Life is Vapour, Therefore Enjoy Life (Ecclesiastes 2:1-3:15)

Everyone has one or more of those religious wet-blanket blips in their lives: the sort who frown upon laughter and carousing, who ask about the eternal value of massaging death-row bovines, and are ready to drive a stake through the still-beating heart of the performing ego of the moment.

But surely the universal enjoyment of food and drink and work, and music and dancing, and the arts and sciences, and sports and games demonstrates that these things are an integral part of the human experience.

Even the least self-aware/situationally-conscious of humans can, without any prompting:

while away the hours on silly iphone games, erm, honing tower defence and practical physics skills:


Plants vs Zombies, Angry Birds

appreciate an evening of comparing the marbling, texture, taste, mouth-feel of the meat of dead cows and discussing various methods of cooking such flesh:


rock Liao Zhai Rocks! and be very impressed by the obvious professionalism of the actors and set designers from The Theatre Practice:


sing badly and emo-ly at a karaoke session, exacerbated no doubt by Lady Gaga and lyrically-incompatible KTV videos of Caucasian women doing strange things:


soak in the “high” at a Chinese rock concert despite the one-hour wait to get into the Singapore National Stadium (which passed quickly thanks to possibly heretical allusions and analogies about the line to get into heaven on the Last Day – "Oh actually, this is the line for hell" and “Yes, well, we did say eternity didn’t we?” and the dangers of being distracted from one’s goal by an opportunistic ice-cream man),

The same line, doubled over
the ability to understand only a small percentage of what was being said, the vocals being a bit off, and not getting a money’s-worth ENcore (“Well, you can’t get your money’s worth if you didn’t actually pay for the tickets.”).

The song list for the D.N.A. Mayday World Tour 2010 变形DNA五月天世界巡回演唱会 (MSN). No iphone videos to spare the general public from the running commentary on postmodern interpretations of the lyrics in Christian terms and the concert-as-"worship service", and the application of the themes of Ecclesiastes to almost everything that was being sung/said, that must have sorely tried the patience of our neighbours at the concert (and at dinner before)!


Opening - youtube


Motorcycle stuntmen - youtube


Video sequence, 春天的吶喊 - music, lyrics

爆肝 - music, lyrics


賭神 - music


夜訪吸血鬼 - music, lyrics


Hosee - music, video

你不是真正的快樂 - music


生存以上 生活以下 - music, lyrics


瘋狂世界 - music
候鳥 - music
一顆蘋果 - music
突然好想你 - music, lyrics ("a sinner singing to sin")
我心中尚未崩壞的地方 - music
人生海海 - music
D.N.A. - music



雌雄同體 - music


離開地球表面 - music


笑忘歌 - music (hand-holding - the "fellowship" moment)
相信 - music
孫悟空 - music, vid


約翰藍儂 - music
小時候 - music
最重要的小事 - music, vid, lyrics


天使 - music
Ashin speaks - vid (inspirational thoughts accompanied by relevant background music)
後青春期的詩 - music
生命有一種絕對 - music, vid
軋車 - music


戀愛ing - music ("Eller-Oh-Vee-Eee!")


知足07’ 最知足版 - music
如煙 - music, vid, lyrics


溫柔(還你自由版) - music ("What God says to sinners!"), vid, vid


Fireworks - vid, vid.


We were urged repeatedly to treasure this historical last concert in the National Stadium.

If we can find some joy in these things, perhaps a higher quantity and quality of the same would be proportionally more happifying? Today at lunch, amidst the suggestions for tax-structuring with private trusts, charitable donations and the like, a friend was moaning about not having the lifestyle of her peers with their jetset weekends away fuelled by top dollar wines and food. When asked why she thought she’d be happier with more expensive pee and a higher risk of deep vein thrombosis, she said well, there was always the hope that she would be.

Qoholet had ample opportunity and ability to test this theory:

I made great works. I built houses and planted vineyards for myself. I made myself gardens and parks, and planted in them all kinds of fruit trees. I made myself pools from which to water the forest of growing trees. I bought male and female slaves, and had slaves who were born in my house. I had also great possessions of herds and flocks, more than any who had been before me in Jerusalem. I also gathered for myself silver and gold and the treasure of kings and provinces. I got singers, both men and women, and many concubines, the delight of the children of man.

