Ecc Study Nine

Study Number Nine

Reread Ecclesiastes 5:8-12. Read Ecclesiastes 7:1-14.

“who knows what is good for a man in life?”

The wedding was supposed to be simple, yes, but Clare still wanted it to be the sort of thing dreams were made of. She’d read too many classic love stories and seen too many movies based on them to settle for too much less than the ideal wedding she’d originally hoped for. So, she booked a florist, a photographer, and a caterer who were not exactly inexpensive. She’d had recommendations for all three and had seen their work as well, so she really felt that they were worth the cost. She remembered her older sister’s simple but pretty church wedding with organ music and homemade dresses, a reception revolving around streamers, cake and punch. Friends had taken pictures and made the cake. It had all been very cheap. Clare wondered fleetingly how shocked Kate would be at the amount of money Clare was spending. But Clare had never been as much of a cheapskate as her older sister, and Clare had never been as poor as her either. Oddly, though, they’d chosen somewhat similar men. They’d hit it off when Clare had introduced them at Christmas, and Clare thought Nick would like Keegan more and more as he got to know him better. Keegan and Nick were even from neighboring towns in Minnesota and both were hockey fans, though Nick more so than Keegan.
She was able to cut some corners, as Keegan had a friend who played the French horn with a small ensemble who were willing to perform at the wedding for a nominal fee, and her younger sister offered to do their hair and makeup. Clare planned to have her two sisters be her bridesmaids and Keegan’s two brothers would be his. He also had an older and a younger sibling and he also was in a family with children all of the same gender. Perhaps they appreciated each other more because there was even more mystery and excitement to the opposite gender for them than for those who’d had more exposure to it through siblings.
Having the wedding at the house didn’t turn out to be as much of a way to save money as one might have hoped. Clare was determined to have the house look as beautiful as possible both on the inside and the outside for the big day. She painted every room, purchased dining room and bedroom sets, as well as a new couch and loveseat, and also some accessories. The grandfather clock she’d fallen in love with when she’d seen it at an antique shop with Kate, who’d come with Nick and the kids that weekend to meet Keegan. Even Kate thought the clock a worthy purchase. Outside, Clare planted flowers in large pots and Keegan, with the help of some of the teens, put in a patio and a gazebo.
They rented chairs and tables, all with a black iron look to go with the garden wedding theme. The florist decorated the gazebo, created centerpieces for the tables, which were arranged on one side of the yard, and made bouquets and corsages. Every flower—and they weren’t all the same variety—was the same or virtually the same pale shade of yellow.
The morning of the wedding, Clare gave her little sister a nervous hug, after she pronounced Clare’s hair, an elegant, smooth updo, and her very tasteful, not too heavy makeup, “perfect.” Clare wondered briefly at the shadows under Annie’s eyes, but said nothing, just as the past few days they’d carefully avoided any uncomfortable conversations, concentrating on the wedding and the most optimistic news they had to share with each other.
Annie was enjoying her teaching, she said, her college days a distant memory. But from the expression on her face, Clare gathered the memory wasn’t really so distant after all. Annie had gone far away from home for school, even farther from home than Clare had gone. Their mother had mourned her daughters’ leaving, as one after the other had gone away from her, the eldest with her husband, the others to school. But she hadn’t really tried to stop them, not that it would have done any good.
Clare wasn’t sure why they’d all left. She knew her mom had been understanding of their need for independence, though she’d sorely wished they’d stayed closer to home as some of her friends’ children had. She—they—everyone blamed it on—Abby. But—who knew. How could you know what would have happened if it hadn’t happened? How could you know if doing—something—differently would have made a difference? You couldn’t really. Intellectually, Clare was convinced of that. You couldn’t know. But you could be haunted by the thought that something could have made a difference after all. “How little a thing it takes to destroy you or to save you,” de Maupassant wrote in “The Necklace.” Clare believed environment neither controlled nor influenced destiny so much as the inclination and desire of the heart. Everyone struggled with the shadows of life to some degree. Her own life was not so far removed from its death, and sometimes a seeming death in life living, but yet, grasping for that life in death hope. It made her take to heart Eliot’s words from “Journey of the Magi,” “how glad they would be for another death.”
Something had happened to Annie in college, though, so far away from her family. Another shadow, perhaps even worse than the first one, the one they all shared. But she hadn’t spoken of it. They knew only a little bit about it.
“Thank you,” Clare told Annie sincerely. She knew without looking that Annie had made her look as nice as it was possible for her to look.
Annie smiled.
Clare’s older sister Kate came into the room then and sat down on the chair in front of Annie, just as Clare left it. “My turn?” Kate said.
“Yes,” Annie said. “We don’t have a lot of time left.”
“Sorry. Trying to keep my brood in line is no easy task, as you know,” Kate said as Annie deftly twisted her hair up and secured it. “You’ve seen Jason doing laps outside on Keegan’s bike? He adjusted the seat for him, even though Jason said it was fine. He thinks he’s as big as Jack and I hate to say it—but he almost is. I’m trying to get him to work off as much of that energy as possible so he’ll sit calmly during the service, which, according to Nick, is going to be a long one. Don’t you think it’s a little much to have Dad, your pastor, Nick, and Keegan all speak?”
“It is a little much,” Clare said. “We asked them each to keep it short.”
“Like that will happen,” Annie said in her quiet voice. “Dad always gets on some soap box, usually about something he feels everybody else is doing wrong. If everybody could only be like him—“ She gave a little laugh.
“I don’t think Dad’s that way at all,” Kate said in surprise. “He’s so ready to see another person’s point of view and so quick to forgive. I wish I were more like him.”
“Maybe to you he’s that way,” Annie said shortly.
“Mom!” Clare said, a little more loudly than necessary, as her mother walked into the room. Her sisters quickly grew quiet.
“You all look beautiful,” the older woman said. Her eyes misted slightly as she studied Clare. “I’m so proud of you, Clare. I hope you’ll be very, very happy, like your dad and I have been all these years. We’ve prayed so much for you, that you’d marry a man who would love you and love the Lord. We prayed that for each of our girls and still do,” she added, looking at Annie.
“God doesn’t always answer our prayers the way we want him too,” Annie said, though she turned away slightly as she spoke, as if trying to take back her words even as she said them. They all knew what she spoke of. Her mother blanched slightly, but didn’t turn away. Instead she reached for her youngest daughter, and placed her hand on her shoulder. Annie turned back to her mother. “I’m sorry,” she said. Clare knew she wished she hadn’t broken the careful, unspoken policy of the past few days of not speaking about uncomfortable things. It had actually been their policy for a long time.
