Bible in A Year: Episode 26

Intro • 00:00
Welcome to Read the Bible in a Year with Matt and Hannah, a weekly podcast from Fairfax Bible Church where we explore scripture together, uncovering its themes and design patterns. We’re glad you’re here. Now, here are your hosts, Matt and Hannah.

Matt • 00:15
Alrighty, it is episode number 26 of Read the Bible with Matt and Hannah. Hannah, we have a special episode this week. Are you excited?

Hannah • 00:24
I’m always excited.

Matt • 00:26
I know. It’s a little bit like when you have company coming over and you sort of get the house cleaned up a little bit So we we had to clean up the podcast a little bit this week because we have some company. Our friend JT is here. Hello, JT. Hello. I’m here. Thank you for having me. You seem really excited to be here.

JT • 00:42
I’m always excited, just like Hamlet.

Matt • 00:47
We can tell. So uh JT th uh we really appreciate you being here. Uh you’re gonna help us understand Ecclesiastes

JT • 00:55
Well, I don’t know about that. Hopefully the Holy Spirit will do that. But I will certainly share. So the the reason I think that you had me is because our small group went through Ecclesiastes last year. And it was an interesting journey. I learned a lot. I think I speak for our entire group when I say we all learned a lot. And um Yeah, it’s it’s not the book that I thought it was. Happy to share what we learned.

Matt • 01:23
Yeah, I think it’ll be fun to talk about. Uh so JT’s here. Uh so Hannah, I we won’t do kind of the narrative catch up ’cause it’s not really we’re not in that kind of part of the Bible, but Set the stage for us a little bit in terms of our reading plan, where have we just come from? Where are we? And sort of it where uh where are we with all that? What’s where are we in the story?

Hannah • 01:45
Yeah, so we are in the wisdom literature, uh traditionally in the Christian tradition, that’s what we call the books of Proverbs, Job, and Ecclesiastes. You can sometimes group Song of Songs or Song of Solomon into the wisdom literature as well because it is Written according to the wisdom tradition of Solomon. So this episode we’re going to talk about both Ecclesiastes And we’ll spend a little bit of time in Song of Songs.

Matt • 02:16
Oh yeah.

Hannah • 02:17
Yeah. So uh maybe to set the scene a little bit with Ecclesiastes in relationship to the other wisdom literature. Uh we saw Proverbs is like this ancient wisdom tested over time. Uh you know it’s true because it’s ancient. All of these little uh short pithy proverbs that are easy to remember. Um and they kind of are like the general rule of thumb for wisdom But we saw Job as one of the exceptions to the rule of Proverbs. So Job uh faces unjust or what seems like unjust suffering, even though he’s righteous. And so that shows us that the wisdom of Proverbs doesn’t always guarantee a a happy or successful life. And Ecclesiastes is kind of similar to Job in a way, but from a different perspective. So another exception to the rule of Proverbs are not promises, you know. The general wisdom of Proverbs is not guaranteed. And Ecclesiastes shows us that.

Matt • 03:30
Oh. So JT, tell us a little bit, uh so you sort of came at this book because you guys did this in your small group. So tell us a little bit about kind of How did you guys come to that decision? Was it just sort of random or were there sort of things popping for you or where where was your head at or where was your group at when you entered into this book?

JT • 03:52
Well, to be completely honest. Shout out to Josh Cavana, who told me that he had been asking small group leaders for years to study Ecclesiastes, and no one had been brave enough or had taken him up on it.

Matt • 04:06
I might dispute this account. I think you and I are the only small group leaders he’s ever had, and I have no memory of this conversation. Probably not.

JT • 04:19
That shots fired. Not even let him defend himself.

Matt • 04:25
He doesn’t listen to this. He won’t hear this.

JT • 04:28
He said he really wanted to study the book and he’s always wanted to study the book. And I said, okay, sure, why not? And uh then as we got into it. It it ended up being just this incredibly ri I at least I thought, but incredibly rich discussion on what the book is, what it’s about. uh from a literary perspective what Solomon or Koheleth the teacher is doing and it it was just Hannah, you mentioned something in the last episode about how in Job you read all of Job’s friends’ speeches. Build Adams Ofar and Elphaz and and then you get to the end and God basically says to Job, you know, you make a sacrifice on their behalf because I I’m not happy with what they said. And you you said I don’t remember exactly how you said it, but it was something along the lines of I just read like 35 chapters of this and that’s not like real. I’m not so what am I supposed to do with all of that? And Ecclesiastes is somewhat similar because there are a lot of statements. There are a lot of observations that the teacher or the professor, I I might have been the Bible project, refers to him as. uh statements, observations, questions that he makes and raises that if you just take them in a vacuum, seem kind of counter to a lot of the other truths that you find in Scripture Or or just sort of head scratchers, like this constant refrain that meaningless, meaningless, everything is meaningless. And this is what I mean a little bit when I say It wasn’t the book that I thought it was, because growing up in the church, I I heard people talk about that and and they would almost kind of casually mention, you know, well it’s all meaningless, so yeah, you know.

Matt • 06:26
Yeah.

