What do you do after the bushfire has gone through and ravaged your house?
After the RFS has finished their mopping up operations, declaring any structures still standing as safe, or knocking down what is unsafe, you go back into the charred and blackened moonscape that was once your home and start the grievous task of scrambling around the rubble, cinders, dust, and ashes, to see if there is anything you can scrape up and salvage.
What do you do after the flood waters have inundated your home?
When the waters subside, and the SES says you won’t get electrocuted and it is safe to go back in, you enter your house, enduring the putrescent stench, to perform the physically and emotionally draining task of seeing what can be recovered, and then filling the skip bin with everything now water logged, damaged, spoilt, rotten, perished, and stinking.
In both cases, you ring your insurance company to see how much you are under-insured.
A problem to be solved needs to be properly analysed. A sickness to be cured needs to be properly diagnosed, and its true extent appreciated. Proper diagnosis is necessary before a meaningful treatment and solution can be suggested. And in the process, it will seem like it is getting worse before it gets better. As the lino is being pulled up, you find more and more white anted floorboards.
The teacher, Qohelet, can only be Solomon, the third king of united Israel. He is ruling from the ancient royal city of Jerusalem, whose occupation dates back to Melchizedek, 1000 years before David.
Qohelet, Ecclesiastes, Solomon, he has uncovered for those he has gathered, the common human predicament, the fundamental problem with our existence. It is extremely costly and painful for him, because it has been his life’s work. Even though he was beloved of God and had every temporal advantage and blessing his eyes could desire, he now understands the great and ultimate human problem: human work under the sun is necessary and painful, and death renders it all the wispiest and most elusive of vapours. God in Genesis 3 decreed painful toil for the man and pain in childbirth for the woman. Both these acts of judgment on the human pair are crowned with the punishment of death as the wages of sin. Thereafter, humans must toil to exist and flourish: it is both necessary and painful, and its joys and fruits are ephemeral.
Solomon gave himself to work in this world. He produced great building and other tangible projects. He sought to build his household through his harem. He found temporary joy in these pursuits (2:10). But as a lasting experience, he found that work under the sun is painful and vexatious and vapourous, a chasing after the wind (2:23). After the fleeting joy goes away, he experiences vexation.
This vexation comes in part because Qohelet has to leave everything for which he has toiled to others. They didn’t work for it, but they get it. And they might be foolish, and waste it (2:18-22). He has seen too much, he knows too much. Ignorance as bliss is not an option for Solomon. His God-given wisdom told him that he won’t get to enjoy what he has built, for all the pains it cost him. Humans die like the animals: “20 All go to one place. All are from pthe dust, and to dust all return” (3:20). Yet unlike the animals, God has put eternity into human hearts (3:11). That makes it worse.
To quote Paul Kelly: “You might have a happy family, nice house fine car. You might be successful in real estate, even be a football star. You might have a prime-time TV show, seen in every home and bar, but you can’t take it with you.”
The result of all this was that Solomon hated his life and his work: “So I hated life, because what is done under the sun was grievous to me, for all is vanity and a striving after wind” (2:17).
But where can he go? What can he do about it? There is no way out. Like a victim of a bushfire or a flood, he is left scraping around in the dust or the mud to salvage something from this disaster. He has invested too much in this pursuit. He seeks to mitigate his despair by finding something good to hang on to.
The mitigation and provisional solution he returns to is this: A man might enjoy his toil and its fruits in the present (3:22): Chapter 3 verse 22: 22 So I saw that there is rnothing better than that a man should rejoice in his work, for sthat is his lot (3:22).
Notice that the conclusion is gendered, because the curses of judgment in Genesis 3 are gendered. It reflects the original curse on the ground directed to the man. Inevitably, the woman is drawn into it, while also having to bear her own difficulties in child bearing, in which the man will also share—a little bit.
So Solomon’s mitigation of the disaster is: be present, be in the moment, practice mindfulness. Enjoy the work that you are doing, building your family, your household. Enjoy the process even if you can’t keep the end result. Take joy in the journey, even if the destination leaves you cold.
What he has come to is something of a first world solution. We might look at it as, Seek job satisfaction, even if the result doesn’t remain. But this provisional solution doesn’t last long at all.
