Welcome to a year in the Bible with daily grace. The Bible tells one big story of

redemption and we want to spend five minutes every day journeying through the Bible from start to finish, and exploring how all of it

points to Jesus.

Hello friends. Welcome to a year in the Bible with Daily Grace. My name is Katie and today we are beginning one of the most interesting books the Bible. Ecclesiasties. We'll study

chapters one through three together today. The author of Ecclesiasties is

technically unknown but most believe it's Solomon, King Davidson.

Ecclesiasties is a book of wisdom and poetry.

Tackling questions like,

what is the meaning of life and how do we find satisfaction?

It's a book of weights and measures as Solomon seems to explore mysteries

of good and evil, wisdom and folly, pleasure and judgment. In chapter one we see Solomon referred to himself as the teacher.

When I was a kid, my granddad would sit back in his recliner, pipe in hand, and tell us stories

of his youth, and lessons learned between puffs of smoke.

This is exactly how I picture Solomon while reading Ecclesiasties.

He seems to be reflecting on his life, sharing with us all that he's observed along the way. He dives right into a phrase that we will see repeated

39 times throughout Ecclesiasties. Absolute futility. Everything is futile. Other translations say vanity. This can be translated to meaningless or a vapor.

The teacher paints a word picture for us describing the things of this world as a vapor or smoke. We see what we desire before us, but just when we reach out to grab it, it has no substance for us to hold on to. Life is empty apart from God. Solomon continues his word

picture for us in verses 4 through 12, describing the world as cyclical and repetitive.

The sun rises and it sets.

The streams continually flow to the seas.

There's nothing new under the sun.

He zeros in on the experience of man. We are never satisfied. We will not be remembered after we die.

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