Lessons from Ecclesiastes w/ Bobby Jamieson

Bobby Jamieson (00:00)
think one implication of that verse is that God is our sovereign good. God is our supreme good. All of our hearts crave good. We all want

fullness fulfillment satisfaction and we go looking for it in these crucially realities, but they’re they’re partial they’re Imperfect they’re they’re not lasting their transients. They don’t fill our hearts part of what Ecclesiastes is saying I think in that that that phrase eternity is in our heart is It’s saying that our hearts yearn for an infinite object our hearts yearn for an infinite good and so we sort of divert it into all these different streams of Like you’re talking about the desires of the flash or desires for physical satisfaction

But ultimately, God Himself is all satisfying.

Aaron Smith (00:41)
Welcome to the Marriage After God podcast. I’m your host, Aaron Smith, and today I’m thrilled to have an insightful and encouraging conversation with Bobby Jamieson on one of my favorite books of the Bible. Bobby’s senior pastor of Trinity Baptist Church in Chapel Hill, North Carolina and author of Everything is Never Enough. Bobby, a husband of 17 years and a dad to four kids, shares his journey from associate pastor at Capitol Hill Baptist to planting a church amid family health challenges. We unpack how Ecclesiastes exposes life’s absurdities.

like chasing money, pleasure or success, and calls us to receive everything as God’s gift. Finding true contentment in Him, from dying to self in ministry and marriage, to viewing our spouse as divine lots to cherish through daily toil, this conversation equips couples to pursue resilient joy in Christ, not fleeting gains. Whether you’re navigating parenting teens or balancing home and calling, this conversation is sure to challenge and encourage you. So please enjoy my conversation with Bobby Jameson.

Aaron Smith (01:40)
Bobby Jamieson, thank you so much for joining the Mary Jeffery God podcast. I’m excited to have you.

Bobby Jamieson (01:44)
Good to be with you.

Aaron Smith (01:45)
Bobby, your publicist reached out. It’s a pretty fun thing being a podcast host and I get to meet a lot of cool people and see a lot of cool books. ⁓ And your book is on my favorite book in the Bible, Ecclesiastes. Yeah.

Bobby Jamieson (01:52)
Yeah.

Praise God. Excellent. It’s up there with

my favorites too. I mean, it’s neck and neck. Hebrews, John, Romans, Ecclesiastes. It’s up there.

Aaron Smith (02:11)
Yeah.

Yeah. So I’m excited to talk about that. Before we talk about that, I’d love for my audience to learn a little bit about you. Who are you? Who’s Bobby James?

Bobby Jamieson (02:22)
Sure,

⁓ bought by the blood of Christ, trusting in Him to save me. That’s probably the most important thing. ⁓ I’m married to Kristen. We’ve been married 17 years. We have four kids, ages 15 down to six. ⁓ My wife and I are both from Northern California, the suburbs of San Francisco, but we’ve lived all over the place. ⁓ Most recently, Washington, D.C. for seven years, where I was an associate pastor at Capitol Hill Baptist Church. And now we live in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, where I’ve been the senior pastor helping to plant ⁓

Aaron Smith (02:26)
Amen.

Bobby Jamieson (02:51)
Trinity Baptist Church in Chapel

Aaron Smith (02:54)
Awesome. Capitol Hill Baptist Church. Who’s the pastor there?

Bobby Jamieson (02:57)
Mark Dever is a senior pastor.

Aaron Smith (02:59)
Okay, I feel like I just interviewed two people yesterday, Thomas, and they wrote a book. Yeah, I just interviewed. feel like he’s the…

Bobby Jamieson (03:11)
Were they from CHBC?

I’m trying to think who it could be. What’s the bug? Can we find it? Okay.

Aaron Smith (03:14)
feel like I’m looking for the book and I feel bad that I…

Yeah, I feel bad that I already forgot. It’s okay. I think it’s Thomas Brooks. Is that right? I’m messing up his name.

Bobby Jamieson (03:26)
Thomas Brooks. There’s

a puritan Thomas Brooks.

Aaron Smith (03:30)
It’s okay. Yeah, I just interviewed someone I think from that church. that’s cool. ⁓ Awesome. So married 17 years. You’re like right in line. How do you

Bobby Jamieson (03:40)
I am 39.

Aaron Smith (03:42)
39, oh man, you’re like, we’re like right in line. I’m just, I’m turning 41 this year. We’ve been married 18 years. We’ve got six kids right in that same range. Your kids are a little older. My oldest is turning 13 this year. So is that your first teenager you said, 15 years old? Teenagers, oh man. Do have any advice on that? We’re about to have a teenage boy.

Bobby Jamieson (03:51)
Sure. Yep.

Well, we have two teenagers, 15 and 13. Two teenage girls. ⁓

Pray more. Pray more than you do now. ⁓ And aim to be lovingly, graciously present and emotionally connected as they might throw up new challenges for you or new difficulties. Try to, and I’m preaching to myself here, but try to press in all the more with connecting with them personally.

Aaron Smith (04:05)
Mm-hmm.

Bobby Jamieson (04:24)
as they’re having more independent thoughts and thinking different things and getting into different things. You wanna be sort of there for them whenever they are ready to open up to you. That can be more challenging.

Aaron Smith (04:35)
Yeah, that’s a great pray. the being available on Open and it’s so hard wanting to continue to control everything. That’s like the natural response is like, actually, no. And then forgetting that like my job is to help him to become an independent young man who loves God. so realizing like, need to I need to loosen up here and pull in there and like, you

Bobby Jamieson (04:46)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

Aaron Smith (05:03)
Think that God would give us a guidebook on that, you know? Kind of did. Exactly, that was the joke. Like the Bible, right? So, pastoring a church plant in North Carolina, by the way, I love North Carolina, I’ve been there several times. Beautiful state. ⁓ What was the journey like getting to planning a church? What were you doing before this? You said you were associate pastor over in…

Bobby Jamieson (05:06)
Well, he has, he has.

Sure, well…

Yeah, I was an associate pastor in DC and I had my role had a lot of preaching, a lot of teaching, a lot of overall leadership, a lot of kind of staff training and development. And it was a role we loved, a congregation we loved, and a city we loved. ⁓ But my desire was just to be preaching full time. that was my desire before I started at Capitol Hill, that desire only grew. But we have a number of challenges in our family.

some health challenges, some disabilities that we began to just understand as more sort of providential constraints. And you might think, well, then why’d go plan to church? That’s kind of a risky thing to do. But the Lord, ⁓ a friend suggested this particular area for us for a few different reasons, a person who knew the area well. We started talking to local pastors who knew the area well, and they thought both that it would be good and appropriate to have a new church there.

and that I would personally be a good fit. And we were also really just trying to think about what’s the sort of way to intersect, kind of the Venn diagram of me try to kind of steward gifts God has given me to try to advance the gospel ⁓ and care for my family well, and even in a sense prioritize some of the needs and interests of our family. And part of this was that the Lord just kind of started providing a really godly, mature, wonderful team of people without too much kind of effort on our part. You really wonderful people to be planting a church together.

that ⁓ meant it was not like a parachute in church plans where it’s a lonely family and the weight of the world’s on their shoulders, but really a lot of people fully committed, a lot of people with a common kind of understanding for ministry and understanding of the kind of church community that God’s Word calls us to form. And so really we just, saw the Lord ⁓ open a lot of doors and answer a lot of prayers and

The transition has been challenging for my family in many ways, but we’ve been here just over a year and a lot of things we’ve been praying for are happening. A lot of ways we’ve wanted to see both the gospel take root in the church and to see the Lord provide for our family are both taking place. it was a, yeah, the desire to preach was primary, but also a sense of care for my family and stewardship of trying to think what could set us up to flourish while in the long term, if that would be the Lord’s

Aaron Smith (07:40)
⁓ there’s a couple of things I wanted to point or tap into. ⁓ you said it wasn’t just you guys moving. Was there, are you saying a bunch of other families?