It is like playing wack-a-mole: you bash one mole down, but then another will stick its head up.
Solomon is like a mechanic fixing an leaking engine. He manages to staunch one leak, but when he restarts the motor, four other leaks spout.
He wants to replace the lino to polish the floorboards, but he discovers he has to build a new floor with new footings. In my Moore College house, I had to get rid of the ancient carpet because of the kids’ allergies. But the lino and Masonite was holding the floor together. The termites had eaten the foorboards.
It was like my experience camping on the headland at Shellharbour. The wind was picking up our K-mart family tent, and the sandy soil wasn’t holding our plastic tent pegs. So I got out and walked around the tent, hammering the tent pegs back in, and when I made it around the whole tent, the ones I had first hammered in had already pulled up again.
As soon as Solomon has come to this provisional solution, he turns around to see a rebutter, the common oppression of humanity.
Chapter 4 verse 1:
Again I looked and saw all the oppression that was taking place under the sun: I saw the tears of the oppressed— and they have no comforter; power was on the side of their oppressors— and they have no comforter. (NIV)
In many ways, Solomon is looking at the by-products of his own single-minded pursuit to find what is meaningful. The great building works Solomon pursued required making forced labourers of his fellow Israelites (1 Kings 5:13-18). God had warned Israel about this eventuality, when they asked for a king. They wanted to be like everyone else (1 Samuel 8:10-20), and they got it: because absolute power corrupts. Solomon wasn’t thinking of his fellow Israelites under God when he pursued his experiment. So now Solomon is looking at one of the fruits of his rule—his appalling oppression of others.
1 Kings 5:13-18: 13 King Solomon drafted rforced labor out of all Israel, and the draft numbered 30,000 men. 14 And he sent them to Lebanon, 10,000 a month in shifts. They would be a month in Lebanon and two months at home. sAdoniram was in charge of the draft. 15 Solomon also thad 70,000 burden-bearers and 80,000 stonecutters in the hill country, 16 besides Solomon’s 3,300 uchief officers who were over the work, who had charge of the people who carried on the work.
Solomon pursued his experiment on the back of other humans made in God’s image. The common man bore the burden of the work and the heat of the day, while Solomon made all his grand plans and preparations from his throne room.
He was like Mao and other Communist leaders on the long march: they themselves did not march, but were carried on horses or by litters on the shoulders of others. They thought and said that they were doing the harder and more important job of thinking.
So Solomon sees oppression all around him: what does this do to Solomon’s mitigating solution—at least we can enjoy the moment in our work?
First, that wonderful enlightened mindfullness is not open to the majority of humanity. The reality is that life is hard, brutish, and short. Its hard to get job satisfaction and work life balance when you are a forced labourer, a slave in everything but name. There is no one to help you—no fair-work commission, no union rep, no award conditions. There is only being a slave under compulsion, working through the pain, blood, and sweat, until your body can do it no more. There are only your tears and pain. The king is the oppressor-in-chief. And there is the knowledge for the Israelites that this is what we asked God for. Solomon admits this in Ecclesiastes 5:8-9:
If you see the poor oppressed in a district, and justice and rights denied, do not be surprised at such things; for one official is eyed by a higher one, and over them both are others higher still. The increase from the land is taken by all; the king himself profits from the fields. (NIV)
There is the king, sitting on top of the pile, living off the fat of his kingdom, chowing down on the endowment of the see, being carried by his people, like Yertle the Turtle being lifted up on the backs of all the turtles beneath him.
Here is Solomon’s ‘under the sun” solution, in 4 verses 2-3:
And I declared that the dead, who had already died, are happier than the living, who are still alive. 3 But better than both is the one who has never been born, who has not seen the evil that is done under the sun.
It looks that way, under the sun. Better to be dead than to endure this suffering. That is why we put down dogs, or horses. That’s why people with only an “under the sun” perspective demand euthanasia: death is better than pain.
But in the end, this thinking is nihilistic. The reductio ad absurdum for this line of argument is that non-existence is better than existence with pain.
Verse 3: But better than both is the one who has never been born,who has not seen the evil that is done under the sun.