“Yes, I don’t always understand His work but I still trust Him. I still strive to focus on Him and live for Him. He’s all that’s worth living for. I pray that each of you will find that true in your lives, no matter what it is that sometimes distracts you from that truth or makes you want to deny it.”
This time their mother’s words caused all three of them to look away briefly, lost in separate thoughts. Kate was the first to return to the present. “Well, we’d better go. It’s time for this wedding to start,” she said.
In her pale yellow dress, Lauren was a lovely junior bridesmaid at fourteen, and perfectly balanced by her twin, who stood up with the men in his tuxedo, as a junior groomsman. Clare could hardly believe how grown-up they were. She’d wanted Jason to have a part in the wedding too, but he hadn’t wanted to be a ring bearer because he thought that was too babyish, and then at the last minute he begged out of standing up with his brother. Kate said she thought he was scared about being in front of everyone. So he decided to remain with the other guests, sitting quietly in his seat. He did choose a seat near the front. He seemed relieved when his grandpa joined him, after he gave Clare away.
Message after message, each thankfully fairly brief, went right by Clare. She tried to focus on the words but found it difficult—rather impossible—to do so. The music was a little easier for her to absorb, though her mind still kept wandering. What comes next, what comes next, she kept thinking.
Clare tripped over her memorized vows just a bit. She, like Jason, felt suddenly nervous, not about being in front of everyone, but about the commitment she was making. Did she really know who this man was? She wondered if she could ever really know who anyone was. Keegan, on the other hand, was as calm as could be, looking steadily into Clare’s eyes. His smile warmed her, gave her confidence. She reminded herself that she had prayed a great deal about this decision. She certainly hadn’t rushed into it. Surely, Keegan was God’s will for her.
Funny that she’d never really pictured herself married to a pastor. She’d thought at one point she’d rather marry a man in any other line of work. Her father was a pastor of a small church, always struggling to retain its members, and her brother-in-law, similarly, pastored a slightly larger, but still struggling congregation. Nick’s church had an assistant pastor, but he only worked part-time. Keegan worked with the youth at a large church, considerably bigger than Clare’s dad’s and brother-in-law’s churches put together. He’d not originally trained for the job and would have at one time been as adverse to the idea of being a youth pastor as Clare to the idea of marrying a pastor. Interestingly, he had gotten a premed degree and wasn’t able to get into medical school immediately so decided to get a job for the year and apply again for the following year. He ended up working at a nursing home. He encouraged the youth group at the church he was attending to develop relationships with the elderly people. The young people came weekly, on Tuesday nights, to have a short service, play games and visit with the elderly people. Then some of the girls started taking sewing lessons with one of the older women. When the church lost their youth pastor, they asked Keegan if he’d be willing to fill in for a while, since he was already working with the teens. He and they enjoyed and benefited from his teaching and working with them so much that he decided maybe God wanted him to work with youth. He wasn’t as much of the crazy, fun-loving type as he perceived a lot of youth pastors as being, although he did have an easy going, energetic spirit, and the teens really appreciated him and what he did with them. So he enrolled in a local Bible college, finished a Bible degree and came on staff at the church full-time. It was a good fit for him. Clare was amazed at how content he seemed to be with what he was doing. She found herself much more restive, frustrated with her inadequacies, bored with her routine, wanting more. She hoped that he would help her to be more content.
They had had a good group of people in attendance at the wedding, Clare noted as she and Keegan walked down the aisle, a long runner placed between the two groups of chairs, when the service was over. There were coworkers and friends of hers and Keegan’s, students of Clare’s and young people from Keegan’s youth group.
Clare and Keegan stopped between the chairs set up for those observing the wedding and the tables arranged for the meal afterward. Soon the rest of the wedding party joined them as they formed an assembly line to greet the guests. People complimented them on the beauty of the wedding, on the beauty of the bride. They wished them well in their life together.
Serena with her husband and little daughter and Abigail without her frequent companion from youth group, the young man Clare thought she could hardly be separated from, came through the line together. Clare admired Serena’s round-faced baby and marveled that this young mother had been her student a relatively short time ago. “Just wait until you have one,” Serena said. “You’ll be so happy.”
Do babies equal happiness then? Clare thought, though she tried not to be cynical. There should be no place for cynicism today. Only room for joy about what the future held. Serena was right. Surely Clare would be happy.
Abigail gave Clare and Keegan both big hugs. She congratulated them repeatedly. She seemed to think they’d already found the pinnacle of happiness. Marriage was it to her, apparently.
Well, it was an exciting thing, to think of herself as a married woman, to remind herself that all these beautiful things were in celebration of her and Keegan’s union.
Clare enjoyed the sunlight’s sparkling on the crystal drinking glasses and on the gleaming silverware on the tables. The plates—fine white china with a silver edge—were stacked by the buffet, which was a tremendous, but also elegant and sophisticated spread, from the fresh tossed salad, warm, homemade bread, and pecan encrusted chicken breast with sautéed vegetables to the fruits and cheeses which concluded the meal, except of course, for the towering wedding cake.
After it was all over, after the last voice had long faded in its cry of good cheer as Keegan and Clare climbed into his car, she still in her lacy wedding dress, Clare still felt nervous, still waiting for what came next. Her heart beat fast in anticipation.
She soon found out. Keegan had reserved a room at the most expensive and lovely hotel room in the city with complimentary room service brunch to be brought them in the morning at whatever time they chose, and then a flight to Paris, France. Clare was overwhelmed. She’d only been out of the country once before, on a missions trip to Mexico when she was a teenager.
Keegan placed their luggage on the floor of their hotel room beside the bed and turned to Clare, who was close at his heels. She didn’t want to be too far away from him.“You are so beautiful,” Keegan said. “My beautiful bride. I just can’t believe how beautiful you are.”
Clare smiled both out of pleasure at his words and out of amusement at his repetition of the word “beautiful.” Should she suggest a synonym? She was touched at the sight of his eyes, so bright, so tender, so filled with gentle promise. Surely they would know great joy together.