JT • 06:27
And Taken in a vacuum, that can be a little bit confusing because it’s not seemingly certainly not the type of truth or greater truth that Jesus points to. So how do you reconcile that within the broader narrative of scripture? And anyway, I think I’m getting ahead of myself a little bit, but There’s just some intentional things that Solomon is doing as an author, but also through the perspective of Kohalith or the teacher.

Matt • 06:56
I feel compelled to point out that we did do ecclesiastes in our smil small group last year. So take that, Josh Cabana.

JT • 07:07
Yeah, we’ll we’ll have to uh compare notes. As to what you pulled and uh what what we pulled as well.

Matt • 07:14
Yeah, so why don’t we get into it? So the you started mentioning You know, Ecclesiastes, it’s it’s using a certain device. And Hannah, I think you might even be better at explaining this than I am, so I’ll invite you in here. But it’s it’s uh it it Not not quite an unreliable narrator, but it’s not a straightforward recitation. It’s almost like you’re meeting a character who’s sort of walking through these concepts with you, and that that character sort of gives himself a name. You’ve mentioned this Koheleth. My Hebrew is terrible. I can’t say it. But Hannah, I think you can explain this better than I can. So why don’t you jump in here? So that it’s sort of a character who’s walking us through this instead of very straightforward narration. Am I getting the essence of it?

Hannah • 07:55
Yeah, well the author is the one who speaks right at the very beginning, who introduces you to Kohelet, and then at the very end, the author provides some commentary on his teaching. Uh and there’s actually like one other time that the author speaks um somewhere in chapter seven, which is just like says the teacher, like there’s one phrase, uh, which is super random. Like why why does the author add that in there? But Um I I do want I know JT wants to talk a little bit more about the role of the teacher and how you viewed or understood him as kind of like a literary device or character.

JT • 08:34
Yeah, I mean it it enables Solomon to do a couple of things. Solomon is perhaps the author. And then Kohalith is more so this character that he’s speaking through. One of the interesting things about Ecclesiastes is You will not find the Hebrew word or the relational covenant relationship, Hebrew word for God in the book of Ecclesiastes, Yahweh. That book, that that word is not in the book a single time. But he talks about God a lot throughout the book. The word he uses though is Elohim. Which that’s really interesting. If you zoom out and think about Solomon, son of David, king of Israel. The chosen people, the ones who have this covenant relationship with God, wouldn’t it make sense that he would refer to him as Yahweh? Kind of like us. I mean if we were talking about God, you you might say God or you might say Jesus, and it might depend on who you’re talking to as well. But Yahweh is is never used. And that’s a a way that Quahelet or the the professor, the teacher, is able to get across a point And from my study, appeal to a broader audience as well. Because if he’s only writing to Israelites, if he’s only writing to the the Hebrews. Of course, he would be talking about Yahweh, which you find that in Proverbs, for example. But in Ecclesiastes, you don’t. And I don’t remember where I read this, but It it’s Ecclesiastes is kind of like the philosophical appeal to the secularist. Basically, it’s it’s a way to appeal to someone who doesn’t come from a background of faith, or who doesn’t come from a Hebrew background or a Christian background. This is the teacher basically saying, I I tried all that stuff. I tried pleasure. I tried possessions. I tried worldly success, it it doesn’t it doesn’t pay off. And this is not Solomon King of Israel saying this. This is this guy, this teacher So it it’s a way for him to appeal in in a a different manner. And and he has a a couple of different ways he does that, which I think we’ll talk about more in a second. But Yeah, very interesting.

Matt • 11:13
Yeah, and he he sort of goes for it like right at the top where he’s like everything’s meaningless.

JT • 11:18
Yeah.

Matt • 11:18
Yeah. I mean it just sets a nice positive constructive tone for the book right there at the beginning.

JT • 11:23
I j I just thought, y you know, I’ve I’ve read the Bible, I’ve read Ecclesiastes many times before, and y again, you just read that at face value, and everybody kinda thinks of like, oh yeah, Ecclesiastes, the downer book, you know, the bummer book. And uh Janelle and I in particular, we had some conversations about this one small group in particular were we were driving home and I just remember she was saying like I don’t know how to I don’t know how to take this. uh when you just read it chapter by chapter. And I so I I told our small group w we will go through it chapter by chapter, but you at least at one point, I think we did it week one, you must read it beginning to end in one sitting. Because if you do read chapters in a vacuum, if you just read it in isolation and you miss the broader context, then you miss that this is a character speaking. That doesn’t mean we take every single word that he says as absolute truth. He’s being used to illustrate some greater points, which is really important in scripture and kind of comes back to what I was talking about or what you were talking about in the last podcast with Job.

Hannah • 12:36
Yeah. You know, this like making this distinction between who the author is and who the primary speaker is. might seem like unnecessary, but it’s actually really important for a biblical interpretation. Uh one of the Main terms used in hermeneutics is authorial intent. So when you’re trying to understand a passage what did the author intend to communicate? You have to know who the author is to determine that. So taking the teacher’s words in light of the author’s commentary at the end is really important too. Yeah.