Bobby Jamieson (07:50)
⁓ yeah, yeah, yeah. So that’s right.

Yeah, I should have been more explicit. So there were both ⁓ several families who had previously been members of the church in DC, including some people we were pretty close with who were already in this area and were happy to start a new work. And they had moved a year, two years, five years previous. And then there were about 10 individuals who decided to move from DC with us.

Aaron Smith (08:04)
So they had earlier points. Yeah.

Wow. I’ll say I think that is definitely the model that should be repeated. Like you said, like can a lone family go and plant a church? Of course. ⁓ Like you said, it’s way harder and to have the ⁓ bringing you mentioned the church culture. That’s a big deal. Being able to come with many families that already understand a culture that you’re trying to develop. ⁓

Bobby Jamieson (08:37)
Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, that’s huge,

Aaron Smith (08:46)
Yeah, being a pastor of a home church

Bobby Jamieson (08:46)
you know. Yeah.

Aaron Smith (08:47)
for a long time, I totally understand that because you kind of have to on a smaller scale, it’s being developed, it’s going, but the more, you know, close families that you have together that think the same, understand the same, have the same goals, same vision, you’re not starting from scratch trying to convince everyone.

Bobby Jamieson (09:01)
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And even, know,

with my wife has some chronic health conditions and we’ve seen some real answers to prayer just very recently in some of those areas. But you know, we have not run this church plant out of our living room. It’s not dependent on our hospitality. We haven’t done as much hospitality as we normally would throughout the course of our ministry, just in this first year. There’ve been some…

heightened challenges for our kids, which have meant we’ve had to keep up kind of some higher boundaries than we normally would. My wife’s health has been poor, her energy’s been low. We’re seeing some, again, the Lord kind of answering some prayers and her getting more energetic and able to do more hospitality. But you there’s been all these different families. The kind of culture we want to see in the church is being embodied in this dear sister who’s a widow and she’s in her late 70s and she has all kinds of ministry capacity and people just come to her and she hosts 30 people in her home and…

Aaron Smith (09:53)
Yeah

Bobby Jamieson (09:55)
You know, I could just list this individual, this couple, this family who are embodying a kind of culture of discipling, hospitality, transparency, care for one another, that even in a sense, they’re sort of outpacing us as the pastor’s family. They’re doing more of the stuff that we’d want to see done. And then we pray we’ll get to contribute to more in due time, but it’s kind of a healthy thing. Like we’re not the pace setters. You know, this family, this individual, all these people are.

Aaron Smith (10:10)
Right.

Yeah.

Well, I feel like

rightfully and biblically, that is the appropriate way a church should operate. It should not be all the responsibility of one individual in the church or one family in the church where every member functioning is the ideal. It doesn’t always work that way, but that is the ideal. So that’s really beautiful that you got families that you’re working with. If you don’t mind and you can share as open or not as open as you’d like, but these, you’re talking about some health issues with your wife and some difficulties with children.

Bobby Jamieson (10:33)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Hmm.

Aaron Smith (10:50)
This is something that, you know, our book, Marriage After God, we talk about with marriage being a ministry itself and seeing it that way and not allowing out external ministries, quote unquote, take from that too much and making sure that everything’s in order as the Bible would want us to have it. How has those things – and again, you can talk about as little or as much as you want. I don’t know what you’re comfortable with in your home. How is that in the church plant?

Bobby Jamieson (10:54)
I’m just… I’m just…

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Hmm.

Aaron Smith (11:18)
What are some of the dynamics there and how are you relying on the Lord and how are you focusing on your family and the church ⁓ simultaneously?

Bobby Jamieson (11:28)
Yeah, I think I would point to a few different things. One, I’ve been preaching through the Gospel of Mark, and one of Jesus’s central teachings throughout is death to self. Death to your own interests, death to anything that competes with loyalty to Him, and throughout chapters eight, nine, and 10, a willingness to ⁓ make yourself least and put yourself last. And the Lord has really revealed to me, often through my own failures of ways I haven’t put myself last or made myself least in relation to my family.

Aaron Smith (11:38)
Mm-hmm.

Bobby Jamieson (11:58)
just ways that the challenges and burdens in my family call for more self-sacrifice, call for more me dying to self, even if that dying to self means not pursuing this particular ministry opportunity or not doing this ministry in the full-blown way that I would want to or that is kind of my ideal, but that in very concrete terms, finding ways to appropriately sacrifice certain ways of doing ministry or certain.

Aaron Smith (12:14)
Yeah.

Bobby Jamieson (12:25)
concrete kind of ministry opportunities for the good of my family. That’s been really helped by having a ⁓ wonderful ⁓ pastor who I’m also serving with full time. Not many church plants have that benefit and blessing to have two full time pastors from day one, but we do. So I kind of have no excuses. ⁓ It’s been helped by having a loving and godly culture in the church of wanting my family to flourish and other elders and other kind of key stakeholders and members who know us well checking in on me and pushing me and counseling me.

Aaron Smith (12:29)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Bobby Jamieson (12:54)
You know, not with, what are you doing more for the church? But how’s it going for your family? We know it’s been a hard year of transition. So I think death to self, you can always ask, especially as a husband and father, what’s another death I need to die? What’s the next death Jesus would have me die? And particularly if you are sort of ambitious in ministry, if you’re gifted in ministry, it may well be in some particular ways that the Lord would…

Aaron Smith (13:01)
Yeah.

Bobby Jamieson (13:20)
⁓ require of you to set limits or say no or ratchet down and trust that he, while of course fulfilling sort of basic responsibilities to the church and what they’re setting me aside to do, ⁓ at the same time, yeah, trusting that the Lord can provide for the church in other ways and that, my stewardship of my family is a prior and more primary calling. I was the husband of Kristen and the father of all these kids before starting this church.

Aaron Smith (13:25)
Hmm.