Keegan and Clare stood in front of the Eiffel Tower, with arms around each others’ waists. They’d just picked up some fresh croissants, baguettes and fruit-filled pastries at a bakery. Keegan suggested they sit on the grass and try them. Clare felt supremely happy.

Later in the day, hot, tired, and frustrated with trying to understand and make themselves understood, as they went to all the sights, purchased lunch, and some flowers, as well as a couple souvenirs, and then made their way back to their rooms, Clare realized the glow had worn off. She’d had fun but almost felt like going home already. When she was back home, in her—their—new house, fixing it up to make it just what they wanted it to be, a perfect retreat for the two of them, she would be perfectly content. Why—maybe a new little someone would even join their family before too long. She and Keegan had decided not to do anything to prevent her getting pregnant right away, as they were both older than many newlyweds and ready to start a family. What a wonderful thing it would be to have a little life growing inside her, someone who was part of her and Keegan yet his or her own person. What happiness such an event would bring.

Questions to Answer

1. What are some of the negatives of having wealth?

2. Fine perfume and feasting are comparatively denigrated in Ecclesiastes 7. What point is Solomon making?

3. What is important to Clare about her wedding? What direction does her life take after the wedding? Is she growing at all?

4. What do you strive for? What do you value?

5. Are you learning and growing? Do you have positive influences in your life and are you listening to them? What are you looking to to satisfy you?