So I became great and surpassed all who were before me in Jerusalem. Also my wisdom remained with me. And whatever my eyes desired I did not keep from them. I kept my heart from no pleasure, for my heart found pleasure in all my toil, and this was my reward for all my toil. (Ecclesiastes 2:4-10)

He had everything anyone could possibly want - maximum possible pleasure for all the senses. This was not some lazy indulgence but good and proper reward for his immense success from his hard work.

But his wisdom and knowledge which were responsible for this success also vexed him and increased his sorrow, for they showed him what a vanity and a striving after the wind both laughter and pleasure and toil were (Ecclesiastes 1:18, 2:17):

• For all the Teacher/Preacher’s work and success, there was nothing new to show – the supposedly great projects he had undertaken were just repetitions of what had already been done (Ecclesiastes 2:12); his achievements added nothing to humanity.
• Even though a wise man manages to navigate life successfully and efficiently whereas the fool trips over himself and stumbles through it, both are equals in death in the end (Ecclesiastes 2:14) and the wise man’s knowledge makes no difference.
• Oh, some might protest, even though the wise man dies in the end, perhaps he will live on in people’s hearts. No, says Q, of both the wise and of the fool, there is no enduring remembrance – in all the days to come all will have been long forgotten (Ecclesiastes 2:16).
• And even the wise man’s achievements hardly outlast him. The person who toiled with wisdom and knowledge and skill, whose mind is working even when he is meant to be resting, doesn’t have enough time to enjoy all the fruit of his labour. Instead, someone else who didn’t bother to work for it will benefit, and if that person is a fool like many a rich man’s son, the assets are quickly dissipated (Ecclesiastes 2:18-23). Even in our lifetime, the most of the marvellous Wonders of the Ancient World are but the stuff of myth (if one can even name them at all), having been allegedly destroyed by earthquakes.

Tasty Peranakan food, Rendezvous Hotel

The believer is hardly surprised by this stark revelation, because God has given knowledge about this world to those who please him:

• The Christian knows that God made this world good and filled it with good things (Genesis 1-2).
• The Christian also knows that because of man’s distrust of the goodness of God and insistence on doing things their own foolish way, this world has been corrupted and nothing is as it was meant to be (Genesis 3): toil is frustrated so that for all our hard work in tilling, we get thorns some of the time; even the most intimate human relationships are painful and prickly.
• But because Christians have turned from living apart from God back to living properly under his rule and in right relationship with him, they understand that God is sovereign over all things and has purposed all things to be done according to his timing. So
  

  For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:
  a time to be born, and a time to die;a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted; a time to kill, and a time to heal;a time to break down, and a time to build up; a time to weep, and a time to laugh;a time to mourn, and a time to dance; a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together;a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; a time to seek, and a time to lose;a time to keep, and a time to cast away; a time to tear, and a time to sew;a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; a time to love, and a time to hate;a time for war, and a time for peace. (Ecclesiastes 3:1-8)

Therefore, what does a worker gain from his toil or the wise man from his knowledge? If he knows God, then there is no desperate searching and striving in the futile hope of finding something to do that is more significant, more valuable; something that will serve as marker so that history will know that we have passed this way and we do not return to dust nameless with nothing to show for our brief existence. For he knows that:

• this world and this life is indeed just vapour in the wind and nothing he can do will change that.
• not everything about life can be understood.

By contrast,

• whatever God does endures forever and nothing can better his work nor can anyone mess it up.
• God alone knows what he has done from beginning to the end.

Kith Cafe, Toast Box, Sushi Tei, Sapporo Ramen Miharu, Dessert Bowl, IKEA. Nothing new under the sun.

