Sermon Tone Analysis

Before you begin your Bible study, as a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, be sure you have named your sins privately to God the Father.

If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

(Known, Unknown and Forgotten sins) (1Jn 1:9)

 

 

You will then be in fellowship with God, Filled with God the Holy Spirit and ready to learn Truth from the Word of God.

 

"God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in Spirit and Truth," (John 4:24)

 

 

 

 

*Apes and Peacocks *

A study from the book of Ecclesiastes

 

       *The Magnificence of Solomon *

     It’s very interesting that right in the middle of the Bible there is an “income tax return.”

It isn’t very long, but it is rather impressive.

Sources of income are shown and then some entertainment items, apparently to be deducted.

/Now the weight of gold which came to Solomon in one year was 666 talents of gold./

(2Ch 9:13)

 In our monetary standard, this adds up to $20,479,500; and even by modern standards and inflation, this is not bad!

/“Beside that which chapmen and merchants brought...”/ “Chapman” is an old English word for people who were conquered and taxed.

Solomon engaged in various businesses, and the merchantmen that were in business with him also brought in money./

/

/     Besides that which the traders and merchants brought; and all the kings of Arabia and the governors of the country brought gold and silver to Solomon.

King Solomon made 200 large shields of beaten gold, using 600 shekels of beaten gold on each large shield./

(2Ch 9:14-15)

     When you get so much money, you have to do something with it.

The ancient Greeks had a custom of converting a large accumulation of gold into shields and spears or other paraphernalia.

Following this custom, Solomon made /“300 shields of beaten gold, using three hundred shekels of gold on each shield, and the king put them in the house of the forest of Lebanon.”/

(2Ch 9:16) This was one of his out-of-town hunting lodges.

/Moreover the king made a great throne of ivory, and overlaid it with pure gold./

(2Ch 9:17)

     The man about whom this is written was a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Obviously, he was the most glamorous king that the Jews ever had.

While we do not know exactly when he got out of fellowship with God, there are one or two passages of Scripture that give us some indication.

One thing is clear from verse 17: an ivory and gold throne was not for comfort.

For this, he would have chosen something like a rocking chair!

Anyone who makes for himself an ivory chair overlaid with gold does so for one reason only — for a status symbol to satisfy the ego.

Now the throne itself was only a part of it./

/

/     And there were six steps to the throne, with a footstool in gold attached to the/ /throne.../ (2Ch 9:18)

In other words, if you got that close to Solomon, you got there by kneeling.

That footstool was for people to kneel in front of him!

/...And arms on each side of the seat, and two lions standing beside the arms.

Twelve lions were standing there on the six steps on the one side and on the other; nothing like it was made for any other kingdom./

(2Ch 9:18-19)

     Solomon also went in for some rather beautiful appointments for his banquet tables./

/

/     All King Solomon's drinking vessels were of gold, and all the vessels of the house of the forest of Lebanon were of pure gold; silver was not considered valuable in the days of Solomon.

For the king’s ships went to Tarshish (Spain, one of the famous smeltering centers of the ancient world) with the servants of Huram; (Hiram, king of Tyre) every three years once came the ships of Tarshish bringing gold, and silver, ivory, and apes and peacocks”/ (2Ch 9:20-21)

Not elephants and lions, not tigers and pythons — but APES AND PEACOCKS!

Can’t you just see one of these ships unloading?

Peacocks strutting down the gangplank, each with a slave leading it; and large cages with apes scratching, howling (For they are not people, and never will be — there is a great gap between us)

     The apes and peacocks were the ultimate in status symbols, the final touch in Solomon’s extravaganzas./

/

/     So King Solomon became greater than all the kings of the earth in riches and wisdom.

/(2Ch 9:22)

     Now, this Genius wisdom was from God:

/     “And all the kings of the earth sought the presence of Solomon, to hear his wisdom that God had put/ /in his heart.

(Mind)/ (2Ch 9:23)

*A Guarantee for Happiness *

     As Solomon had approached the throne, he recognized immediately the magnitude of the task ahead of him.

He sought the Lord, and offered burnt offerings unto Him at the brazen altar of the Tabernacle.

(2Ch 1:6) As a result, God appeared to him and offered him whatever he should ask.

(2Ch 1:7) Solomon answered, /“Give me now wisdom and knowledge, that I may go out and come in/ /before this people:  for who can rule this great people of Yours?”/(2Ch 1:10) God was pleased with his request and granted him his desire above anything he could have dreamed:      

     /“Wisdom and knowledge have been granted to you.

And I will give you riches and wealth and honor, such as none of the kings who were before you has possessed nor those who will come after you.”/ (2Ch 1:12)

     Then God added a Promise, which would be a guarantee for happiness: /“If you walk in My Ways, keeping My Statutes and Commandments, as your father David walked, then I will prolong your days.”