Bobby Jamieson (13:49)
Lord willing, I will be the husband of Christen and the father of these kids after whatever my role is in this church however long the Lord gives me. So ⁓ a season like church planting where it’s brand new, it kind of feels like it depends on you, is this thing gonna work? Those could be sort of extra temptations to sacrifice family for the sake of ministry. ⁓ But yeah, the Lord’s been teaching me and humbling me in that area.

Aaron Smith (14:14)
Do you have any specific examples of something recently that he’s been teaching you about self-sacrifice, death of self, when it comes to family and ministry and…

Bobby Jamieson (14:24)
Good question.

Aaron Smith (14:26)
Putting

you on the spot, I know. It’s just good stuff for us as husbands and fathers to hear ⁓ and wives that are listening is to realize exactly what you said and how true it is of, you know, are we following the example of our Savior? Are we looking to the of God and saying, what do I need to put to that? That was a hard question you just asked. What do I need to do that? Yeah.

Bobby Jamieson (14:34)
Sure.

Yeah, what needs to die? What

death do I need to die? Let me think for a moment about something that’ll be broadly useful.

Hmm, I mean in some ways, I think for me, it’s an area it feels like the Lord is refining me and teaching me and pushing my nose into my failures and weaknesses. It’s not even so much sort of, ⁓ you know, get rid of this ministry thing or reclaim these hours from ministry for family so much as it is when I finish at 5 p.m.

I need to be as fully committed and fully available and energetically serving and kind of, even if it’s 5 p.m. till I’m asleep. If my family just needs ⁓ total service from me for that whole second shift, that’s what they’re gonna get. And it has to come from the heart. It has to be joyful. I have to be able to serve them with pleasure and with thankfulness ⁓ that they are, they’re all gifts to me. They’re all gifts of grace. don’t deserve them. I haven’t earned them.

My wife is a gift, my kids are gifts, and they call for a lot of care and stewardship, and there’s all sorts of challenges and conflicts as parents. ⁓ But even in some ways, it’s maybe even being willing to die more to that craving for rest or refreshment or ease or don’t I deserve a break after I’ve done this all day for the church, in a sense, trying to bring the same attitude of service. Of course, I need to have a better attitude of service toward the church as well.

That would be one way to put it, or one fresh lesson.

Aaron Smith (16:23)
That’s a really good one. if anyone listening is this is all you get out of this. thought that that was a ⁓ beautifully put and so encouraging, especially for us husbands and fathers. But again, it goes for wives as well ⁓ because you come home from work or, you know, we have our phones that want all of our attention. have our, you know, our other relationships outside the home. We have our other hobbies or all these things drawing.

Bobby Jamieson (16:41)
Yeah. Yeah.

Aaron Smith (16:51)
our attention and our hearts. that the way you put that is when you come home is being there, being home, being present, which is a very hard thing to do. Because I think as men, one of the things you might be able to relate to this, one of the things we do, especially when we’re stressed, overwhelmed, tired, we tend to drift in our hearts and our mind. We want to tune out, we want to check out.

Bobby Jamieson (17:13)
Sure.

Kind of tune out, check out,

Aaron Smith (17:20)
⁓ I know I feel that way often. ⁓ Not when I say often, but I’ve felt that way many times and wanting to check out and it takes intentional, purposeful choosing of I’m going to choose something that my flesh does not want right now, which is essentially dying to your flesh. Putting the deeds of the flesh to death may not gratify the desires of the flesh, which my desire is I want to just tune out. I just want to shut off.

Bobby Jamieson (17:36)
You

Mm-hmm, mm-hmm, in that moment.

Yeah. That’s

right. And it could be, you know, there’s a subtlety here. It could be there’s something sinful that you need to absolutely deny to yourself. It could also be there’s something good in and of itself. You know, read a book, rest on the couch, whatever it is, that is actually your, your called to give up to pursue something better, which is serving your family in this concrete way. And sometimes it can be a little bit more of a mind trip or harder to be content. Oh, it’s harder to give up. I, I, okay, if I know this is wrong, I know I shouldn’t do it.

Aaron Smith (17:57)
Yeah.

Bobby Jamieson (18:13)
but why do I have to give up X, Y, Z? Can’t I just enjoy blank? ⁓ When oftentimes the answer is die to it and go serve your family.

Aaron Smith (18:15)
Yeah.

And that’s exactly, I mean, we’re going to be talking about Ecclesiastes in your new book, ⁓ is this idea of looking at these things and you said it could be a good thing. And often I think we do this, men, women, anyone, we’re going to say like, justify, well, this thing’s good, therefore I shouldn’t have to give it up or therefore everyone else should bend to it for me. And there’s nothing, there’s not a single thing

Bobby Jamieson (18:44)
⁓ huh.

Aaron Smith (18:51)
that we should not, that should not be on the altar before God, right? Exactly. And we make, we’re very good idol makers in this world. ⁓ Everything, anything at any point can become an idol. Even good things. Often they’re good things. You know, we make an idol of them. And ⁓ so that was, I thought that was a really good draw you pulled out right there. Thank you for that.

Bobby Jamieson (18:53)
Yeah, that’s right. Otherwise it is a potential idol. Yeah.

Appreciate it.

Aaron Smith (19:20)
But let’s dig into your book a little bit because, like I said at the beginning, Ecclesiastes is one of my favorite books of the Bible. And the reason is not because I I ⁓ know that its contrast is the wisdom of the world and God and God’s wisdom. Like that is what we get from Ecclesiastes. So even though Solomon was the wisest man, wisest king that ever lived, ⁓ his wisdom, we get shown such a ⁓

Bobby Jamieson (19:40)
Mm-hmm.

Aaron Smith (19:49)
a sky level picture from the top to bottom of every possible thing that you can imagine and what it looks like from the worldly perspective and what it looks like from a godly perspective. And so I thought it was really cool the way you formatted your book talking about all these different high level topics and then pulling stuff from Ecclesiastes. What was the… you written books before? Is this your first book? Okay. What led you to write this book? Why are you writing about Ecclesiastes right now?

Bobby Jamieson (20:10)
Sure, I’ve written a few, yeah.

Yeah, it’s because I preached through it as part of my ministry tour church in DC and it really got a hold of me. It really got under my skin. I think it got a hold of the congregation, got under the congregation skin. I just didn’t want to be done. When I was done with the preaching series, I didn’t want to be done with the book. And part of the reason for that is it just, it wrestles so hard with all the deepest issues in life. It just goes straight for the jugular with our deepest motivations, desires, fears, hopes, dreams.

Aaron Smith (20:32)
Mm-hmm.