JT • 13:18
But and it can be confusing if you don’t do that, because there are some things that the teacher says that okay, yeah, obviously we would agree with that. And there are other things that are questionable. Um there’s a Matt, I don’t know if you know the book The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien.

Matt • 13:34
Yeah, I I had I read it in college, which is many years ago at this point, but I’m familiar with the book, yes.

JT • 13:39
It is a classic College assigned reading book. And it it gets c I thought of this book when we read Ecclesiastes because Tim O’Brien was a Vietnam War veteran and he wrote this book, which is really just a collection of short stories. But he’s going for this idea of verisimilitude. And the the idea behind it is you can tell the facts. You can also tell perhaps a greater truth through fiction. And I’m not saying that’s what Ecclesiastes is doing, but it reminded me of that because he’ll have stories where he he tells this whole short story about some experience he had in the Vietnam. And then the next story will be about how he’s pointing out all of the things that were not true about the prior story or that he made up about the prior story and why he made them up. And so it goes back to exactly what you’re talking about, Hannah, with authorial intent. He’s using it in kind of a meta way to illustrate some you know, things about war. But with Ecclesiastes, that idea is somewhat present. It’s a it’s a loose comparison, but it’s somewhat present because of how he’s using this character or this literary device to communicate truths to an audience that maybe he wouldn’t normally be able to appeal to.

Matt • 15:02
Yeah. So a really important word in Ecclesiastic. is this word in in the ESV, which I I think a lot of people are using, it starts out as vanity or vanities. And in the version I grew up reading, it would have said meaningless. Everything is meaningless. It’s kind of a in verse two, chapter one. But the Hebrew word there, that’s not quite what it means. So we’ve we’ve got maybe a little bit of a rough translation there. The Hebrew word is, is Hannah check my pronunciation, hevel? Yeah. Heavel. And and Heavel it has a very specific meaning in this context, right? Am I right?

Hannah • 15:35
Yeah. Yep. Yeah, I know JT wants to talk about this, but at its like literal definition is smoke or vapor.

JT • 15:43
Okay.

Hannah • 15:43
So it’s playing on a few different metaphors.

JT • 15:47
Yeah. Yeah, I mean the study that I did is it’s also somewhat difficult to translate, especially in this context But smoke or vapor is a good image to use in the Bible Project. I think it’s in one of the videos of the reading plan, but the Bible Project has a great visual for this where it talks about the word And I read the different qualities or aspects of vapor or smoke, and it’s fleeting, it’s hard to grasp. It’s there one second, gone the next, which are a lot of the truths that Kohaleth is trying to communicate, and he does it constantly through the use of this word heavily or meaningless or vanity of vanities. There’s a lot of different translations that you’ll read.

Hannah • 16:41
Yeah, so uh meaningless is kind of a bad translation, honestly, because uh the teacher’s not trying to say that life itself itself is meaningless, but that its meaning is difficult to grasp or uh things of this life are fleeting and you can’t hold on to them. And you can’t control life the way you can’t control where smoke or vapor goes.

JT • 17:07
Yeah. Yeah, exactly. It’s it difficult to grasp is is the best. a picture, word picture that I have. And the yeah, I think the Bible project has a like an image of a hand trying to reach through smoke and grab it. And you know, you can imagine what that looks like. But It it is very complex is the idea that he’s getting across and it goes back to Job as well. you know, another book within the wisdom literature tradition, but Job is like right next to Genesis as being chronologically maybe the oldest book in the Bible. And it’s all about the oldest question in the book. If God is good, why do bad things happen to good people? And Ecclesiastes is grappling with the exact question. same thing. And just like everybody learns in Job, you can’t give Pat answers to this stuff. It’s not so easy as well you must be at fault or you must be sinful. And you see that multiple times. throughout Ecclesiastes talking about how the wicked prosper, well the good are are uh oppressed or or or killed or you know the it’s just life is not so simple. Very complex.

Hannah • 18:24
You know, one of the main things that the teacher is trying to do well, his words are really framed like this big thought experiment and he’s conducted all these experiments. I tried this and this happened. I tried that and that happened. And I the author, I think believes that it’s good that we go through this thought experiment that the teacher is presenting to kind of shake up And dissolve our assumptions or illusions or expectations about how the world is supposed to work. And I think that image of Heville does that very well. Uh because the things that we thought were certain or true are not always certain or true. Just like vapor or smoke looks like it has substance, but when you try to grasp it, it’s not actually there.

JT • 19:15
Yeah. Which is a a powerful image and metaphor of the themes as a whole, and he very systematically goes through all of the things that humans are drawn to in this life. He talks about wealth and money and riches, he talks about possessions, he talks about status, he talks about success, he talks about um pleasures, sex and food and drink, and l literally anything that the human heart could be drawn to. He again it’s it’s a philosophical appeal to the secularist. I I I’ve I tried it. Just listen to me. I tried it. It doesn’t it doesn’t work. it is.

