
Father, I will not do it during your lifetime.
I will tear it out of the hand of your son.
Yet. I will not tear the whole
Kingdom from him, but we'll give him one tribe for the sake of
David, my servant, and for the sake of Jerusalem, which I have
chosen. Ecclesiastes is the search for
meaning. In the lower story.
I wonder how many of us are searching for meaning in the
lower story in the circumstances of this world.
The problem is that meaning or purpose isn't there?
It's in the upper Story. The upper story isn't about the
things that God can give you in the lower story.
Like the Prosperity Gospel says, right.
It's about God's presence in your life.
And it's about God's plan for your life.
Now Solomon directed, his god-given gift at cornering, the
market of the lower story, which he did better than anybody
chasing Shades. And in the end.
He had nothing to show for it. His family was a mess, his
kingdom was divided and eventually everything he built,
even the temple, he built to God, came to ruin, you know,
some historians up until recently and recent archaeology.
Wondered if King Solomon had ever even existed at all.
Solomon became the object of his own conclusion.
Interesting thing a book about the Book of Ecclesiastes just
that the conclusion is at the very beginning of the book, not
at the end. The conclusion is everything is
meaningless. And he was the object of that.
He was meaningless. The thing is he knew better his
father even with all of his shortcomings did better because
he's pursued the heart of almighty.
God, Solomon was more about what he could get from God.
Then to be close to God. Have you ever heard this before?
The person who dies with the most toys wins?
How many of you've heard that before?
The truth is the person who dies with the most toys is Dad.
Winds, are you kidding in my opinion?
Ecclesiastes is the most depressing book of the entire
Bible and that's saying something because it's even
worse than the book of Lamentations.
You know, the book of Lamentations is titled
Lamentations, which means incredible deep sorrow.
Because at least Lamentations reminds us of the upper story.
Look at Lamentations, 3:22-23 for, because of the Lord's.
Great love. We are not consumed for his
compassion's never fail. Well, that's upper story.
There are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness?
Can I get an amen? That's the upper story?
I say to myself. The Lord is my portion.
Therefore. I will wait for him.
Wow. Beautiful.
So why in the world are we in this most depressing book of the
Bible? Like I could have done a lot of
things today. Jerry.
What do I have to listen to this?
Because it shows us that the pursuit of happiness in the
lower story is an illusion. And you know what?
I think I think a lot of us are doing exactly that.
I think a lot of us are looking for happiness, in the lower
story. We're pursuing it in the lore
story. We're saying, if I just get
enough money, if I just get enough education, if I just get
a better relationship, if I just get better connected, if they're
just something else in the lower story.
If I live in a nicer house, my drive, a better car.
If I have a little bit more money in the bank, if I have a
little bit better, retirement portfolio.
Then I'll be happy. Nobody ever searched harder and
went deeper in this than Solomon and you're not going to find
something that he didn't. The tragedy of the of his life
is a testimony for us to find our meaning are worth our
identity, and our purpose in the upper story.
The good life is a god life must say it.
Again. The good life is a god life.
Everything else is Carnival barkers and throw away prizes.
Let's apply this. Okay, looking across the board.
As I scan this audience all the rest of the audiences that are
listening right. Now.
How many of you by show of hands?
Consider yourself, Young? Okay, it's good.
If you consider yourself young, you really need this book.
Look at Ecclesiastes 12 one. Remember your creator in the
days of your youth. Before the days of trouble.
Anybody, my age are around my age, or older than my's going.
I get the days of trouble. Like I do an assessment every
morning. What is still working?
I'm like, on Apollo 13. It's like what on the spacecraft
still? Works absolutely true before the
days of trouble come and the years approach when you will say
hi fine. No pleasure in them.
If you're young or consider yourself young, you can start
right now. You can make the most of your
life. In the upper story.
You can take advantage of your youth, your health, your energy,
and your gifts to very make the very most of your life for God.
How many of you across all of our locations, ready your show
of hands time? Are middle-aged.
It is so funny. When I asked these questions.
Nobody wants to admit anything. You need this book.
If you consider yourself, middle-aged, you need this book
because you can wake up one day and find yourself thinking is
this all there is and that's pretty disconcerting.
You can, you can look at your life and you can say, you know,
what, I've spent years climbing, the ladder of success, only to
find that that ladder was leaning against the wrong wall.
We've all heard midlife crisis, right?
Well a midlife crisis, can be a good thing if it leads to a
midlife evaluation in the direction of the upper story.
All right. I'm going to ask the question
again. How many of you consider
yourself a senior adult? Yeah, you get the discounts.