Bobby Jamieson (20:49)
And it is so relevant to the modern world. think because the book of Ecclesiastes really is a quest. It’s a quest for good, it’s a quest for enjoyment, it’s a quest for fulfillment. As kind of cliche as it sounds, Ecclesiastes was kind of the original quest for the meaning of life. And particularly in the modern world, if you have any degree, if you live in America, if your basic needs are provided for, if you have any degree of affluence, there is just infinite options out there for you, whether in terms of what should I try to pursue for work.

what entertainment, enjoyment, and you know, through kind of massive communication devices, it’s just kind of things bombarding you all the time. Options seem infinite. And so your ways to sort of seek fulfillment in worldly terms are infinite. And Ecclesiastes is a demolition project, again, just trying to find your ultimate happiness in all of them. So it struck me that I think Ecclesiastes is such a ⁓ particularly modern book.

that especially if I could put it into dialogue with critics of modernity, who could kind of help us see some of the things that are wrong with the world we live in, use that apologetically to try to kind of diagnose and even in a sense out narrate the way unbelievers understand their own problems. You you think this is your problem with money, it goes deeper. You think this is your problem with time, it goes deeper. You think this is your problem with ambition, it goes deeper. So that if I could sort of use the topics Ecclesiastes raises,

Aaron Smith (22:03)
Mm.

Bobby Jamieson (22:16)
and try to get to the deep roots of things, I could try to have a two-for-one of explaining the book and its relevance to believers, but all along being making a case for the sort of truth and beauty of the gospel.

Aaron Smith (22:28)
That’s a great explanation. Something that what you were just saying about, you have this question, but it actually goes deeper than that. It reminds me of the Sermon on the Mount. You heard it said, you know, and he brings up all these laws that God gave to the people of Israel. And then he’s like, but I say, and then he gets down to like actually the spirit of the law and makes it even deeper into the heart of like, well, you’re using the letter of the law.

justify yourself. He’s like, but here’s the actual spirit of the law that God gave and you’re far from it. And like showing like we often will do that. ⁓ And so what you were just describing sounds a lot like how Jesus did the exact same thing. He was dismantling the wisdom of the Pharisees. They were saying, look at us. We’ve got it figured out. And God’s like, well, actually, Jesus is like, you actually don’t. You’ve missed it.

Bobby Jamieson (23:00)
you

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Yeah, and you know Jesus is primarily diagnosing a kind of ⁓ self-righteousness, you know, and a kind of false ⁓ sense of religious confidence. Ecclesiastes is more diagnosing ⁓ kind of false sources of contentment or ⁓ false hopes that will ultimately deceive you. Pursuits, that’s right.

Aaron Smith (23:27)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, pursuit.

Yeah. Well, but I would look at it. This is something that blows my mind all the time when I’m reading the Old Testament. I mean, reading anything in the Bible, actually. The way I know that we have, you know, translations into English from the original language, they’ve I mean, good translations essentially are just taking the closest English word and, you know, applying it to the Aramaic or the Hebrew or whatever the language, the host language was.

Bobby Jamieson (23:58)
Yeah.

Aaron Smith (24:09)
And when I read these, like Ecclesiastes, all the Old Testament, when I read these stories of how people respond, the thoughts that they had, the way they dealt with things, it doesn’t sound like at all any different than right now. And this is one of the things, one of the proofs, I believe, of the truth of the Bible and the reality that like, you know,

Bobby Jamieson (24:25)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Aaron Smith (24:36)
Current culture will say, we used to be barbarians back then and now we’re so smart today. And I think like, well, I don’t know, like all I see today is the exact same things that the Bible talks about. There’s nothing new.

Bobby Jamieson (24:38)
Sure. Yeah,

Yeah, the term workaholic,

yeah, there’s nothing to under the sun. You the term workaholic was invented actually by a Baptist preacher, a guy who used to lecture at Southern Seminary, I forget his name now, but it was invented in the 1970s, that word workaholic. But if you look at Ecclesiastes 4.7, it is a portrait of a workaholic. So Ecclesiastes diagnoses the reality thousands of years before a modern American puts a name on

Aaron Smith (25:13)
Mm-hmm. Well, and it does it in every facet of life. You see that all throughout Ecclesiastes. All of the pursuits, all of the desires, all of the wants, it’s the exact same thing today. something that I think our American culture, the Western culture, ⁓ doesn’t realize. You know, there’s a lot of – I don’t want to minimize people that are in poverty, people that are living paycheck to paycheck.

Bobby Jamieson (25:39)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah. Yeah.

Aaron Smith (25:42)
For the

most part, our country is very wealthy. And like you said, we have so much choice and opportunity. We don’t realize that we’re all in the same pursuit that Solomon was, the wealthiest, you know, king of Israel. He was pursuing these things. And each one of us every single day are pursuing the exact same things that he was. It’s one of the reasons why I love the book so much. Because like you said, it shines a light on the reality of our, you these false hopes, these false wisdom.

Bobby Jamieson (25:55)
Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

Aaron Smith (26:12)
and trying to fulfill something inside of us that cannot be fulfilled by the things he’s searching for.

Bobby Jamieson (26:18)
Yeah, that’s right. And you know, one of the contributions my book tries to make that might be new for some people is that people often think that Ecclesiastes point in terms of why these things aren’t satisfying is that they don’t last. You know, they fade away. They don’t kind of stick around. You get this attainment, but then you’re onto the next thing. That’s partly true. That is part of Ecclesiastes’ problem with this worldly goods. But it’s even more fundamental problem is that they’re absurd.

The outcome doesn’t match the desire or the input or the expectation. There’s a fundamental disconnect between what we want and what we get. There’s a fundamental disconnect between what we deserve and what we get. There’s a fundamental disconnect between what our hearts instinctively yearn for and what the world turns back in result. And I think the best kind of term to capture that whole reality in a nutshell is to say it’s absurd. It doesn’t match. It doesn’t fit. Life doesn’t make sense.

because there’s this disconnect between our hearts and the world.

Aaron Smith (27:17)
What are some of the, I’d like you to point out, what are some of the heart’s desires that Ecclesiastes highlights that are natural?

Bobby Jamieson (27:26)
Yeah,

sure. Well, ⁓ one that immediately comes to mind is love of money. So Ecclesiastes explicitly condemns love of money in 510. He who loves money will not be satisfied with money, nor he who loves wealth with his income. This also is vanity, or you could translate it absurd. So how is it that love of money guarantees dissatisfaction? It’s because money has no built-in off switch.

Like if you eat a meal, you drink the, know, drink whatever comes along with it, you will get full. And even if you force yourself to eat or drink more, there’ll be diminishing returns. You’ll get sick, you’ll throw up. Like even if you force yourself to do more, there’ll be a limit and it’ll go bad for you. Money has no limit. Money you can always get more. And money, you know, in a society, which is clearly the case, you know, at the time of the book of Ecclesiastes, it’s even more the case now. The more things money can get you.

the more reason you have to want money. And so it’s an endless loop. If your desire is for money in itself, that desire itself is a trap. And that’s what ⁓ Jesus teaches, that’s what Paul confirms in the New Testament. Those who desire to be rich fall into a trap, a snare, they pierce themselves with many pangs. So that’s just a really clear example where Ecclesiastes is not just talking about money, it’s talking about the love of money. It’s talking about an inordinate desire for money. If money is the object that you’re after, that is going to harm

Aaron Smith (28:54)
Yeah. where does it say, you know, what you love? You know, that there your treasure is, you know, we are. Yep.