Matt • 20:13
Yeah, I I think it’s speaking as much to this idea that we could be confident in anything at all. Uh you know, I’ve been thinking, I I I’ve shared with people before, I spent eight years as a consultant, HR researcher. And uh GE was the big company at the time. They had all the best practices. If you wanted to be uh well no, I mean they were number one in the Dow Jones and all that kind of stuff. It’s the great American company. GE essentially does not exist at this point. I mean, as recently as ten years ago, they would have been one of the top twenty-five companies in revenue and pr and all this kind of stuff. They barely exist at this point. Their assets are owned by uh one of their former children company. So if you told somebody in say nineteen ninety-four Put all of your 401k money on GE. It’s totally safe bet. You’d be bankrupt now. You know, it’s the most secure thing you could do. It’s the most secure asset we have, the the best company we have. And now, what, not even a generation later, it essentially doesn’t exist.

JT • 21:13
Yeah. Yeah. It’s not always so easy.

Matt • 21:18
Yeah. And there’s also this premise, so the this word heavel or vapor is promised. Then there’s also this uh sort of phrase that he uses a lot called under the sun. Yeah. Or phrase under the sun.

JT • 21:32
That that one was very eye-opening to me personally, ’cause Heville uh uh it’s difficult to translate, but it’s easy to study because there’s It is so difficult to translate that you can pretty easily find a lot of commentary on the word. Under the Sun is is a little bit more nuanced But it does come back to this idea that it’s an appeal to one who might not come from a background of faith. The idea being, if everything under the sun is all there is, then what? Well, you gotta think about that for a second. What’s under the sun versus what’s above the sun? Well, we would think that what perhaps above the sun, metaphorically, would be the heavens, would be God. uh would be Yahweh, perhaps. But he he doesn’t go there. He’s saying under the sun and under the sun is just what’s on the earth. So if if this earth, if these things is all that there is, well then I’m gonna go on this journey to explore where ultimate meaning is. And and that’s where I go back to what I talked about earlier. It’s a very systematic takedown of all of the different Aspects of life that are under the sun. He really leaves no stone unturned as to where meaning could be found, where we might seek interest or purpose and every single one he comes back to Hebel. Hebel. It’s yeah. Yeah. And that not a not a single Not a single thing really satisfies or or is as concrete as I thought it would be.

Matt • 23:25
You know, that strikes me. I I think that’s an eternal conversation. You know, every millennium generation, whatever, has probably had that conversation. But I feel like there’s sort of a unique aspect to that conversation for our our day and time that I find myself in more and more. I don’t know about you guys. But I remember uh this is kind of in the lobby after church a couple weeks ago and uh a guy that I’ve come to know a little bit, I I’m not I don’t think he would even call himself a believer, but he’s sort of talking about AI and sort of, you know, all the the ways that it is um you know showing up in our work and our life and how we do things and and he was talking about how AI is probably gonna make his job redundant. And I was like, okay, so you know, what does that mean for you? It’s like, oh, well, you know, I have to learn this programming thing. I was like, no, no, no. I wanna, what does that mean for you? Like who are like cause I know you to be somebody who’s like pretty wrapped up in your job and so if this thing takes away your job, it’s gonna take away some of your identity. So what does that mean for you? And he was like, oh, I I don’t know if I’m ready to have that conversation. And I think that’s happening a lot. Yeah.

JT • 24:33
I think you find it a lot too when people get what they wanted, when their when their dreams come true, so to speak, proverbially. I heard a story the other day about um shoot, I can’t remember the name of the company. It’s a very famous company. It’s like a wings company. Anyway, the guy recently sold it for like some crazy amount of money, you know, hundreds of millions of dollars. And in an interview he talked about Uh not a week went by when he was just trying to figure out what the next company was gonna be and just felt this emptiness a after he achieved what anyone, any rational person would consider to be the pinnacle. in this life and basically came right back to what the teacher could have told him to begin with. It’s it’s Hebel. Hebble. You know, if under the sun is all there is, if that’s all you got, then it’s Hebel.

Matt • 25:34
Yeah. Yeah. Uh now Hannah, there’s a theme that you picked up that you wanted to share, and this that’s uh this idea of the gift of joy. Tell us a little bit about what you’re seeing and and and what your thoughts are there.

Hannah • 25:50
Yeah, well it stood out to me a lot because, you know, like JT was saying, this book is very bleak or or the at least the teacher’s words are quite bleak and cynical and everyone’s gonna die. Like that’s you know what keeps being repeated throughout the whole book. But then uh randomly, it seems random, this repeated refrain about joy keeps popping up. Okay. And so there’s like in chapter two, verses twenty four to twenty six, chapter three, twelve to thirteen, another time later in chapter three, chapter five, chapter eight. Chapter nine, there’s like one or two verses here and there throughout the book where the speaker, the teacher says, um You know, there’s nothing better than to just be joyful and to do good, and eat and drink and take pleasure And like eating and drinking is repeated like four or five times.

Matt • 26:50
I mean you know eating and drinking is pretty good. I’m not gonna fight him on this one.