It is the wish that one never have been born. That right there is the teenager not wanting to do the dishes: “Well you’re part of this family, aren’t you?” Well, I didn’t ask to be born, did I?” as they return to their computer game. In this thinking, life is only about pain and pleasure. Because there is pain, or the possibility of pain, I will protest against God and wish I’d never been born. If I were God I would have done it differently. It is the fallacious argument that non-existence is better than existence because life has the experience of pain. There is no thought about the human agency through whom the pain has come—in this case, Solomon himself, or the first two humans, our parents who represented us in the garden. There is no thought that maybe God has a plan. There is no opening the way for the possibility that the pain and frustration of this world is training sent from the good God to prepare us for the world to come. There is no thought that God himself accepted and endured the experience of pain, when he took on human flesh in the person of his Son.
The reason the argument is folly is that it can never be. No one can choose non-existence. You can’t go back in time, despite what science fiction movies tell us. We are caught in existence. You are here now, in time and space, with rational thought, most of the time anyway. You didn’t choose to be.
And you and I cannot choose never having been. God has not given you that option. He has taken the “I wish I was never born” option away. God said you should be, because you are. Even if thumbs up their noses, and say to God, I choose chooses suicide, I choose voluntary assisted dying, I choose euthanasia, how do you know the post suicide state is not being.
Just like you didn’t get to choose whether to live or not, what makes you think you will get to choose non-existence after you kill yourself? You weren’t very good at choosing not being. That’s why you are here. What makes you think that you can then undo your own being and existing when you want? Sure, you might be successful in killing yourself, but that doesn’t guarantee your non-being, does it? You don’t have a very good track record at choosing not being, do you?
Just like you and and I don’t didn’t choose whether to have life or not, we don’t get to choose having eternal life or not? We only get to choose what it will be like, whether it is with God and around Jesus Christ, or it is apart from God in the fires of hell. That’s what Jesus, who came back from the death on the first easter Day, tells us.
Qohelet cannot escape God, though he conducts his thought experiment under the sun. God has put eternity into the heart of humans. And all through this book, he puts his periscope up, to peer above the clouds, and the sun. If God decides we must live, we will live. Choosing non-existence is as wishful thinking as choosing not to be born. So what you and I need to do is make peace with God and the reality that God has decided will be.
I like reading the last chapter first. I don’t like surprises. I like finding out what I’m in for. It has gotten me in trouble when I spoil the ending. I would much rather watch the Grand Final once I know that the colours I want to win has won. Then I will watch the game with all the satisfaction of getting the right ending with none of the needless and stupid anxiety that wastes life and stops me from doing something useful.
Here is the ending of Ecclesiastes, 12 verses 13 and 14:
Now all has been heard; here is the conclusion of the matter: Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the duty of all mankind. 14 For God will bring every deed into judgment, including every hidden thing, whether it is good or evil.
You don’t get to choose non existence: You are heading to judgement. God your maker is there. He will judge you with utter justice for what you have done. This should make you rightly anxious, because you, like me, are a sinner. You deserve more than death, but punishment for the sins you have committed against God and each other.
You know what this should do? It should drive you to Jesus Christ, the resurrection and the life. He promises that whoever believes in him shall not die but have eternal life. Whoever believes in him receives forgiveness of sin, but whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for God’s anger remains on him. That is living in the light of the reality of eternity.
And if you do that, you will have the resources to face the thorns and thistles of this life, including the oppression of your fellow human, if God in his sovereignty wills it. The new heaven and the new earth, and who we are in Christ, enables us to endure suffering. Here is Paul’s word to real, fair dinkum slaves in the Roman Empire:
21 Were you a slave when you were called? Don’t let it trouble you—although if you can gain your freedom, do so. 22 For the one who was a slave when called to faith in the Lord is the Lord’s freed person; similarly, the one who was free when called is Christ’s slave. 23 You were bought at a price; do not become slaves of human beings. (1 Corinthians 7:21-23)
5 Slaves, obey your earthly masters with respect and fear, and with sincerity of heart, just as you would obey Christ. 6 Obey them not only to win their favour when their eye is on you, but as slaves of Christ, doing the will of God from your heart. 7 Serve wholeheartedly, as if you were serving the Lord, not people, 8 because you know that the Lord will reward each one for whatever good they do, whether they are slave or free. (Ephesians 6:5-9)
In other words, in Christ our work is eternally significant. We are serving Jesus Christ in our daily toil, and we will receive an eternal reward. In God’s upside down kingdom, the last will be first and the first will be last.