Bobby Jamieson (29:01)
Yeah, that’s right. 6, your

treasure is, there your heart will be also. That’s right.

Aaron Smith (29:05)
Yeah, and then first Timothy the the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil not money money’s not the root of all kinds of evil the love of it Which is the driving factor in our our pursuits, you know causes us to steal because we can’t afford, know causes us to ⁓ cheat to get what we want ⁓

Bobby Jamieson (29:09)
Yes, absolutely. Love of money.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. You

know, another disordered desire that Ecclesiastes’ diagnosis comes in in chapter 4, like chapter 4 verse 4, I saw that all toil and all skill and work come from a man’s envy of his neighbor. This also is absurd and it’s driving after wind. So envy, the desire to be better, the desire to have something someone else doesn’t. There can be a godly sense of sort of a joyful competition spurring people on, kind of trying to rise to new heights, but that can tip right over into

Aaron Smith (29:42)
Yep.

Bobby Jamieson (29:52)
wanting harm to another person, wanting to be better than another person, wanting you to have something and them to not have it. And so I think, yeah, that’s, we often might just kind of gloss over it and cover over it say, it’s ambition. It’s a desire to be the best. is it? Is it a desire to be excellent or is it a desire to be better? If it’s a desire to be better, then you got problems.

Aaron Smith (29:58)
Yep.

Well, and

I think a good test for that is, do you rejoice when other people succeed or do you get embittered? You’re like, well, why not me? Why’d that person get this? Don’t I deserve it? The questions we ask and the embitterment we feel towards others, because we’re to celebrate when others are lifted up. Those that are lifted up, quote unquote, are to be humbled.

Bobby Jamieson (30:24)
Bingo.

Bingo.

Yeah. Yeah.

Aaron Smith (30:46)
Paul talks about several times, you know, the rich will be humbled and the poor will be exalted and ⁓ showing this leveling of the playing field in the body of Christ.

Bobby Jamieson (30:51)
Yeah. You know what?

Amen, amen. You know, one last desire we could talk about, I there’s others in the book, but a love of pleasure. You know, so he goes on this big quest for the meaning of life. And one of the things he indulges in is every kind of conceivable pleasure, food, wine, music, women, know, chapter two, verse 10, 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 is my reward for all my toil. Then I considered all that my hands had done in the toil I had expended in doing it. And behold, all was vanity and striving after the wind.

There’s nothing to be gained under the sun. So ultimately, giving yourself over to pleasure, seeking satisfaction or fulfillment in any type of experience is going to come back empty. Your glass will always drain empty. You always need to refill it. Your stomach will always become hungry again. You’re like ⁓ the eye is never satisfied with seeing nor the ear with hearing is how he puts it in chapter one verse eight. ⁓ So why? It’s not…

Aaron Smith (31:43)
Yep.

The ear, yeah.

Bobby Jamieson (31:54)
You know, our eyes and our ears aren’t just like neutral instruments that like are waiting for stimuli. It’s expressing how we, the things we want come through them. We want stimulation, we want beauty, we want to be entertained, we want to see something novel. And the point is, if you let that become ultimate, it’s an endless loop. can never get enough of

Aaron Smith (32:17)
Would you say that… It’s kind of a rhetorical question because I think you’ll agree with this. This wisdom that Ecclesiastes, that King Solomon is talking about, is all in relation to the biological, physical, the flesh self. Like you said, our eyes and ears, right? I want to see, I want to hear, I want to taste, I want to eat. These are all biological things. And the Bible makes it very clear the carnal, that word carnal means flesh.

Bobby Jamieson (32:46)
Yeah.

Aaron Smith (32:47)
And we often spiritualize that, which it is a spiritual thing, but it literally means the flesh. Like when my flesh is in charge, meaning what my brain and my eyes and my heart, my body, my skin, touch, tastes, all the senses when they’re in charge, we aren’t going to have enough. I, that feeling we get from success and I want to be more successful and better than so-and-so and it makes me feel a certain way. I’m never going to feel it enough.

when I want to eat this certain food because it tastes good. Sugar is good. It tastes good. Your body needs it. It’s a carbohydrate. It’s a natural thing. I want to eat it and when it’s in charge, I will never have enough. I will keep doing it. It will always win. And I think that’s good.

Bobby Jamieson (33:29)
Yeah, yeah. know,

I was just gonna say one way Ecclesiastes talks about this is the difference between gain and gift. He goes on this quest for gain and what he means is kind of something you can hold on to, something you can keep for yourself, something you can sort of set aside as a reliable resource that you can have whenever you need it. And he says there is no such gain. You can’t keep it, you can’t store it up, you certainly can’t take it with you into the next life. If what you’re after is something where it’s this kind of

You can always access it when you need it. It can always be there for you. Yeah, that’s not gonna happen. Whereas if you receive these things as gifts, they’re from God, they’re designed by him, they’re ordained by him, they have limits. That’s why Ecclesiastes uses this language of lot. It’s what is allotted to you, like a plot of land. These are the dimensions of the land and nothing else. All the kind of things you were talking about, it’s not that Ecclesiastes is against the satisfaction of bodily appetites, but if they have the upper hand,

Aaron Smith (34:12)
Yep.

Yeah.

Yep.

Bobby Jamieson (34:27)
That’s what

he means by kind of pursuing gain. Those appetites, desires, urges, etc. kind of have the upper hand over you. You, in a sense, are their slave. You are their servant. They are in charge of you. By contrast, when he talks about, and this is very different tone at these kind of seven key passages in the book, he talks about receiving these things as gifts from God. Those are fundamentally different paradigms. Striving or grasping for gain versus receiving them as gift.

He kind of builds an ethic. The one is what not to do, the one is what to do. The one is I’m in charge and I’m seeking sort of selfish fulfillment and satisfaction. The other is God’s in charge, God is generous, God gets to decide what I have and I’m going to receive everything he gives me with gratitude, thanksgiving, humility, a sense of my own limits and a sense of enjoying the present moment because he’s the one providing all these gifts.

Aaron Smith (35:19)
So what makes the difference between these good things and it’s good to have happiness and joy, right? ⁓ But then pursuing those only, I just think about people that say this term, say God wants me to be happy. And they use that, they’re like, so why wouldn’t I? Anything that makes them happy in that moment, right?

Bobby Jamieson (35:40)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, they can justify anything.

Yeah, yeah.

Aaron Smith (35:49)
And I mean, we just talked about in the beginning of this, the dying to self, the theme of, we need to put to death the deeds of the flesh, these things that are driving us. I just think about when the Bible tells us that temptation comes from within a man, the desires that is within us. Like we already desire a thing. It’s already there. That’s what tempts us, not something outside of us, not

the cake on the thing or the image on the screen. It’s the desire for those things that draws us to it. Otherwise, we couldn’t be tempted at all by those things if they weren’t inside of us already wanting to be tempted by them. But how does King Solomon in Ecclesiastes, what is the solution to this? husbands and wives that are listening to this in their own marriage, oftentimes the conflicts that are coming up are derogatory.