Hannah • 26:53
Right. So go eat your bread with joy and drink your wine with a merry heart, for God has already approved what you do. That’s nine uh chapter nine verse seven so this idea of joy even in the midst of all this like bleak cynicism keeps Arising and that stood out to me a lot. And I did uh a bit of studying. I listened to a sermon about um related to this specific idea. And Um, really struck me this idea of when you accept the heaven in life, when you accept It’s fleeting nature. When you recognize your lack of control, you can’t grasp at the heavel, and you release this illusion that you have any control at all, that’s when you really experience freedom to find joy in life. And especially, like Kohellett says, in the simple things, enjoy a good meal, have a drink with a friend, you know, even in the midst of your toilsome work. Find some joy in it and in the day-to-day small good things because those things are a gift from God. That’s repeated a couple times. I think in chapter three, it says this is God’s gift to man.

Matt • 28:09
So I don’t think coffee had been discovered at the time. I think we talked about this before, yeah. Can you imagine Solomon with a cup of coffee? We’d have like a whole we’d have a whole nother book of the Bible. He would not be able to stop

JT • 28:25
Hey, can we take a quick tangent? Just really quick. Please. My observation, uh, we’re halfway through the year, 26 episodes in. I I think the two of you are are getting your groove, your rhythm.

Matt • 28:37
I’d like to think so.

JT • 28:39
Something I have noticed is you have both Uh take it on a a little bit of a a character, if you will. I don’t know if I want to hear the next part. All right. Well, Hannah will. She’ll appreciate it. Matt, you your character of view is you’re you’re like a little bit of the funny one.

Matt • 28:58
Oh, okay.

JT • 28:59
You know, you’re the one who’s like always bringing up funny things and references and whatever. And there have been a couple I have noticed that seem to take Hannah by surprise.

Hannah • 29:11
They all Take me by surprise.

JT • 29:13
So here’s my question. This is our sidebar. This is a tangent.

Matt • 29:16
Oh, people are really behind the curtain now.

JT • 29:19
Is there is there anything that Matt has brought up that stand out in your mind of like the most out of left field. Okay.

Matt • 29:28
I’m gonna take my headphones off for this part.

Hannah • 29:30
I just I I think the the thing that stands out to me the most, it might not be the most out of left field. But it was when uh you know we’re preparing to start. And then he’s like, all right, we’re gonna start recording. Hits record and he just starts singing.

JT • 29:47
No notice.

Hannah • 29:48
There was no pre-planning of that whatsoever. And I was like, what? That was not on the agenda.

Matt • 29:55
I gotta keep you on your I gotta keep you on your toes, Hannah.

JT • 30:00
Keep all of us on our toes. You gotta entertain the troops. Alright, sideboard done.

Matt • 30:04
All that is to say.

JT • 30:05
I had to fit that in at some point.

Matt • 30:07
So, you know, Pastor Matthew gets on my case. Um that we that really all we talk about is bougie coffee on this podcast. I’m just saying Solomon would be here for it.

Hannah • 30:15
Yeah. Yeah. You might be smoking a pipe at the same time, but like A cup of coffee, I think.

Matt • 30:22
For sure. For sure. Yeah.

Hannah • 30:26
Um yeah. All right. What was I talking about?

Matt • 30:29
We were talking about joy. And joy is closer related to coffee.

Hannah • 30:33
Yeah.

Matt • 30:34
That’s the connection I’m trying to help us make there.

JT • 30:36
Yeah, I think it’s I think it’s interesting though because it’s basically this secular guy, this teacher or whatever, who’s drawing these types of conclusions. And and I I think that’s a huge point of the book is is someone who is finding their way to an above the sun premise, if you will. That’s not in the book, that’s me. But finding their way to realize a greater reality, a greater purpose, a greater truth, in spite of all the hebel. And I’m realizing, well, maybe these little joyful moments like a cup of coffee or smelling the Roses on your way to work. Yeah. You know, just a a good song. Or whatever. Maybe maybe those are part of God’s plan. Yeah. Enjoy that.

Matt • 31:34
It’s definitely a nudge toward humility. I think individual like intellectual humility, sort of like kind of letting go of the idea that you can figure it all out and you’re gonna be the one who like puts the puzzle pieces together and explains the universe and everything. And then just personal humility, you know, being properly stationed before God and others. It’s reminded me there’s that exchange Oh, I I’m thinking of this off the top of my head my head so I don’t have the specific reference, but that verse in Jeremiah where where he says, Do you seek great things for yourself? Seek them not. Do you have these big dreams and ambitions? Seek them not. Just be humble. Live in your community. Serve, worship the Lord. Just chill and it’s gonna work out just fine. Yeah.

Hannah • 32:23
Yeah. Yeah. I mean I don’t think it’s a completely secular perspective because he uh is acknowledging that these joys are a gift from God. Yes. In a in a couple of these passages about about finding joy in the small thing. So uh I think part of this thought experiment is like you’re working so hard to try to control the outcome so that life will be good for you. But it’s not going to work like that. So when you do find something good, recognize that you didn’t earn it. It’s actually a gift from God. And I think that really stood out to me. Yeah, especially just in my own life, like trying to control the outcomes. I’m a very like per try to be so productive and I’m so focused on tangible outcomes of my work and and acknowledging like, man, you know, I’m not in control of anything. So why don’t I just enjoy life a little bit more? Yeah. Yeah.

Matt • 33:28
Yeah.