But let’s return to Ecclesiastes “under the sun” perspective. Oppression takes away the “in the moment” enjoyment if all you can get is, enjoyment from the process of work. As he scrabbles around the ruin of his life’s work that it is under the sun, he sees something about the engine room of his own and other’s work.
Verse 4:
4 And I saw that all toil and all achievement spring from one person’s envy of another. This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind.
Search your feelings, you know this to be true.
All through your life, you’ve been placed on a bell curve, compared to your peers. Are you a 10, or mid, or ugly. You are being ranked, and assessed, to determine your worth, as a romantic partner, a sportsman, a bread-winner. The fact that people try to drop out merely proves the point: the can’t take the heat, so they get out of the kitchen. It doesn’t change the reality. It works that way in geo-politics. Hitler says, “I want that thing”: Austria or the Sudetenland. The other nations say, no, you can’t have that thing. Hitler takes it, because he is big enough and strong enough. So the UK and France say, OK you can have that thing, but no more. Then they all catch their breath, and Hitler says, “I want Poland”. Rinse and repeat. That explains Ukraine, the Gaza conflict, Sudan, Nigeria, and all the other ones we don’t hear about. That explains why you and I are jealous of your work mate, your friend, your brother or sister, the mean girls, the cool kids, the successful.
It's absurd because the person we are jealous of is as miserable as we are, maybe even more so. The person you envy is probably jealous of you. We are going to see this of Solomon himself. He will say in chapter 5 verse 12:
The sleep of a laborer is sweet, whether they eat little or much, but as for the rich, their abundance permits them no sleep.
Poor little rich man: Solomon has his sleepless nights thinking about all his stuff, looking after it, managing it, worrying about it. He is jealous of the forced labourers who are tired at night and drift off into the joy of sleep.
And you can’t opt out of toil. In the wisdom literature, there is the sluggard, the person who won’t work, the bludger, the shirker, who won’t pull his weight. And he emergers here in verse 5:
5 Fools fold their hands and ruin themselves.
You can’t opt out of work, just like you can’t opt out of life. You can’t opt out of the pain of work even if you are wealthy. God has willed work, so that is what we must do, whether in the world or in the home. He who will not work, neither shall he eat. Laziness or dishonesty is not the way to deal with toil. And having more stuff means that Solomon has seen the pain of both wealth and poverty. Poverty leads to pain, and wealth leads to a different pain.
Who can handle the disaster of the bushfire better? The one who owns the homestead, lands, shed, and livestock ravaged the fire, or the jolly swagman, who travels light, stashes a jumbuck in his tuckerbag, packs his billy, and tramps five miles down the track. Who can handle the flood better: the man whose home is inundated and his worldly goods ruined, or the poor fisherman, with his tinnie and butane burner, who rows further down the river, and puts in his line in for his evening meal? Both ways of life have challenges in the uncertainty of life, but the one with less escapes the disaster more easily.
So Solomon looks to the happy mean, not too much nor too little. Verse 6:
6 Better one handful with tranquillity than two handfuls with toil and chasing after the wind.
Given that you can’t keep it, and it hurts to get it, maybe just get what you need, and that will be enough.
Mind you, this is beyond Solomon, and every rich person. Once the rich person has got all their stuff, the house and his household, his wives and his children and servants, he is bound to it. He has acquired it, and it now owns him. He has shaped his way of life, and his way of life shapes. All his choices mean that he is the wealthy person. And he must keep peddaling the bicycle, keep being a wealthy person, to sustain it all. But in his wisdom and as he passes on his wisdom, Solomon sees the benefit of the happy mean, his daily bread, and living lighter in the world.