Bobby Jamieson (36:29)
Hmm.

Yeah.

Aaron Smith (36:46)
are

coming directly from these false pursuits. I’m not happy because I don’t have this. We don’t have enough of this. I’m thinking finances, I’m thinking sex, communication, all of these things. When we pursue Solomon’s way, we end up in conflict, we end in silence, we end in pain. What is that divergent path? What’s Solomon saying?

Bobby Jamieson (36:51)
Yeah. Yeah.

I think the fullest explanation of the alternative path in the book is Ecclesiastes 5, 18-20.

Behold, what I have seen to be good and fitting is to eat and drink and find enjoyment in all the toil with which one toils under the sun, the few days of his life that God has given him, for this is his lot. Everyone also to whom God has given wealth and possessions and power to enjoy them and to accept his lot and rejoice in his toil, this is the gift of God.

for he will not much remember the days of his life, because God keeps him occupied with joy in his heart. So joy is a gift of God. And joy is a gift of God that comes through, at least in part, enjoying the good gifts that God has already seen fit to generously give you. But there’s a key here. It’s to accept his lot.

and rejoice in his toil, verse 19. Accepting your lot means submitting to the limits God has ordained, starting there, recognizing I’m not God, God sets the boundaries. I’m not God, God decides how much. So in a sense, death to all sense of entitlement, death to all demand. A married couple can decide, it’s prudent for them to pursue.

this level of financial stability or this purchase or this house or whatever. But it has to start from a standpoint of we are fundamentally trusting in the Lord, content in what He provides, content if He sets a limit where we sort of make an effort and it fails and we just have to take that as, God has ordained this limit for us, we’ve done our best, He hasn’t sort of granted us that, let’s be thankful for all that He has given us. So there’s a sort of baseline of humility, gratitude, contentment, and starting from a sense of fullness.

Not that we’re empty and have to go out and be filled by all the sort of sources of happiness we can conquer and consume and sort of colonize into ourselves. But starting with a sense of fullness. What has God already given us? What is the lot He’s assigned? What has He given us to enjoy? Pray for the power to enjoy it. There’s the one guarantee that you’ll never enjoy anything you have is if you always want something different or something more. So there’s a…

Aaron Smith (39:38)
Amen.

Bobby Jamieson (39:39)
One of the keys to contentment is learning to enjoy that thing God has already given you. And in a marriage, that starts with kind of a refreshed and renewed sense of husband and wife each are a tremendous gift of God to the other. With all of our weaknesses, with all of our frailty, despite all of our sin, the very fact of this covenant relationship, it’s a gift. It’s a gift of companionship, it’s a gift of openness to new life, it’s a gift of intimacy, it’s a gift of partnership.

that person in their self-gift, their total self-gift to you, ⁓ they are a gift of God. Period. That’s what they are. It’s not like depending on their performance, no, no, no, that person in their covenant relationship to you is a gift from the Lord. So start by enjoying, start by receiving, start by thanking God for this spouse He’s given you. And there is a kind of practice, you could talk about a practice of accepting your lot, you could talk about a practice of learning to enjoy what’s right in front of

You could certainly talk about a practice of rejoicing in toil. There’s this poem I heard, I can’t remember the author of it. It’s this kind of lament of an English teacher about AI taking over all the students writing. And he’s trying to plead with them. It’s like, what kind of life do you wanna live? Do you wanna live a life where you can have the power to find a beautiful word? Do you wanna live a life where you can work through hardship and actually produce something beautiful? And the last line of the poem is, love is for the ones who love the work.

Aaron Smith (40:46)
Yeah.

Bobby Jamieson (41:04)
And in marriage, love is for the ones who love the work. Like marriage is itself a labor of love. Marriage itself requires constant toil, both in the sense of the toil to maintain the relationship and the toil that comes with the relationship. You know, the sort of upkeep, upkeep of a home, raising children, working together, all the kind of, all the kind of daily labor. If you just resent that and view it as an obstacle to your sort of true and greater fulfillment, whether that’s at work or leisure or entertainment or whatever.

Aaron Smith (41:23)
Mm-hmm.

Bobby Jamieson (41:34)
Yeah, there’s no way you’re gonna be happy. Life is full of toil. Love is for the ones who love the work. So how can you learn to enjoy? And Ecclesiastes’ word is rejoice in his toil. You know, the book uses this word of toil, which is a word that has like that slight negative tinge. Like it’s hard, it’s repeated, it’s frustrating, there’s annoyances. Well, that’s right. Yes. But, but there’s something to rejoice in even in the toil.

Aaron Smith (41:52)
Well, it was part of the curse, wasn’t it? We tie it to the curse. We say you’re gonna toil, you know?

Bobby Jamieson (42:03)
the labor, the repetition, who are you doing it for? Why are you doing it? The fact that you have dishes to wash means you just had a meal, you have a safe home, you’ve got water to spare. Quit complaining about washing the dishes and start giving thanks for all those things.

Aaron Smith (42:19)
I think about ⁓ just the key theme that we’re talking about. ⁓ I can’t remember the scriptures, I can look it up actually, but godliness with contentment is great gain.

Bobby Jamieson (42:30)
Yes, that’s in First Timothy 6. That resonates deeply with Ecclesiastes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Toward the end. Exactly.

Aaron Smith (42:32)
There you go. by the other verse we were talking about, love

of money. But that right there, there’s a bunch of marriage books that I’ve read that are not even Christian. not there, but they’re… Yeah, but yeah, they… Often, one of the main things that they suggest is just be thankful for your spouse, even if you aren’t happy.

Bobby Jamieson (42:47)
Mm-hmm. Some common grace wisdom.

Aaron Smith (43:01)
Be thankful for the person that you have. thinking, like writing down, maybe you can’t think of two things, but you can think of one thing and write that down. that practice is what we’re talking about. It’s a biblical concept. It’s being intent, being thankful, appreciative, rejoicing is essentially the word. Like, ⁓ I’m rejoicing in the wife of my youth, as the Bible puts it.

Bobby Jamieson (43:15)
Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Aaron Smith (43:28)
Even in the midst of, if you’re listening and you’re like struggling in your marriage, this tactic, this strategy with an honest heart before God saying, God, I’m going to try my hardest right now to be thankful for my spouse for something. Thank you that, you know, they made dinner tonight. Thank you that, you know, that they came home from work and did not come home. You know, being thankful for something is the heart.

Bobby Jamieson (43:49)
Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, sure. Well, what are you doing when you

do that? Yeah, yeah, and when you do that, you are aligning your heart with the structure of reality. You might not know it, but if you’re thanking God for this feature of your spouse or this thing they did, you’re giving credit to God, which is right, because it’s ultimately from Him. This person’s existence is from Him. The fact that they’re alive is from Him. The fact that they’re willing to be your spouse is from Him. The fact that they’re doing this, whatever this good thing, even if it seems pitifully small.