/(1Ki 3:14) Solomon was to function daily under the “grace apparatus perception — Operation Z” that is, he was to take in God's Thoughts, transfer it by faith to his human spirit, and exhale it toward God and toward man.

Although Solomon was granted human genius and Divine Spiritual wisdom, like the Lord Jesus Christ, (Luk 2:40-52) it had to grow and develop under Bible teaching, just as ours does.

(1Ki 2:1-4; Prov 1:1-6)

     Solomon started out great: from Divine Thinking in his human spirit, he began to erect an “edification complex — Temple” in his soul.

He was grace oriented: “Who am I, “he said, “that I should build a house for Him..?” (2Ch 2:6) He had the mastery of the details of life: “Because....

You had this in mind, and did not ask for riches, wealth or honor...” (2Ch 1:11) He had a relaxed mental attitude, free from mental attitude sins: “Not one word has failed of all His good Promise, which He Promised; (1Ki 8:56) and he admonished his people, “Let your heart therefore be wholly devoted to the LORD our God, to walk in His Statutes and to keep His Commandments, as at this day.”

(1Ki 8:61)

     He demonstrated the capacity to love God when he determined “to build a house for the name of the Lord.”

(2Ch 2:1) capacity for friendship; (1Ki 2:7) and he even had the capacity to love the opposite sex until promiscuity destroyed it.

Finally, we see the “top floor” of his edification complex, (Spiritual life) — in the statement of the Queen of Sheba in, (2Ch 9:7-8) — his inner happiness: “How blessed are your men, how blessed are these your servants who stand before you continually and hear your wisdom.

Blessed be the LORD your God who delighted in you...” In other words, the Queen of Sheba realized that it is the Spiritual wisdom of God which makes people happy.

She saw the reflected glory of God through Solomon’s Spiritual life, and she believed in the Lord! (Matt 12:42)

     Unhappily, there came a time when Solomon’s head was turned, and he went on a carnal binge./

“They brought every man his gift, articles of silver and gold, garments, weapons, spices, horses and mules, so much year by year.

Now Solomon had 4,000 stalls for horses, (Quite a rancher!) and chariots and 12,000 horsemen, and he stationed them in the chariot cities and with the king in Jerusalem.

He was the ruler over all the kings from the Euphrates River even to the land of the Philistines, and as far as the border of Egypt.

The king made silver as common as stones in Jerusalem, and he made cedars as plentiful as sycamore trees that are in the lowland.

And they were bringing horses for Solomon from Egypt and from all countries.”

(/2Ch 9:24-28)

     From this passage, you get the impression that Solomon was not only rich, but getting richer by the minute: yet somewhere along the line, the mental attitude sin of pride started him on a downward path.

Now remember, he is born again; he is a saved man; but he got out of fellowship and failed to rebound.

I don’t know exactly where or when; but I can tell you he was out from the “apes and peacocks.”

Now there is nothing wrong with having an income of twenty million dollars a year — even for a believer — provided he comes by it honestly.

It is not a sin to be rich; but  it is sinful to desire to be rich; you have to be careful that money doesn’t turn your head, form going all the way to Spiritual maturity.

(1Ti 6:9-10) Two things got to Solomon, money and women!

He got out of fellowship — had a thousand women and twenty million a year income, and the continued result was that he was not functioning by the “grace apparatus for perception, — Operation Z” and the erection of his edification complex came to a screeching halt; but his human genius stayed with him!

(Eccles 1:13; Eccles 2:9)

*The Grace Apparatus for Perception *

     God gives every believer a “grace apparatus” by which to learn and understand Divine Thinking and by which to live in the angelic conflict.

Although it was somewhat different in the Old Testament, every believer in the New Covenant Age is the recipient of the human spirit, Spiritual life and the indwelling of God the Holy Spirit, at the moment of Salvation.

This is strictly grace; no believer earns or deserves such a gift!

The human spirit is the means of storing and using Truth; the Holy Spirit is the means of understanding Truth.

God has further provided by grace the completed canon of Scripture, which is the “Mind of Christ.”

(1Co 2:16) He has authorized the local church and or computer, (Heb 10:25) and the gift of pastor-teacher, (Eph 4:11) to communicate Divine Thoughts to the assembly by Isagogics, (Historical background) Categories (Salvation, sin, Spirituality, carnality, etc.) and Exegesis.

(Etymological and syntactical word meanings from the original languages)

     It is generally assumed that human I.Q.

also determines the ability to learn in the Spiritual realm.

But grace would not be grace if every believer did not have the same ability to learn and understand Truth.

The difference in believers is in volition — whether they are positive or negative toward Thinking with Truth!

When the grace apparatus is functioning properly, Truth goes into the perceptive lobe of the mind by the filling of God the Holy Spirit; here it becomes “gnosis” or knowledge understood.

This, however, is not the final target in “Operation Z”; for at this point you neither agree nor disagree — you merely understand what is communicated.

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