JT • 33:29
Yeah, I lived I lived that. Sornat.

Matt • 33:32
No, go f I was gonna say, uh you you had a takeaway that you wanted to share with us. So I was actually trying to make space for you to do that.

JT • 33:39
So go for it. Yeah, this might be a little bit long, so bear with me. But I I uh we I later We can have Kyle edit if we have to, but that that was the store of my whole life, my whole year in twenty twenty five for both of us me and Janelle for our whole family because you both know this, but For anybody listening who doesn’t, we got pregnant in 2024 and pretty early on in the pregnancy got the diagnosis that uh Isaac, our son had onencephaly, which is where your child’s skull does not develop in the womb. They’re completely normal, healthy child, and will survive all the way to term and be born, but will will die shortly after they’re born. And we did that and carried him to term and he was born January 22nd of 2025, last year. And we got 12 hours with them. And then that was it. And uh yeah, that was my last year was my Job year. for sure my living out the complexities, the nuances, the grapplings of life. Through that, and it completely changed my life. It’s maybe an understatement, but for both of us, completely changed us. And then Not long after going through that to study Ecclesiastes, whether I’ve I realized it or not. I was absolutely trying to do what Job did and trying to do what Kohaleth is Doing on purpose to illustrate a point. I was trying to make sense of it. And I couldn’t. And it was deeply frustrating. And Yeah, it’s like what do you what do you do with that when y you know, it’s it’s silence. There’s no rational explanation and I I absolutely had some I wrote all of these uh proverbs myself, actually, or I don’t know if that’s the right word for them, but I just I wrote a lot of short thoughts that I I had during last year and I haven’t really gone back to them but I did, I don’t know, uh several months ago, just kind of glanced at a couple, and it very much reminded me of Job and of Ecclesiastes. the things that we were wrestling and grappling with. And yeah, if there’s a a theme verse of 2025 for me, it’s Ecclesiastes 7. uh 14, which I think it’s fourteen, maybe it’s eleven. Anyway, where he says, uh, in the day of prosperity rejoice, and in the day of adversity consider God has made one as well as the other, so that man may not find out what will come after him. And that was my year because in every other area of our lives, it was just immense blessing. Our other kids were doing great and were growing. I got a job promotion. It was, you know, was making more money. We were living in this new house. Family was good. Every other area was day of prosperity. And then we had this dark cloud, this you know, an eclipse of the sun in January. Uh that’s this day of adversity. And how do you reconcile both of those things? Just like Job. Yeah. And uh it’s Yeah, but the point the point of the book just as I think the point of the of Job is Trying to figure out the answer is not necessarily the right approach. Trying to just figure out What is the purpose of all of this is not necessarily what we’re supposed to take from all of this. And that’s very much what Solomon, the author, not the teacher, steps in at the end of the book and gives a bit of a cautionary tale, which is of uh an odd epilogue to the book when we spend all of these chapters with Kohaleth just beating us over the head with these meaningless and hemble and vanity and it’s it’s you know, life is not gonna work out the way you think it is, but there is joy.

Matt • 38:30
Yeah.

JT • 38:30
And and then at the end the author steps in and says, be very careful about how much you study.

Matt • 38:36
Uh-huh.

JT • 38:37
Odd comment. And then he pulls it all together to to fear God. That’s all you bam.

Matt • 38:44
We talked a little bit about this on the last episode in the context of Job and I think it’s worth bringing back to this one sort of the the point that you’re making JT about when we get into explanation mode and we need it to make sense, whatever the it is. you know, a tragedy like the ones that you uh you and your family experience. You know, certainly in our family we’ve had some struggles. I bet everybody listening to this has an episode in mind where God just didn’t show up in the way that they expected him to or wanted him to, that he didn’t answer their prayers in the way that he did. And And we talked about this with Job and I think we see it here in Ecclesiastes. When when we sort of force the issue of make this make sense, we’re making God smaller. God has to fit into our experience on our imagination and our paradigms and our whatever. And the invitation in Job and the invitation, sir, that’s more more striking even here in Ecclesiastes is let God be big. Let God be bigger than your understanding and your ability to explain and your ability to comprehend and predict and all of these things. And there’s there’s joy in that. And it does mean that you sit with some unanswered questions and you live with some unmet or um you know redefined expectations, but there’s there’s joy in that if we can get there.

JT • 40:03
Yeah. I heard a great sermon by Tim Keller on Job, which I put in one of the comments of our Bible chat, but he he talks about that and Uh talking about you you cannot you you have to avoid pad answers. These simple explanations don’t cut it. And um it’s very humbling.

Matt • 40:26
Yeah. Well JT, thanks for sharing your experience with the Ecclesiastes. Sounds like you guys had a great time as a group. We certainly enjoyed our experience in Ecclesiastes. We used a uh uh book study, so uh slightly different, I think, view of the content, but it was still a really good experience for us. Uh I want to pivot now in the time we have left to uh another really unusual book, and that is The Song of Songs. It’s right after Ecclesiastes. And Hannah, I gotta ask you, like, what is this book doing in the Bible? Like you’re you’re the Old Testament scholar around here. What oh what what’s going on here? Why is this book in the Bible? Why is there a book that reads like a uh romance novel? Just right there smack in the middle of the Bible. What what in the world? What’s happening here?