Aaron Smith (44:09)
Mm-hmm.

It’s, yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Bobby Jamieson (44:23)
You’re

aligning your heart actually with the deep structure of the universe, which is every good thing in your life is a gift from God. Everything you see is a gift from God. And you’re beginning to sort of open up your heart to, wait a minute, this is from the Lord, he’s good, I don’t deserve this. I should be humble, I should recognize I stand in the Lord’s debt for all of this. I don’t deserve any of it. He’s the one who called it all into existence. And pretty soon that can then turn into humility, love, service.

You know, and in a sense, thankfulness is a direct line to content.

Aaron Smith (44:57)
Well, with you can’t be content without thankfulness, you know, so that that thankfulness is it’s it’s practicing contentment. ⁓ You know, my my kids, when we give them meals that they don’t like, often it’s like they say, I don’t like this. like, well, have you thanked God for it? You know, like you before you didn’t have anything and now you do ⁓ being being thankful is the first step to contentment. It’s saying I’m to thank God for this for my spouse, for this thing, for this opportunity, for this job.

Bobby Jamieson (45:12)
Hahaha! ⁓

Aaron Smith (45:27)
I think King Solomon pointed out so well the idea of contentment and the toil and the work and the labor and what we’ve been given our lot in life. I’ve seen people desire someone else’s career. They’re like, man, I want a career like that. And I think, like we said, it’s not bad to desire something like someone else. It is bad to desire what someone else has. And then ⁓ I’ve seen them get it.

Bobby Jamieson (45:37)
Yeah. Yep.

Aaron Smith (45:56)
and then still not be satisfied. And people that, you know, that have everything and you won’t be satisfied with much if you’re not satisfied with little, just like that scripture that Jesus get when he’s given that, that idea of being faithful little, that is part of faithfulness. To have something and to be thankful for it and to be appreciative and take care of it is to be thankful and content with the thing you have. And so if you look at your marriage, if you look at your job, if you look at anything and you say, well, this isn’t enough, it’s not what I wanted.

Bobby Jamieson (46:05)
Thank

Yeah.

Aaron Smith (46:25)
It’s not right. It’s not good enough. I deserve better than you’re not being faithful to that little thing that you have wherever it’s at that the little amount of love that’s left, the little amount of, you know, the little paycheck you get. So there’s nothing to say that when you get the thing that you think you want, that you will then be thankful. So.

Bobby Jamieson (46:44)
Yeah, bingo.

And Ecclesiastes is the continual diagnosis of all those false horizons, all those false summits. You you think you’re at the top of the mountain, you think you’re at top of the mountain in terms of there’s a higher peak. You think you’re at the horizon, but it’s always just over the next horizon. You know, that’s what Ecclesiastes is sort of in the Bible to teach us.

Aaron Smith (46:51)
Yeah, that’s exactly what it

Mm.

And what I think is awesome is the things that we desire in the flesh, the things that he’s pursuing, they’re very tangible. They’re things that we all on various levels are pursuing. And often when you look at the spiritual things, because like the flesh desires the things of the flesh and the spirit desires things of the spirit. But the flesh almost never desires the things of the spirit. And so it actually takes a

an active pursuit of the things of the Spirit. I’m almost never like, I just want to read the Bible for hours. And even when I do, I’m like, it’s good. I received from it. And it’s actually never enough. But I don’t have that same desire of the other things that are easy that feel never enough. And there’s just this crazy dichotomy that takes place inside the human person that we are struggling constantly with this.

pursuit of the flesh or pursuit of the Spirit. ⁓ And just praise God that the Spirit helps us pursue the things of the Spirit because without it we wouldn’t want to. mean it’s hard to desire it even with the Holy Spirit in me. ⁓ But the more we pursue the other things, the more it takes our attention, the more it takes our energy, the more it takes our desire because we’re feeding the wrong animal, right? We’re moving the wrong direction. Our eyes are in the wrong place.

Bobby Jamieson (48:22)
Mmm.

Yeah, and one

key to that that I think is at least implicit in Ecclesiastes, it shows up in chapter 3 verse 11. think one implication of that verse is that God is our sovereign good. God is our supreme good. All of our hearts crave good. We all want

fullness fulfillment satisfaction and we go looking for it in these crucially realities, but they’re they’re partial they’re Imperfect they’re they’re not lasting their transients. They don’t fill our hearts part of what Ecclesiastes is saying I think in that that that phrase eternity is in our heart is It’s saying that our hearts yearn for an infinite object our hearts yearn for an infinite good and so we sort of divert it into all these different streams of Like you’re talking about the desires of the flash or desires for physical satisfaction

But ultimately, God Himself is all satisfying. And that’s kind of the key to the riddle that Ecclesiastes is pointing to and giving us the elements of the problem. Not so much making it explicit, except in teaching like, remember your creator, chapter 12, verse one, or fear God and keep His commandments. It’s kind of the summary of the whole thing. I do think in principle, that saying, God is your greatest good, God is your all in all, give Him everything. So I think that command to fear God is more related.

Aaron Smith (49:46)
Yeah.

Bobby Jamieson (49:50)
actually to happiness and satisfaction in God. Don’t do anything that would divide your heart from God. Don’t do anything that would anger God. Give your whole self to God in reverence of mission, which also includes looking for your full satisfaction in Him. So I do think chapter three, verse 11 is kind of a clue to like the deep heart anthropology going on here, that we’re driven by these longings. Ultimately, only an infinite object can satisfy us. And Pascal in the 17th century talked about kind of the whole human experiment is,

Everybody thinks it’s gonna be different for them. know, like you’re saying, the person who gets the career they’ve yearned for or whatever. They think, ⁓ all these people have chased all these things and not been satisfied by any of them, but I’ll be different. When I get it, I’m really gonna be satisfied. know, and so Ecclesiastes’ standing witness in the Bible is, no, you’re not. You’re not gonna be any different. But the good news is, there is a God who’s an infinitely satisfying object for all your desires, all your affections. They have to be mortified, they have to be killed, they have to be purified.

But ultimately the Bible’s answer to desire is what God has made us for himself our hearts are restless until we rest in him like Augustine

Aaron Smith (50:56)
A good thing for us to remember is, someone said to me a long time ago, the common denominator in all of our problems is us. where we’re at now and how we perceive our circumstances, our situation, our God, our relationships, and where we are in the future, we’re bringing ourselves with it. either we are content and satisfied and

pursuing the Lord and enjoying now, as Paul was in prison singing praise songs and writing letters to the churches. He was satisfied then in prison. He was satisfied when he, as he said, I learned to be content in much and in little, you know. We’re going to bring ourselves with us. And so who are we now? How do we perceive everything now? I want our listeners to look at their marriages in the same way.

