Whatever thy hand findeth to do, do with thy might; for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in Sheol, whither thou goest.
Solomon has just been looking at death, which comes to everyone alike. Now he turns from that dark fact to a command: work now, with all your strength. That raises two questions. Why should a short life make us work harder? And what do the words about Sheol teach about the dead?
The book argues from what a person can see in this world. One writer shows why a life that ends in darkness leads to a call for urgency:
Death is the end of all here below; but in Him is life, and those who believe have it in Christ. Before He came, death could only be dreadful. Even for a believer, the light beyond was that dim. In those days this present life was the whole field of knowledge and activity, and death closed it in darkness… So the call was to be earnest in what lay before each person.
The lesson here is practical. It is not a description of what happens to the soul after death:
So the moral is: be busy now. Work stops in the grave. There is no wisdom there for this busy scene, no heart that plans, no planning head. All true in its way. But this was man's musings, not divine revelation of the state of the dead at all, nor given as such. Had you asked this man what he knew of that, he would have said, as he did say, Who knows? "Who knows whether the spirit of man goes upward?" He saw the dust laid in the tomb, and that was all he knew. The rest was conjecture, nothing more.
Another writer answers those who use the verse to prove the dead are unconscious:
Yes, but this is NOT revelation. It is the inspired record of what Solomon summed up about his knowledge of things "under the sun." He was looking at things as they affected his work, knowledge and wisdom in the affairs of this life. For people alive on earth, such things do not reach beyond this life.
Nothing starts or finishes in the grave. So the most important business of a life will not wait:
You die only once, and after death there is nothing left to do. If you die without repenting, there is no repenting in the grave. If you leave your work at death half done, there is no finishing it in the grave.
Solomon tells his reader to enjoy the present. One writer shows what shadows that enjoyment, and what later removed the shadow:
Yes, let him enjoy himself in the present, but there is "a dead fly in the ointment" (10:1). The dark future is looming up. Days of darkness are coming for him — that is the grave. Human reason, philosophy and science cannot bring light into this baffling darkness, and nothing else can either. "All that comes is vanity!" But thank God, through revelation we know more. Some believe what God has revealed, and believe on the One God has sent. He is the propitiation for our sins, and He conquered death and the grave. For them, "all that comes is glory!"
The command covers your daily work. But that energy needs the right aim:
Yes — working hard honours God. A lazy Christian is a disgrace to the coat he wears. But it is one thing to do our work with all our heart. It is another to be so taken up with it that Christ is shut out… Start by running your business as the Lord's steward. Work for His glory first, not for your own profit. Then the dull routine of business has a halo of glory around it. Ordinary actions take on a dignity that makes a crown and sceptre look like nothing at all.
Elsewhere the same phrase is used to define how wide "business" reaches:
The "business," I suppose, means whatever might claim a believer's just attention — "whatever your hand finds to do." The wisdom of urging simply "not slothful," as to such matters, is most obvious. On the other hand, the word is "fervent in spirit," not in business. The one refers to the outward, the other to the inner life… We are to redeem the time or opportunity, but to serve the Lord.
Solomon's motive was that everything stops at death. There is a motive that runs the other way:
We know, with Solomon, that what God does He does for ever. It is certain therefore that if God establishes upon us the work of our hands it will be forever. Just think of it! You and I have at this moment the opportunity of putting our hands to work, the results of which will never disappear. The work of kings and statesmen, of conquerors and diplomats and builders of big business, is nothing compared with it.
- Vantage — The verse looks at life "under the sun," where death closes all activity in darkness. That view is what makes the call urgent.
- Limit — "No work in Sheol" teaches be busy now. It does not reveal the state of the dead. Solomon himself asked, "Who knows?"
- Urgency — No half-done work gets finished in the grave, and no one repents there. That business belongs to today.
- Light — Solomon saw only coming days of darkness. For those who believe in the One who conquered death and the grave, "all that comes is vanity" becomes "all that comes is glory."
- Might — Work with all your heart, as the Lord's steward and for His glory. What God establishes through your hands will never disappear.
I returned, and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to the intelligent, nor yet favour to men of knowledge; but time and chance happeneth to them all.
The writer of Ecclesiastes looks around at the world he can see, and it does not add up. The fastest runner loses the race. The strongest army loses the battle. The clever man goes hungry. Two questions follow: is human effort worth anything, and is life ruled by luck?
The verse first says where the writer was standing when he looked: "under the sun." One commentator explains what that phrase shuts out:
What is "under the sun" is on the earth. There is, of course, something above the sun — that is heaven, the heavenly things. So Ecclesiastes deals with earthly things, with what man does apart from God... In all his searching and describing of the things under the sun, the writer makes it clear that he does not depend on divine revelation, on what is above the sun. He reaches his results by the light that nature gives. His resources are within himself.
So the bleakness of the verse is not God's last word on the subject. It is an honest report from a man limited to what he can observe:
This book gives us man's experience, and man's reasoning, about everything that happens under the sun. Remember that, and the passages that look like unbelief cause no difficulty. Man's experience is bound to be unbelieving. He admits his ignorance, because experience can know nothing beyond what is seen. But the answer to every moral problem lies above and beyond what is seen.
The verse names five people with real advantages: the swift, the strong, the wise, the intelligent, and those with knowledge. Each one still fails. One writer reads the verse as a second trouble beyond the death already in view, then blocks the wrong conclusion about wisdom:
From verse 11 he follows another line of thought. It is not only that the end is so dark and so near. It is that the course meanwhile is so uncertain that no advantages can make it safe... The season God provides may never come, and without it the swift and the strong, the wise and the prudent and the instructed all fail. Ruin follows instead of the prize... Is wisdom useless, then? Far from it.
Does "time and chance" leave room for blind luck? One writer answers that question about this verse. He puts the result in God's hand and leaves the work in ours:
In Ecclesiastes it seems to mean that, with all man's efforts to achieve something, the outcome does not always depend on the strongest, and so on. God rules over all. He does not always give returns for the greatest efforts, but according to His will. We have to work and leave the result with God. A fine preacher works hard at preaching the gospel with no result. Then a simple man struggles through a basic talk, and someone confesses the Lord. We ought to do our best in all our service but, as Paul said, "God gave the increase."
One commentator turns the verse from a complaint into a comfort. He reads it through Jacob, who prevailed but was left limping:
We must always keep in the place of weakness, for it is the place of power... We have no resources in ourselves. Jacob had gained the victory through his dislocated hip. He limped on that hip, yet he had prevailed. "The race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong." He now had to meet Esau with a weakened muscle. But it taught him not to trust in his own natural strength, but in the One who had weakened him and made him strong.
The verse describes a world where nothing lines up as it should. One commentator names the cause of that disorder, and points to where the answer lies:
Sin has ruined and confused everything here below. To look to the One above the ruin, Who stays the same for ever, was the only wisdom and righteousness. Now that He has revealed Himself in His Son, this is far clearer. Death is the end of everything here below; but in Him is life, and those who believe have it in Christ.
- Under — The verse reports only what a man can see from ground level. "Under the sun" means earth without revelation. Its findings are honest observation, not God's final word.
- Unsecured — Speed, strength, wisdom, money and standing are real advantages. None of them can guarantee the prize. Without the season God provides, every one of them fails.
- Undeserved — "Time and chance" is not blind luck. God rules over all. He gives results according to His will, not according to who tried hardest.
- Unreserved — Give full effort anyway. Do your best in every service, then leave the result with God, who gives the increase.
- Upward — Sin has confused everything down here. The only wisdom is to look to the One above the ruin, Who stays the same for ever and has now made Himself known in His Son. In Him is life.