Agur son of Jakeh likewise expanded on this insight, with the wisdom God gave him, in Proverbs 30:8-9:
Keep falsehood and lies far from me; give me neither poverty nor riches, but give me only my daily bread. 9 Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you and say, ‘Who is the Lord?’ Or I may become poor and steal, and so dishonour the name of my God.
In other words, “give us this day our daily bread”, not too much, nor too little. Give us tomorrow’s bread, so I don’t have to worry about tomorrow, but I don’t need bigger barns.
Jesus, of course, sharpens this insight:
31 So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33 But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own. (Matthew 6:31-34)
Or as Paul said:
7 For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. 8 But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that. 9 Those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. 10 For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. (1 Timothy 6:7-10)
So oppression and pain is terrible and tearful, minimising the meaningfulness of enjoying one’s work. Being the slave driver is horrible because it is sleepless nights for you. Insatiable desire is stupid, because everyone is afraid of missing out and envying everyone else, and the reality is that the rich aren’t happy and the poor aren’t happy. So it’s good to pursue just what you need, not too much, nor too little.
Then Solomon the motor mechanic sees another leak spout from his life’s work. Another mole pops up needing to be wacked. That is, it’s hard to be a solo man, you have to take the lead and let the other’s follow. He turns to see the futility and sadness of not having fellowship and companionship in one’s labour.
Solomon may have been observing one of his citizens who was all alone. He have been observing one of his many father’s-in-laws who were kings of the surrounding nations, for Solomon had 700 hundred wives of royal birth (1 Kings 11:3). Maybe Solomon himself knew something of this loneliness in his pursuits. For all his thousand-woman harem, he lacks real companionship. For all the sycophancy and fawning, great dictators like Solomon are profoundly lonely, because it’s lonely at the top. Ecclesiastes 4:7-8.
7 Again I saw something meaningless under the sun: 8 There was a man all alone; he had neither son nor brother. There was no end to his toil, yet his eyes were not content with his wealth. “For whom am I toiling,” he asked, “and why am I depriving myself of enjoyment?” This too is meaningless— a miserable business!
Notice that the labourer has neither son nor brother: that is, he doesn’t have a partner in the work he is doing. He is not talking about marriage. I have preached on this section at weddings, but that is only a secondary application. Solomon here is talking about business partnerships. Here, a wife is necessary if one was to have a son who can help in the work. But a brother will do. Not very romantic, is it? But with a thousand wives, Solomon was no romantic.
So the provisional solution is, get a business partner.
Don’t go out in the fields alone, if you can help it. Don’t cut wood, haul stone, and labour alone. Don’t cry alone. Cry with a mate. Misery loves company. Work in pairs. Then you’ve got someone to do first aid when you fall into the pit you dug, or when you are bitten by a snake, or you are injured by the stones you quarry or the logs you split (10:8-9). When you are out at night or in the middle of winter pursuing something the king fancies, then you can huddle together to keep warm. Or when robbers or wild animals come at you, you can stand back to back to defend yourself.
Are you feeling the job satisfaction yet? At one level, this advice is just Solomon preserving his labour force as he drives them on in seeking ever more luxurious and exotic pleasures that he hopes will satisfy him, but haven’t.
At best, Solomon is saying that group work is better than working alone. I hope you liked “group work” at school, because that is the mitigation Solomon is suggesting. Enjoy the group work, even if the project is ultimately meaningless. I never liked group work. First there’s the power struggle to work out who will lead the group. Then there are the disagreements. Then there’s the inevitably unfair distribution of labour. And someone ends up shirking.
Well, that’s the problem I see with Solomon’s provisional solution. But Solomon sees another problem: yet another leak spouting from his life’s work.
Solomon gives a story about an old and foolish king who found a second: a wise but poor youth. Solomon knew a foolish old king when he saw one: as an old man, he himself flagrantly disobeyed the law of the king (Deut 17:14-20): Solomon saw a foolish old king when he looked in the mirror. But this story may recount the experiences of one of his many father’s in law, who were foreign kings.
