To live the good life now, we need to let death be our teacher. We need to reflect on the end of our own lives. We need the wisdom that only our own impending deaths can give us. The death of others and the prospect of our own should cause us to think about how we live today so when people gather at our funeral, we won’t need vats of perfume to mask a poor character and stained reputation. – Brian Borgman

Qoheleth changes his style in chapter 7, but he does not change his provocative spirit. The first six chapters are full of reflections, arguments, questions, deductions, and conclusions. Now he is going to “bombard us with proverbs.” The proverbs he writes fit into the category of “better” proverbs. There are no less than twenty-three “better” proverbs in the book of Proverbs.

A few examples are in order:

“Better is a little with the fear of the LORD than great treasure and trouble with it.     Better is a dinner of herbs where love is than a fattened ox and hatred with it” (Prov. 15:16–17).

“Better is a dry morsel with quiet than a house full of feasting with strife” (17:1). “It is better to live in a corner of the housetop than in a house shared with a quarrelsome wife” (21:9). “It is better to live in a desert land than with a quarrelsome and fretful woman” (21:19). There are also twenty-three “better” statements in Qoheleth. Chapter 7 gives us a series of them. They compare two things and state what is “good,” or by way of comparison, what is “better.” They show the way of wisdom, and that way sets before us our better life now.

Lessons Learned from the Funeral (7:1–4) – The first proverb deals with one’s character. A good reputation is better than lots of perfume. Perfume, in the ancient world, covered up bad smells. A good reputation reflects one’s inner character and it does not require hiding or covering over something bad or unpleasant. This first proverb is not disconnected from what follows. “The day of one’s death is better than the day of one’s birth.” This seems awfully morbid. But as David Gibson notes, “In my opinion, the Preacher is saying that the day of your death is a better teacher than the day of your birth.… A coffin preaches better sermons than a cot [i.e., a crib].”

Qoheleth continues this line of thought that death is a good teacher when he tells us, “It is better to go to the house of mourning than to go to the house of feasting, because that is the end of every man, and the living will lay it to heart.” For the living, it is better to go to a funeral than to a party.

Qoheleth did not say it was more fun to go to the funeral than to the party but that it was “better.” Indeed, the coffin is a better teacher than rowdy laughter. The wise person attends the funeral, and he reflects on his own death. He thinks about the reputation he will leave behind. He thinks about the words that will be spoken about him. “Will they need a vat of perfume to cover up the stench of my character, or will they be able to speak with a good conscience?” He thinks about the reality that one day he will breathe his last. “Every funeral anticipates our own.” On Boothill, the famous graveyard outside of Tombstone, Arizona, there is a grave marker that Qoheleth would have approved: “As you pass by Remember that as You are so once was I And as I am you Soon will be Remember me Sorrow is better than laughter, for by sadness of face the heart is made glad” (Eccl. 7:3).

Wisdom refuses to idolize the past in order to dismiss the present……..Wisdom may evaluate the times, but it doesn’t cripple itself with endless questions about the good old days….

Qoheleth is not discounting laughter. There is a time to laugh (3:4). But for the mind that reflects on death, there is sobriety, even sorrow, that cannot disappear with a joke. Nevertheless, don’t think that this sorrow is a hopeless one, for there can be a deeper happiness in the heart even when the heart is sad. This gladness can run deep because living life from the perspective of death compels us to see it as a breath and a gift to be enjoyed while we have it. This is why the heart of the wise does not mind spending time in the house of mourning (7:4a), but the heart of the fool only thinks about having a good time (7:4b). The wise man ponders while he is at the funeral, and he learns. The fool avoids the funeral, and parties like it is 1999.

To live the good life now, we need to let death be our teacher. We need to reflect on the end of our own lives. We need the wisdom that only our own impending deaths can give us. The death of others and the prospect of our own should cause us to think about how we live today so when people gather at our funeral, we won’t need vats of perfume to mask a poor character and stained reputation.

God makes the good days and the bad. “Blessed be Your name, on the road marked with suffering, though there’s pain in the offering, blessed be Your name.”Reflect on the truth that God makes both days and has a purpose in both. Consider that God knows what He is doing even though you probably don’t have a clue. Acknowledge that both days come from His hand.

“The Good Old Days” (7:10) Wisdom does not long for the good old days. We are romantics when it comes to the good old days. To be sure, there is nothing wrong with looking back with fondness on bygone eras, but if there is nothing new under the sun, then there is no such thing as the good old days. Every day, every era, has its strengths, its weaknesses, its virtues, and its vices. The folly comes when we think the former days were just better than our days. Qoheleth says such a romanticized view of the past does not come from wisdom. I think Qoheleth would have smirked or outright laughed at this country song from 1986.

