Solomon in the only Pilgrim Psalm (Psalm 127) he wrote, challenged us three times in two verses, not to live a “vain” or empty, worthless, or wasted life. John Piper wrote a book entitled Don’t Waste Your Life. In chapter three, he wrote of two women who some might consider to have wasted their lives. In April 2000, Ruby Eliason and Laura Edwards were killed in Cameroon, West Africa. Ruby was over eighty. Single all her life, she poured it out for one great thing: to make Jesus Christ known among the unreached, the poor, and the sick. Laura was a widow, a medical doctor, pushing eighty years old, and serving at Ruby’s side in Cameroon. The brakes failed, the car went over a cliff, and they were both killed instantly…. Was that a tragedy?
Then Piper writes of real tragedy. Consider a story from the February 1998 edition of Reader’s Digest, which tells about a couple who took early retirement from their jobs in the Northeast five years ago when he was 59 and she was 51. Now they live in Punta Gorda, Florida, where they cruise on their 30-foot trawler, play softball and collect shells. At first, when I read it, I thought it might be a joke. A spoof on the American Dream. But it wasn’t. Tragically, this was the dream: Come to the end of your life---your one and only precious God-given life---and let the last great work of your life, before you give an account to your Creator, be this: playing softball and collecting shells. Picture them before Christ at the great day of judgment: “Look, Lord. See my shells.”
The couple falls into the first of two ways Solomon states that a person can waste his/her life. The first is to be lazy or doing what is not important. Solomon warns against this slothful lifestyle in Proverbs (10:4; 6:6-8; 20:4). Solomon contrasts the wise and the fool in different ways in Proverbs. There are the adulterous or foolish woman contrasted with the virtuous or wise woman. Also there is the lazy sluggard who is a fool and the diligent is a wise. The other way a person can waste his/her life is do important tasks in the energy of the flesh not for God’s glory. This is the wasted life that Solomon warns against in Psalm 127.
When Solomon refers to “house” in verse one, he could be referring to God’s House or Your House or to both. He could be referring to God’s House because the pilgrims were singing these “songs of degrees” or “songs of ascent” as they travelled to worship in God’s House in Jerusalem (122:1). Solomon also could be referring to Your House or family because in verses three to five, he writes of “children” whom we, with God’s help, should make into useful arrows in God’s service.
We see this same play on words in 2 Samuel 7, when David desired to build God a “house” (7:1-3) that He was worthy of. But then God revealed to the Nathan the prophet that God was going to build David’s house or family which included the coming Messiah (7:11, 16). How Solomon built God’s house and his house are recorded in Solomon’s biography in 1 Kings 3-11?
First, Solomon challenges us not to waste our life but invest it in building God’s house or God’s work.
The biographer of Solomon in 1 Kings 9:10 records that Solomon spent twenty years building God’s house and his house. We could add at great expense. Fifty percent of Solomon’s biography is dedicated to describing Solomon’s building projects. It is estimated that it took 200,000 workers seven years to build Solomon’s temple. Solomon spared no expense in building God’s house.
In contrast to Solomon building God’s house, Walter Kaiser, Jr. in The Journey Isn’t Over: The Pilgrim Psalms for Life’s Challenges and Joys wrote about Nicolae and Elena Ceausescu, who were the tandem dictators over Romania for twenty-four years. For the twenty-four years, the dictators stole from the starving people to build their eight hundred million-dollar, 150 room gold plated mansion. Fifteen thousand workers labored for years to build their personal house and private hideaway with gold fixtures in the bathroom, gold finger bowls, with gold picture frames. When the communist’s dictators were executed in 1989, the completion was still four years away. They never lived in the extravagant villa one day. They labored in vain. They wasted their lives and God’s resources selfishly on themselves. We must choose to serve God for his glory, not ours, and in dependence on God and not in the energy of the flesh.
Next, Solomon challenges us to not waste our life in building our house or family.
The record of how Solomon failed in this area is in 1 Kings 11:1-4. In 1 Kings 3:3, the author notes at the beginning of Solomon’s forty-year reign that “Solomon loved the Lord.” The author bookended Solomon’s biography in 1 Kings 11:1 by saying the opposite: “But king Solomon loved many foreign women.” The problem is not racial but religious. The women, Solomon married were foreign with false gods that Solomon adopted as his. In 1 Kings 3:3, when Solomon loved the Lord, he also loved the Shulamite women to whom he wrote his love ballot called the Song of Solomon. When his love for God waned so did his love for his first love. Solomon departure from the Lord and his first wife and God promise to bring down his kingdom (1Kings 11:11). Solomon labored in “vain.”
At the beginning of Psalm 127:2 Solomon warned that “it is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrow.” But this is where Solomon wasted his life as he admits in Ecclesiastes. Most likely Solomon repented of the sins in 1 Kings 11 that would split his kingdom and wrote Ecclesiastes shortly before his death to warn young men who were once like him not to repeat his sins and waste their lives. In Ecclesiastes 2:4, Solomon shared that he “made me great works; I built me houses.” He continued listing his incredible accomplishments. Solomon was a machine. He built houses, cities, fleets of ships, a sophisticated organization, etc. But in Ecclesiastes 2:11, he admitted that all of his accomplishments “was vanity” and brought him frustrations. These were the years Solomon wasted.
At the end of Psalm 127:2, Solomon draws a contrast for the believer who labors for God in dependence of God. For this believer God “gives his beloved sleep.” This possibly has a two-part meaning. First, God gives sleep to the believer who is serving for His glory no matter what the circumstances. In Acts 12, Herod has already murdered the first apostle to see how the Jews would respond. Seeing that the Jews reacted positively to his test case, Herod locked up Peter, the leader of the apostles. The night before Peter was to be martyred, Luke records that God had given his beloved sleep in prison chained to two guards. Peter was so sound asleep, the angel had to smite him in the side.
There is a second part to this promise. The NASB translate this promise thusly: “For He gives to His beloved even in his sleep.” Not only does God give sleep to his believers but to them while they sleep. This is the context of Psalm 127:2-3. When a husband and wife enjoy the one-flesh relationship at night, while they sleep God performs the miracle of conception and a verse three states, “Behold, children.” The farmer sows seeds during the day and while he sleeps God gives to him the increase.
My mom gave me the gospel over and over again. She took me to church to hear my pastor preach the gospel. While they slept, God worked in my heart. While under conviction, before I would finally fall off to sleep, I would wonder, if I died tonight where would I spend eternity? I knew where I would be. Another question haunted me, “If Jesus comes back during the night while I am asleep, would I be left behind?” While my mom and pastor slept, God was giving to them answers to their prayers for my salvation.
Solomon’s message is this: Don’t waste your life. Don’t live a vain, meaningless life. Live for God’s glory in dependence on Him to build an eternally meaningful life.