Ecclesiastes 5 Devotional

Coming Near to Listen

“Do not be quick to speak, and do not be hasty in your heart to utter a word before God. For God is in heaven and you are on earth. So let your words be few.”Ecclesiastes 5:2 (BSB)

The Teacher begins this chapter at the house of God. He urges listening over the careless offerings of fools (5:1). God is in heaven and we are not, so we should come to him with few words (5:2), and any vow made to him should be kept (5:4-5). Reverence is not a show of many words. It is a right sense of who God is and who we are.

The same humility shapes the rest. Whoever loves money is never satisfied by it (5:10). Everyone leaves this life the way they came into it, carrying nothing (5:15). Paul agrees: we brought nothing into the world and can take nothing out, but godliness joined with contentment is great gain (1 Timothy 6:6-7). Then the Teacher names what is truly good. When God gives someone wealth and the ability to enjoy it, that is his gift (5:19). Before God, we come as receivers. That frees us from grasping and lets us enjoy what he has actually given.

To think about: Where are you trying to secure your life by having more, when God is inviting you to enjoy what he has already given?