Grandpa, tell me ‘bout the good old days Sometimes it feels like this world’s gone crazy Grandpa, take me back to yesterday When the line between right and wrong Didn’t seem so hazy Did lovers really fall in love to stay And stand beside each other, come what may Was a promise really something people kept Not just something they would say Did families really bow their heads to pray Did daddies really never go away Oh, grandpa, tell me ‘bout the good old days Grandpa, everything is changing fast We call it progress, but I just don’t know And grandpa, let’s wander back into the past And paint me the picture of long ago.

What about the happy days of yesteryear? If life is a vapor, don’t waste it by bemoaning that life isn’t like your childhood. Wisdom refuses to idolize the past in order to dismiss the present. “Often when we ask this, it’s because we are blind to the good things of the present and ignorant of the evil of the past.” Wisdom may evaluate the times, but it doesn’t cripple itself with endless questions about the good old days and why can’t today be like it was in 1977? Such thinking leaves God out of the equation and turns a blind eye to the troubles of the past and the blessings of the present. .

Prosperity’s Prescription: Rejoice! (7:14a) The next step after “consider” God’s work is to “accept” God’s work. “In the day of prosperity be happy” (7:14). In the day when everything seems straight, when everything seems good, when things are the way they are supposed to be, be happy. The phrase, “in the day of prosperity” is literally, “in the good day.” The phrase, “be joyful” is “be in the good.” In the good day, be in the good, that is, enjoy it. There is nothing wrong with enjoying the good days. There are times when we should sing, “Blessed be Your name, when the sun’s shining down on me, when the world’s all it should be, blessed be Your name.”117 Yes, when the sun’s shining down on us, when the world’s as it should be, be happy! Enjoy such days as gifts from God.

Adversity’s Answer: Consider (7:14b) The good days don’t stick around forever. The days of prosperity don’t last a lifetime. Adversity will come. “In the day of adversity,” is literally in the Hebrew text, “in the day of evil.” Solomon is referring to the day when the bad stuff happens. If we are thinking, then we might conjecture that Qoheleth’s next move is to say this: good days be happy; bad days, be sad, whine, and complain! That would be symmetrical, but not biblical. Rather, he tells us, “In the day of adversity, consider this.” When the day of adversity hits us, Qoheleth wants us to think and consider that God has made the good day as well as the bad day. The Bible is not shy in declaring God’s sovereignty over everything, even the bad (Isa. 45:7; Lam. 3:38; Amos 3:6).

God makes the good days and the bad. “Blessed be Your name, on the road marked with suffering, though there’s pain in the offering, blessed be Your name.”118 Reflect on the truth that God makes both days and has a purpose in both. Consider that God knows what He is doing even though you probably don’t have a clue. Acknowledge that both days come from His hand.

Qoheleth concludes Ecclesiastes 7:14 by saying, “So that man may not find out anything that will be after him.” We acknowledge God is over both days. We can’t straighten what He has bent, and He also keeps us from knowing what will come after us. Just as in Ecclesiastes 3:1–15, we know He is sovereign, and we know there is a reason, but in the end, we do not know why, and we certainly don’t know how all of it will play out after we are gone. Qoheleth is drilling down on our limitations. We do not have the capacity to read providence with clear eyes. We cannot see the future. All we can do is rest in the hands of a good and sovereign God, enjoying this life as a gift, reflecting on Him when He dispenses adversity, and trusting Him in the darkness. When the worst happens, we don’t need to know why or what the outcome will be. All we need to know is that God is enough.

“God doesn’t promise us a trouble-free life. But he does promise that he will be there in the midst of our sorrows.”119 Qoheleth then gives one other note on the work of God. He writes, “In my vain (fleeting) life I have seen everything. There is a righteous man who perishes in his righteousness, and there is a wicked man who prolongs his life in his evildoing” (7:15). There is some debate about whether verse 15 goes with verses 13–14 or verses 16–18. It seems that Qoheleth is saying in his short, vaporous, not vain, life, he has seen it all. What troubles him, for good measure, is one more crooked thing. A righteous man perishes while being righteous and a wicked man prolongs his life in his wickedness. This is not the way things ought to be. But it is a potent reminder to us, who are under His sovereign hand, that we cannot control the good days or the days of adversity by what we do. The wicked, who deserve many bad days, may have very few. The righteous, who (we would think) should have more good days than bad, have the ultimate bad day when he perishes. Life does not make sense.  —Brian Borgman

Soli Deo Gloria!