- I hated all my toil in which I toil under the sun, seeing that I must leave it to the man who will come after me, and who knows whether he will be wise or a fool? Yet he will be master of all for which I toiled and used my wisdom under the sun. This also is vanity. -

Shots fired Rehoboam!
Get it? Solomon’s heir?
Guys…?
Okay, back to why you’re here. As we discussed Tuesday, part 2 of chapter 2 deals primarily with this problem of what can my children do after I’m gone.
The answer is grim and leaves Solomon in a dark place, which then fuels his next thought, “What if I’ve put all this effort forward and whoever rules Israel after me is a fool?”
Your first question might be, “Why does that matter? Didn’t we say there’s no advantage to being a fool or a wise man?”
We did. In respect to meaning.
In respect to wisdom acting as a light? It still holds that advantage. It’s immediately beneficial that our kings be wise rather than fools, even if it doesn’t matter in the long run.
Hold onto that thought. We’ll get back to it in a future post.
So how does it matter? The fool will waste everything. He could destroy years of progress.
He could undo the work of David. He could undo the temple. He could split the kingdom in half.
To those who know their Bible, you’re probably already aware that after Solomon died, all of this came to pass sooner or later.
Now, how does this relate to us? Last I checked, no one around here is running a kingdom.
That’s right. We still have heirs. Families throughout generations which we are the end product of, that we’re responsible for maintaining and building upon.
I grew up in a private Christian school. Now, I was oblivious to most of it, but there were plenty of students getting away with all kinds of shenanigans.
It was all hush hush, behind the scenes, and under everybody’s noses. You kept it away from parents, teachers, and well people like me.
Some kids had their fun, got to other side of it, and grew up. Hooray for them.
Some, well they didn’t get so lucky.
Kids showing up high to class, someone got pregnant, etc. It caught up to them, and a darling was turned into a how-could-they.
Rumors, rumors, rumors followed by gossip. Who was at fault? Well, the kid for sure but the parents got a huge chunk of the blame.
The real culprit? Vanity.
We all demand perfect lives with a perfect spouse and perfect children. Sometimes we demand God give them. Sometimes we tyrannize them into being, removing beauty from our lives.
The end result of the latter? Slaves who perform out of fear or rebels making their own rules.
The truth? Parents, kids, and you all fall short, i.e. you missed the perfect bus with everybody else.
What then? You have been given/entrusted/blessed with what you have.
That means love it like Christ would! Take on the suffering and sin for others as if they were your own, even if you have to forgive them more than seven times.
To the church? Calm down. Stop trying to look so perfect.
We’re Christians, not gods.