The youth is the king’s second: perhaps as Joseph was to Pharaoh. So here is an example of two working together: the old foolish king working with a wise youth—I say the youth is the king’s second because that is a more literal translation of the word the NIV translates as ‘successor’ in 4:15. The wise youth was universally followed, but then those who come later didn’t rejoice in him. In other words, here is a king who found a second, who was wise, but in the end this wise second is not accepted by those who come later. The partnership looked promising, but the second ultimately was rejected, so what looked good came to nothing. That is consistent with the ephemeral nature of existence under the sun.
In the New Testament, both singleness and partnership are good. In terms of this world and current existence and marriage, the man and woman cannot fulfill their mandate to fill the earth without each other. It is not good for the man to be alone. Marriage is good. But because of the world to come, and the shortness of the time, singleness is better than marriage. That is the teaching and personal example of both Jesus and Paul. Yes, Jesus sent his disciples out two by two. And yes, Jesus bore the wrath of God alone on the cross. There is a place for both. A Chinese proverbs says, if you need to go quickly, go alone: if you need to go far, take a friend.
The final section of our passage today warns us against kicking an own goal when it comes to keeping the benefits of toil. There are so many things to trip us up, that Solomon warns against a foolish thing.
People in the Old Testament sometimes made vows to God: It is sometimes framed as effectively doing a deal with God. God, if you do this for me, I will do that. It was often a way people in desperate situations sought to get God to give them the thing that they wanted.
Jacob did this when he was running away from Esau: exhausted, he sleeps and sees the stairway to heaven in a dream. He wakes and says to God, If you like after me, give me food and clothes, and bring me back to my father’s house, you will be my God and I will tithe to you (Gen 28:20-22). Jepthah tragically vowed to give as a burnt offering the first thing that comes to greet him when he returns from victory (Judges 11:30-35). The barren Hannah, deep in distress, promises to give a firstborn son, if God would give it, back to God to serve at the temple (1 Samuel 1:11-13).
Unsurprisingly, Solomon advises his congregation not to make vows. In their pain and difficulty, God’s people should come to God’s meeting place to listen, not to make a vows. Because if you make a vow, you better fulfill it.
The reason Solomon gives for paying the vow is of a piece with his endeavour in Ecclesiastes thus far. Solomon is trying to mitigate the tragedy and disaster that fallenness and death have brought upon human toil and work. And here is another opportunity for God to render all our endeavours vapour—an unfulfilled vow.
Ecclesiastes 5:6-7: Why should God be angry at what you say and destroy the work of your hands? 7 Much dreaming and many words are meaningless. Therefore fear God.
Solomon is advocates acting so as to preserve the fragile fruits of human toil. An unfulfilled vow is an own goal, it is inviting God to destroy the work of your hands. So you need to pay your vow as a type of insurance to keep what you’ve got.
Solomon of course is right that people should keep their promises. And he is right to advocate that people not vow. Jesus takes a similar view: Jesus says do not swear, do not make oaths.
34 But I tell you, do not swear an oath at all: either by heaven, for it is God’s throne; 35 or by the earth, for it is his footstool; or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the Great King. 36 And do not swear by your head, for you cannot make even one hair white or black. 37 All you need to say is simply “Yes,” or “No”; anything beyond this comes from the evil one.
In other words, don’t swear oaths, because God is sovereign and in control, and you cannot control anything, not even the hairs on your head. Don’t seek to control God and the future by making vows and making deals with God. Instead, be a person committed to truth, saying what you mean, and trusting God as both sovereign and good.
Solomon does not want to walk away from his life’s work. He is heroically trying to salvage meaning for his toil under the sun. But under the sun, toil cannot be salvaged. It is the vapour that he has said it is.
However, there is not just ‘under the sun’ existence. There is beyond the sun, heavenly reality. And we have access to that in Christ. In Jesus, the heavenly world has broken into the present. The resurrection life has come into the present on the first Easter Day. We have been raised with Christ and seated with him in the heavenly realms. The eternity that God placed in our hearts will be satisfied. God will bring us into judgment. This salvages everything we do, think, or say under the sun. Everything we do has eternal significance.
So as Jesus said, “Seek first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness, and all these things, the necessities of life, will be given to you as well”.
Or as Paul says, in 1 Corinthians 15:58: Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labour in the Lord is not in vain.
Or Colossians 3:23-24: “23 Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters, 24 since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving. ”
Let’s pray.