⁓ What you have now is what you have and what God has given you and that you can be appreciative and thankful for it. And again, you could think like, if I only had this, if my husband was only this way, if my wife was only this way. Just remember your way you view them now, if you were to have the woman you think you want, you would think this way now about that woman. You would be the same kind of person you are now with that spouse. And so God desires us

As from what you’re just what you’re talking about and what we’ve been discussing is that he wants our hearts to be his today. The highest good pursuit is of God. I think about all of the things that we enjoy, like everything sugar, sites, poetry, like, you know, music, all the things that are that feel good and look good and sound good. Like in Romans, it just talks about that his divine, his divine. ⁓

Bobby Jamieson (52:54)
Mm-hmm.

Hold on. eternal attributes, namely his eternal power and divine nature have been clearly perceived in the things that have been made. Yeah.

Aaron Smith (53:05)
Yes, thank you. Yeah,

and we see what we’ve been given in this world and the way our biological bodies, the flesh responds to them, are our gifts. They’re there to point us to, as you said, the higher, the eternal good. Like, I love good tasting food, but it’s temporary. I will be hungry again tomorrow. It’s why Jesus says, I am the bread.

Right? He’s the eternal bread that satisfies ⁓ the everlasting water, the eternal water. He’s the water that quenches our thirst forever. If you drink of me, you will never thirst again. ⁓ He’s the life that never ends. So the things that we desire in this life, the things that are good, of course, in moderation, right, are to point us to our desire for the eternal thing. And so I just want everyone listening to consider that, that what we pursue

is never going to satisfy if it’s not Christ. If we’re not pursuing our Heavenly Father who’s eternal, ⁓ all of the other things, like you said, are going to be gains that we’re looking for, but not gifts. And so I just appreciated that. You were going to say something a second ago, I think.

Bobby Jamieson (54:19)
⁓ yeah, know, Ecclesiastes ⁓ most explicit commendation of marriage. only place it mentions it explicitly is in 9.9. Enjoy life with the wife whom you love all the days of your vain life that he has given you under the sun, because that is your portion in life and in your toil at which you toil under the sun. And we’ve talked about this a little bit, but in the chapter in the book on marriage, I contrast two paradigms. One paradigm you could call the quest, and the quest is like

You know, it’s like the romantic quest, finding the one, you know, or in other realms of life, it’s, well, what’s my sort of calling in life? How do I find the kind of thing that’s built for me? And I’m gonna build my life around this satisfying work. I’m gonna be happy when I get it. And the quest does not set us up. know, romantic comedies end, I mean, these days they don’t even do this, but you know, romantic comedies end, they don’t end with like kids and like 20 or 30 or 40 or 50 years of marriage. They end before you ever get to the altar. You know, they end when they like finally like each other and that’s to be enough or something.

Aaron Smith (55:11)
I know, they never show you the hard stuff.

Bobby Jamieson (55:18)
You know, ⁓ the quest does not set you up for what marriage actually is, which I call the toil of nurture. Nurturing, caring, it’s an opposite paradigm from the quest. The quest is self-focused, toil of nurture is other focused. The quest is this kind of trajectory, direction, path. Toil of nurture is sort of cyclical, repeated, daily, small acts. You know, the quest is like, I’m striving for this one big payoff that it’s gonna make me happy. Toil of nurture is.

Aaron Smith (55:26)
yeah.

Bobby Jamieson (55:46)
showing up for the same person, doing the same stuff every day, and making those little deposits of care, of affection, of attention, of pouring into somebody physically, emotionally, spiritually. It’s toil and not giving up. And it’s toil. You know, if the farmer gives up, there’s no crops. If you give up on your garden, you know, it’s all going to get devoured and overgrown with weeds. It’s marriage is a garden plot to tend with little attentive acts of nurture daily.

Aaron Smith (55:55)
Yeah, I’m not giving up. Yeah.

Bobby Jamieson (56:13)
And the way so many things in our culture kind of set us up to look for satisfaction, it’s actually the opposite of what you need to thrive in marriage. What are the virtues of small acts of attentive, caring, affectionate nurture? That’s how you sustain a marriage.

Aaron Smith (56:30)
You know, I don’t like thinking about this concept, I often think ⁓ if, God forbid, I was to lose my wife, because those thoughts come up for whatever reason. We’re traveling. like, this would be hard. The first thought in my mind is like, I would not want to start over because I’ve invested so much energy and time and tears and sweat and joy and excitement and life into my marriage that I don’t

I don’t think I have enough time in my life to redo that. Not saying it’s impossible. People do it all the time. But ⁓ I just recognize the investment of time into my spouse, into my home, into my marriage. And that when we see it that way, it’s like, I’m actually, I’m building something. I think it’s proverbs that, I think it’s in a few other spots also that it ⁓ says a wife is like a well or a spring.

Right. And then to not dip into other wells, right? You have your own well and to also to not let it spill over like Proverbs talks about that. But if you think about a well in the Old Testament, you know this, they had to hand dig those things. Dig, dig, dig, dig, hit rock, move rocks, build the walls around it, dig until they found the water. And then they had a spring that was satisfying, clean water. And that’s something that we’re building as husbands in our marriages is we are like that toil. We are building something beautiful.

And it is not easy all the time. But if you stop and if you give up, you didn’t. You didn’t complete it. You didn’t work and get that fruit or that water or whatever analogy you want to use. That’s what we’re doing. And I think that’s something that we could take away from this is if you’re in a hard spot in your marriage, start with thanking God for it anyway. Thanking God for your spouse anyway. Thanking God for all of the little things. And I promise you,

Um, you’ll see it. You’ll see things change, not just in your heart, but you’ll also see the way you respond to your spouse will change the way you spawn your situations will change. And, it’s a, it’s a powerful thing. It’s a spiritual thing. Would you agree?

Bobby Jamieson (58:40)
Yeah, man. Yeah.

Aaron Smith (58:41)
Yeah.

What’s one last thing you want to share with our audience and then end with telling them where to get your book?

Bobby Jamieson (58:55)
What do I want to end with? ⁓ Here’s kind of a summary, well, everything, yeah. Here’s, mean, a kind of a summary of the book is in the title. Everything is never enough, but God is enough to satisfy your heart forever. That’s the message of Ecclesiastes. And ⁓ the more satisfied you are in God, the more that satisfaction will overflow in your ability to lovingly serve and sacrifice for your spouse and your family.

Aaron Smith (58:59)
I mean, it’s just like… Yeah. Yeah.

Bobby Jamieson (59:22)
The books called everything is never enough Ecclesiastes surprising path resilient happiness Get it wherever you get your books bookshop Amazon etc. Etc

Aaron Smith (59:23)
Amen.

Really appreciate it, Bobby. That was an awesome conversation. just pray that everyone would, I think everyone should dig into the Ecclesiastes. It’s like you said, it’s a really good, yeah, it shines a light on our hearts pursuits and points out its inadequacies. So praise God for you, man. I appreciate you for your time. I thank you. And I will put the link to your book in my show notes and God bless you.

Bobby Jamieson (59:41)
That’s my hope that the book will help with that. it’s a deep, yeah.

Amen.

Appreciate it.

Thank you.