As the popularity of Mayday’s emo rock ballads might demonstrate, frustration and futility is part of the universal human experience, as is partying and pleasure. Everyone, whether Christian or not, observes this in his life. For in his mercy, God has allowed some sliver of beauty and the enjoyment thereof to remain for all, and yet has put eternity in the heart of man so that we might have an inkling that the here and now is not all there is; we frustrated in our attempts to enjoy life - food and drink and work seem sweet and pleasant for a while but leave a bitter aftertaste in our mouths because no matter how much we extol their virtues, the wisest amongst us sees not only that they are in the end utterly fleeting, meaningless and pointless and yet cannot fathom what else there might be. And in fact, wisdom and foolishness are both moot for both the wise and the fool die in the end, rage raging against the dying of the light. And so frustrated, we might perhaps seek the One who not only understands the world, but shows us that there is no purpose in our lives apart from a relationship with Him.

The person who fears God as God and so knows Him and acknowledges their own vapour-ous existence will be able to rest from his fruitless yearning for importance, significance and worth and enjoy eating and drinking and take pleasure in his toil in the limited time he has and do good without paralysing poignancy, because he understands that a good God has given this business to the children of man to be busy with (Ecclesiastes 3:10, cf 1:13). This sort of fleeting satisfaction is a very good gift in this corrupt fallen world and God gives the creature who pleases him the ability to enjoy it (Ecclesiastes 3:11-14).


Ecclesiastes
Easter Everyday
Quest for Immortality: EPIC FAIL (Ecclesiastes 1:1-15)
Life is Vapour, Therefore Enjoy Life (Ecclesiastes 2:1-3:15)
Life is Far Worse than an iPhone Game, Therefore Harvest the Day! (Ecclesiastes 3:16-5:7)
Rawa Island and Godly Contentment (Ecclesiastes 5:8 - 6:9)
Fallen Frangipani, Really Wise Living (Ecclesiastes 6:10-7:29)

Inevitabilities, Boat Asia, Strawberries, 五月天 (wuyuetian, MayDay)'s 回到地球表面 (Down To Earth) Concert and 2 Samuel 12

A crazy week filled with inevitabilities.

It was inevitable that the gloriously hot weekend was just the thing for Boat Asia 2008 at Marina@Keppel Bay on Keppel Island. There were jetskis and sailboats for sale, and floating platoons to put together like real life Lego, and yachts to clamber onto for joyrides and also houseboats to dream of living and navigating the world in.

Out of the heat, in the air-conditioned confines of TCC, we sat and chatted till the lights came on and some of the boat crew sounded their foghorns, untied big bunches of balloons and let the wind carry them up into the darkness.

It was also inevitable that the heat made it impossible to eat much, so fruits were the order of the day. Because strawberries were cheap in the fresh produce section, there was an attempt at Le Fraisier, but really, that was far too precious.

Much better was just heaping them in a bowl with leftover vanilla sponge and natural Greek yoghurt and drizzling some manuka honey over the lot.

And even better just kosong: strawberries and yoghurt and nothing else.

(When some friends rolled into town from half-way across the world though, we managed (for their sake, of course) a bit of chilli crab and cereal crayfish (the receipt said "clay fish"). After, durians were hunted down.)

Again, it was inevitable that we would not have had been able to enjoy completely 五月天 (wuyuetian, MayDay)'s 回到地球表面 (Down To Earth) (新加坡第一站 hor) Concert at the Singapore Indoor Stadium, however novel the concept of Chinese pop music concert-going, however free the tickets, however better the sound system than the one at Singapore Expo Max Pavilion,


however innovative the stage,


however wonderful the guitar antics of Monster (here with pink bear standing by),


however crazy the drumming of Guanyou/Ming (here with unwelcome helpers),


however communist and equal-opportunity the UFO-like skybridge,


however raptuously the crowd greeted the proximity of band members,


drummer Guanyou/Ming and bassist Masa
however cheeky the banter that put paid the innocence of candles on birthday cakes,


however "high" the audience and however companionable the neighbours. A function, no doubt, of the fact that no amount of earnest emotion set to catchy music can guarantee the future and the understanding that all good things are but a pale low-quality imitation of the great party-to-come (see Revelation).