Hannah • 41:10
Great question. I don’t have the answer for you.

JT • 41:13
We were just talking about you can’t ask these answers.

Hannah • 41:21
Yeah, well uh I mentioned that Song of Songs or Song of Solomon, depending on which translation you’re reading. I think it’s actually maybe the only book in the Bible where different translations change the name of the book. Now that I’m thinking of it. Maybe not. Anyway. I’m gonna call it Song of Songs. Okay, let’s do that. It’s written, it Solomon is actually named in the book. Unlike Ecclesiastes, he’s not actually named. And um I you know, JT, you were saying Solomon is the author of Ecclesiastes, but that’s not actually a hundred percent agreed upon.

JT • 42:02
I actually, yeah, I I should have mentioned that earlier. I did know that. Um it is church tradition considered to have an author, and there’s a lot of reference material that strongly suggests, given his experiences.

Hannah • 42:16
But yeah, we actually don’t know that for and that’s actually true with Song of Songs too, even though Solomon is named uh kind of a as the author of the book. But there is a tradition uh actually across ancient Near Eastern literature where a well-known figure, particularly a royal figure, will be named as an author of a book, even though they maybe didn’t write it. Um but it’s written as if it’s in the tradition of that individual. So um Solomon was known to be the wisest person in Israel and I want to write a wisdom book, so I’m going to dedicate it you know, in the tradition of Solomon.

Matt • 42:58
Sounds like ancient fanfiction is what that sounds like.

Hannah • 43:02
Yeah, sure. Yeah. So anyway, um one reason That a lot of scholars think it would be weird for Solomon to have written Song of Songs is because he had a thousand wives. Yeah. Um Or 700 depending on how you count. But um cubines, wives. Yeah, what’s the difference?

Matt • 43:23
Where you put the decimal point, yeah.

Hannah • 43:27
But to for this type of love poetry about, you know, I am my beloved’s and my beloved is mine, this one for one dedication, one man, one woman. Like, is Solomon really writing?

JT • 43:41
But I’m on brand for Solomon.

Hannah • 43:43
Yeah.

JT • 43:44
So that I did not I I am not nearly as studied in the Song of Solomon as I am coming off of our study of Ecclesiastes. But a question for the two of you, I mean, could this be Solomon writing in different time periods of his life?

Hannah • 44:01
It’s certainly possible, but it is a well-known ancient Near Eastern um style literature to write with the voice of a royal figure. It’s called uh royal fictional autobiography is the name of it.

JT • 44:18
I like Matt’s word better, ancient fanfiction.

Hannah • 44:24
Anyway, it is this collection of ancient Jewish love poetry. Um and it is that, you know, just what it seems like on the surface, but why would that be in the Bible? I think the idea is that it’s pointing us to something deeper about the source of love, which is the God who is love. Uh and he grants divine love this divine gift of love to humanity to experience and give and receive that love to one another and back to God. as well. And we uh uh uh the Bible project points out there’s so many hyperlinks to particularly garden imagery.

JT • 45:07
Yes

Hannah • 45:07
And so it’s connecting these poems back into the bib the bigger biblical narrative, um what an ideal you know, what ideal love looks like if we were still back in the garden.

Matt • 45:22
Yeah.

Hannah • 45:23
Yeah.

Matt • 45:24
Well, and and that, yes. So so imagining a little bit, if you will, like what it would be like to relate to each other on a human level, especially a married couple or a man or woman uh leading toward marriage, what that relationship might look like in the Garden of Eden, untainted by sin. But also what it’s like to just experience there’s something about love. when when we love one another, that that sort of brings about new creation life, that it is love that sort of makes the garden around us. I’m I’m I’m I’m leaning hard into the metaphor, but I think there is something, and I think Jesus would talk about this, um, that you know you don’t need the conditions to make love for you, that love often is the thing that makes the conditions like things around you better. I think there’s a hint of that in the way that the characters relate to each other in Song of Songs, especially since there’s so much of this pursuit and you almost catch them. But then they escape and so this this idea of pursuit not quite there and they’re sort of chasing each other and connecting with each other. But they they delight in the chase with each other and it just it only builds their affection with each other. So I think there’s this idea that the their love for each other is what makes the garden around them that much more aromatic and delightful and and that much more of a uh good experience. So yeah, it’s It’s a really interesting book. I get why it’s uncomfortable for people. Yeah, I will always remember it was when I was in high school. The church that I went to, uh there’s a tradition that all the youth or students, we all sat front and center. It was a fairly big auditorium. Maybe a thousand people or whatever, but we all sat front and center. Um, and I’ll never forget it. One week I was, I don’t know, third, fourth row, wherever I was sitting, and right in front of me was Mimi Compton. Mimi Compton, if you’re out there, shout out. You made it onto the podcast all these years later. Um and um I don’t know, her she had a friend sitting next to her and we’re not really paying attention during the sermon. Well I was because I was studious and uh And good at at that. But um but her friend was like showing her Song of Solomon in the Bible and Mimi turns to her friend and goes Put that away. That’s pornographic. Wow. In the Bible, right? So like it’s uncomfortable for people. Uh and I get that, right? So because it’s It’s yeah, it’s very vivid. Um, it’s blunt. I mean, it’s using words that we don’t generally use in polite company, certainly at church. Um But you know, it’s it’s very vivid, sort of going after this idea that, you know, God delights in how we love each other and God certainly finds delight in a in a couple enjoying this kind of love. So yeah, it’s it’s interesting.