If you're a senior adult, you need this book because often
people get to the age where they qualify themselves a senior
adults and they wonder if they're not needed or if they're
useless. This book reminds us that your
value is calculated in the upper Storey.
Not in the lower Storey, not in other people's evaluation of
you, but in God's and it's incredible.
You realize that your experience can teach your children, your
grandchildren, even your great-grandchildren and the
church, this incredible value of an intimate personal
relationship, with Jesus Christ, listening to me, for the Long
Haul. You know, I can say things like
this. I am young and now I'm old and I
have not seen the righteous forsaken and I say it with
authority. And it's because of my age.
Or their children begging bread. We have a certain amount of
authority because of the experience of our lives and we
can utilize those experiences to make such a difference.
Let me sum it up this way. It's time to get off the
merry-go-round. And begin the Great Adventure
through the high mountains and the deep valleys of God's
glorious, Grace. His Amazing Grace.
Everything isn't meaningless. Is it?
Not when you're living in the upper story.
We're moving to a time of decision.
This is where. The gospel comes rushing in
because it is such a contrast between the lower story.
And the upper story you think about Jesus Christ dying on the
cross and from the standpoint of the lower story.
Doesn't that just completely fit meaningless?
Man, this great man who is able to accomplish all these amazing
things that everybody can see and experience dies at the prime
of his life at 33 and Enemy of the State.
Executed horribly. But that's only in the lower
story. He was doing something amazing.
He was taking your sin. All of it.
Every bit of it, all your debt. Taking it.
Allowing his father in Heaven to place it on his shoulders.
Saying, I'll be responsible for all they've done. and when he
died, On that cross. He said the Greek word.
That means paid in full. Me, ask you a question.
Is there a lot of things you've done in your life that you need
to say? You're sorry to God for, there's
a lot in mind. And is God going to take that
apology? He will.
If you come to Christ because he paid it all.
So, here's the moment. Where we realize that Jesus
died, not for what he did. But for what we've done that he
was buried and that he rose again.
And he lives today. That is the upper story.
That's the gospel message. And you can come to Christ.
And you don't have to be who you were anymore?
All the answers that Solomon had could give him everything that
this world could offer. And yet he missed the one answer
that he needed most. And as you can have an intimate
personal relationship with God through Jesus Christ, and if
you've never come into that relationship, you can do that
right now. You can do it today.
You can't afford the ticket. You can't pay the admission.
Jesus bought you the ticket. There's going to be somebody
right over there by our baptistry that would love to
talk to you about what that next step is.
You can he baptized into Christ? Buried with him raised to walk
in newness of Life. Bible says that anyone is in
Christ. He is a new creation.
The old has gone. The new has come.
What a? What a joyful, wonderful hopeful
thing. But only God can give you and he
gives it to you through his own son.
It's not meaningless. Not in the upper story.
Many of you today are here and you've made a decision to
follow. Jesus Christ.
Oh, but that doesn't mean that you don't struggle with the
lower story. Some of you, you know what I'm
saying, all of us at one time or another, we get lost in it.
The cares of this world. They weigh us down.
They break us down. And we don't see any way out.
I mean, think about how many people are struggling needing
counseling right now. you know, Jesus said, He goes when I
leave. He said this to his Apostles
night before he died. He said when I leave, I'm not
going to leave you as orphans. And then he went on to say I'm
going to send you the counselor. I invite you to come up here in
a moment. Get down on your knees and have
a little time with your counselor.
With your counselor, the Holy Spirit.
Lower story's getting you down to Breaking, you down its
grinding on you. You know what he'll do.
He'll help. You see the upper story again.
He'll kind of reorient you to the person that God made you to
be. He'll change you.
I encourage you to consider that today.
These steps will be open and there's plenty of room.
Hey, and you say, well, I can't get to the steps so I don't need
to come. Well, you know what?
There's a second layer. There's a third layer.
There's plenty of room. Would you consider that would
you stand with me? Heavenly father?
I'm praying right now. Because we put all of these
defenses up because we don't want to be made uncomfortable or
feel uncomfortable. I know there's a little bit of
that right now. The idea of, I don't know if I
should go up there or not or my hair looks really bad when it's
wet or who knows? What?
I just pray right now. Father, you'll break through all
of those defenses, all of those pretenses and just see this
child's human heart that just needs you.
So desperately. And I pray father, like little
children. We would just run.
To be close to your son Jesus. My pre we find him here in this
moment. In Jesus name, I pray.
Amen.