Setlist/Song list (mostly thanks to the fans at mdmd.net forum):

lead singer Ashin hamming it up for the camera
五月天 回到地球表面
The stage was covered with a ceiling-to-floor white sheet. 4 "armed" men rappelled down from the ceiling wearing gas masks. Continuation of video from their last concert 離開地球表面.
1. 抓狂 - MV, Singapore concert
2. 香水 - MV
3. 叫我第一名
4. 為愛而生 - MV, Singapore concert
5. 一千個世紀 - MV, Singapore concert
6. 雌雄同體 - MV, Singapore concert
7. 愛情萬歲 - MV, Singapore concert
8. 離開地球表面 - MV
9. 生命有一種絕對 - MV
10. 孫悟空 (每個人各唱一小段) - MV, Singapore concert
11. 小太陽 (「回到地球表面」演唱會主題曲) - MV, Singapore concert
12. 九號球+離家出走 - MV, Singapore concert
13. 闖 - MV, Singapore concert
14. 生活 + 疯狂世界 - MV, MV, Singapore concert
15. 垃圾車 + 生日快樂 (瑪莎慶生 Masa's birthday) - MV, Singapore concert
16. 愛情的模樣 - MV, Singapore concert
17. 最重要的小事 (阿信彈吉他) - MV, Singapore concert
18. 我又初戀了 - MV
19. 戀愛ING - MV, Singapore concert
20. 溫柔 - MV, Singapore concert
21. 洋蔥 - Singapore concert
22. 軋車 - MV
23. 溫柔 (還你自由版)
24. 倔強 - MV (the sinner's song, said the B)
25. 人生海海 - MV, Singapore concert

Encore

Second descent of UFO-like skybridge


26. 天使 - MV, Singapore concert


27. 知足 - MV, Singapore concert (I waited the whole concert for this, said the C)


28. 離開地球表面 電音版
then they threw their sweat-drenched towels into the audience. One man's bio-hazard, another's prized possession.

And it was also inevitable that, living in the community of believers, there would be the shared pain of the suffering of fellow brothers and sisters: young mothers diagnosed with third stage breast cancer, sudden deaths of loved ones in swimming pools, the tearing apart of families in the bid to make new ones, disillusionment with the manifestation of God's kingdom on earth, the lust for gossip and the injustice of the manipulation and lies so rife within Christ's body.

2 Samuel 12-13 is one of those passages in the Bible ripe with the complexity of reality that couldn't have been dreamt up by the human mind.

At the end of 2 Samuel 11, David seemed very much in control. He'd taken and gotten what he'd wanted and the cover-up of his adultery with Bathsheba and murder of her husband Uriah appeared flawless. But we are told at the end of 2 Samuel 11 that what the thing David had done displeased the Lord. And we know that several centuries before, Moses had already warned that one could be sure that one's sin would find one out (Numbers 32:23). Whereas 2 Samuel 11 is all about David sending people out to do his bidding, 2 Samuel 12 opens with the LORD sending Nathan to David. It was God who was in control and despite David's erstwhile relationship with God, he'd incomprehensibly forgotten that he would have God to answer to.

David's strong reaction to Nathan's story (2 Samuel 12:1-7a) demonstrated that David was not incognisant of right and wrong, but merely deliberately blind to his own sin. "The man must die" he said of the rich man in the story, thereby accusing and condemning himself. "You are that man," said Nathan. And God was as livid and outraged at what David had done as David was indignant at the rich man in Nathan's story.

It wasn't just that David had broken some laws and destroyed the lives of people, he was that he had despised the LORD himself (2 Samuel 12:9). When we breach God's laws, it isn't just about socio-economic-political consequences; when we sin, we show utter contempt for God, the law-maker/giver.

David acknowledged that he had indeed sinned against the LORD (2 Samuel 12:13). This was a great change from his predecessor, Saul, who had a whole slew of excuses for disobedience ("you didn't come on time, what was I to do" etc). David didn't bring forth defences nor character witnesses to attest to his general generosity and the good he had done for his people, instead, we see in Psalm 51 the plain confession of his sinfulness. David knew that that had not been a one-off, a moment of weakness, a temporary aboration, a sorry-won't-happen-again incident. He had been sinful from birth and would forever be inclined to spit on the living God. He was a born adulterer and born murderer. He admitted that he deserved punishment.