JT • 48:02
It’s short, it’s about it, what, eight chapters? Is that right? To Mimi’s credit, it is a constant refrain not to awaken love.

Matt • 48:10
That’s right. Maybe it turns out you were right. Who knew?

JT • 48:14
So.

Matt • 48:14
Yeah.

JT • 48:15
Yeah.

Matt • 48:16
Now I’ve never heard a sermon preached on Song of Solomon or Song of Songs. JT, you said you had or you knew somebody who had preached through this.

JT • 48:23
Yeah. Tom Nelson at uh Denton Bible Church, which is uh large church in Denton, Texas. And uh the church I I I guess I can’t say I grew up in, but when I was very young We went there. It’s my grandparents’ church. They’ve gone there for decades and decades and decades. And Tom Nelson was the pastor, I think just recently retired actually. But he has a pretty well-known Song of Solomon series. I remember when I was young that we had the cassette tapes of that series. And I remember my dad telling me, when you’re old enough, do not awaken love before it’s time. That’s true. Anyway, but uh yeah, it’s it’s fairly well known. But that’s the only one that I am familiar with was Tom Nelson’s series on that.

Matt • 49:20
Yeah. So interesting book, couple days. It’s definitely a different point of view than Job or Ecclesiastes, but there it is. So there’s something in it that God wants us to know and understand about who he is and his character. So Yeah. Good times. Yeah. Uh any other thoughts on Ecclesiastes or Song of Songs?

Hannah • 49:41
No, nothing for me.

JT • 49:42
Yeah. Why wise words Wise words from the wisest man who ever lived, or at least attributed to the wisest man who ever lived.

Matt • 49:52
Yeah, so I would say a soft challenge. For certainly the three of us and and those of you listening is like I I want you to have an ecclesiastes moment this week. I want you to go to like your favorite restaurant, your favorite coffee spot. your favorite bread shop or place where you get cookies or pastries. And I want you to enjoy something good that God made and take pleasure in it and thank him for it. Santa, this is like total biblical cover to go get the bougiest coffee you can think of.

Hannah • 50:22
Okay. I gotta I gotta plan that out. I have a I have a Google Maps list of fourteen hundred coffee shops around the world, so I’ll have to narrow it down a little bit.

Matt • 50:31
You gotta knock one out this weekend. Yeah.

JT • 50:34
All 1400 Starbucks. Oh no. I know who I’m talking to. I had to pro post the first. Not a single Starbucks. That was so rude. Yeah, I know. I know. But actually it says a lot about how much I know the two of you. I would know how offensive that would be.

Matt • 50:53
I still like Starbucks, don’t tell Hannah.

JT • 50:55
Uh I wouldn’t well if yeah. Hey, um, were all of your references just now food, Matt? Coffee. It might have been. Okay, I’m gonna go play pickleball this week. That’s gonna be my ecclesiastic model.

Matt • 51:12
I don’t know if you play golf or tennis or go to the beach, just Do something you enjoy for the glory of God this weekend. So that’s right. Sound good. All right, I’m gonna pray for us. Actually, you know what, JT, can you pray for us? Absolutely. Yeah.

JT • 51:23
Dear Heavenly Father, we we thank you for your word, which is complex. It is nuanced. And I’m so glad for that, because that is the way that life is. Life is not. linear. It is not A plus B equals C. It is not always so simple. As much as we would like it to be, as much as we would love for that paradigm to fit into the way that we think the world works, it’s often far more difficult, far more complicated. And that should like Matt said, rather than push us to make God fit into the way we think the world should be, that should expand our view. of you and all of your creation, which is good and is also hard to grasp sometimes, like vapor or smoke But what a blessing we have that you hold it all together, that you are sovereign, that even in the midst of the day of adversity or the day of prosperity. You’ve created the both of them. And that should be immensely comforting for those who Have put their faith and trust and hope in you. And so I’m so thankful for that. And I’m so thankful for how much you love us and uh have created love that we can experience as humans, physical love, spiritual love, emotional. Greek has all these different words for love, and you created all of those expressions and I’m so thankful that you love us so much that you sent your son to die for us. So we are so grateful to be able to read your word, to study it, to dig into it, to understand more of it. And we’re just thankful, we’re grateful, we’re thankful for how much you love us and how big, how wise you are. Pray all this in your name. Amen.

Matt • 53:28
Amen. Thanks so much, JT.

JT • 53:30
Thank you for having me. I appreciate it. Exactly halfway through the year, 26 episodes. Here we go.

Matt • 53:35
And as ever, thank you, Hannah.

Hannah • 53:36
Yeah, thanks, Matt.