Yet, immediately, David received gratuitous forgiveness. "The LORD has put away your sin," said Nathan, "you shall not die" (2 Samuel 12:13). But this was not the slap on the wrist given to smug perpetrators that cause grieving members of victims' families to attack them outside the courtroom with foldable umbrellas. Nevertheless, and this was a big nevertheless, despite David not getting the death sentence he deserved, his son would die (2 Samuel 12:14). And there would always be the perpetual reek of death in David's family (2 Samuel 12:10). And there would always be the dreadful agonising tyranny of evil on his loved ones (2 Samuel 12:11).

(Several centuries later, in the New Testamental times, Jesus would explain that suffering was not always caused by sin. The man born blind and the people killed by the falling tower of Silom did not suffer because of their sin and rebellion. But other times, suffering and difficulties are the consequences of our sin and we must bear the responsibility for that - the illegitimate child, being made a paraplegic from drinking and driving, the broken relationships caused by gossip and slander etc. But in David's case, the cause of his suffering was quite certainly his past sins. Because God said so.)

So sure enough, the child took sick. David lay on the ground all night pleading with God to spare his son. He refused to get up and took no food. His grief freaked out his aides. (2 Samuel 12:15b-17) They figured him for a suicide risk and when the kid in fact died, they didn't know how to break the news. They needn't have worried. When David heard that his son had died, David got up, had a bath, put on clean clothes, slapped on some Old Spice and worshipped God. Then he went home and had a good meal (2 Samuel 12:20), possibly while his servants stood gaping. David explained: he'd thought that perhaps, just perhaps, God's word through Nathan wasn't his last word and plus he knew that he could rely on God's graciousness to let the child live if he wished. But, in a way that did not impinge on his graciousness, God's judgement through his prophet had been his last word on the matter and David accepted and trusted God on this (2 Samuel 12:22).

2 Samuel 12 ended with a note of hope - God gave David victory over the Ammonites in battle and David begot a son with Bathsheba whom the LORD loved.

There are certain inevitabilities we can be sure of in this 疯狂世界:

The Initiative of Grace
God is the one in control. He takes the initiative and seeks sinners to bring them to repentance. (Sinners, inevitably don't seek after the real God, no matter how they might claim to be looking for him.)

The Severity of Grace
"T'was grace that taught my heart to fear". Grace reveals and exposes and brings people to repentance so that they might be saved. The only heart that God can accept is a broken and contrite heart so therefore, in his love and his grace, he must break us so that we can see the death sentence which we are facing because of our rebellion against him, and turn to him for mercy.

The Miracle of Grace
Grace gives totally free forgiveness. But the consequences remain with us. The rest of David's life is grim: David's baby son dies even before he can be named; David's other son Amnon rapes his daughter and Amnon's half-sister Tamar (2 Samuel 13); David's yet other son Absalom murders Amnon for what he did, then leads a rebellion against his father; David's other other son Solomon eyed the crown while David was still alive etc.

And though the sinner has to deal with the consequences of his sin, he does not pay for them through his suffering. The fact is, he can never do enough to pay for even a quark of his sin because the wages of sin is death. What is free for sinners is costly to God because it cost him his only son who died on the cross in our place so that we will not have to face eternal death.

Dale Ralph Davis, 2 Samuel
Jonathan Fletcher, Grace Abounding

_________________________________________

• The Myanmar-Sichuan Double Disasters, Ironman and Watchmen, and 2 Samuel 21 - 24
• Dead Dogs, Dead Cows and Dead Men in 2 Samuel 19 - 20
  
• Chek Jawa, the 37.96km Ride Along the Eastern Coastal Park Connector etc and 2 Samuel 14 - 18
  
• The Covalent Bonds of Cake-baking and the Covenantal Bonds of 2 Samuel 8-10
  
• Operation Leftover Easter Stuff: Chocolate Experiments in the Physiology of Taste and 2 Samuel 7
  
• The Return of Sunshine and the Return of the Ark in 2 Samuel 6
• Operation Leftover Easter Stuff: Reconstructed Deconstructed Lemon Meringue Tart and 2 Samuel 1 - 4