Daily Devotions
Ecclesiastes
"Cast your bread upon the waters"
Text: Ecclesiastes 11:1
CHALLENGING WORDS OF ADVICE
Solomon had written much about the value of wisdom. Now he focused on giving practical but challenging words of advice. To have wisdom without using it well serves no purpose!
“Cast your bread upon the waters,
For you will find it after many days.”
Ecclesiastes 11:1
1. “Cast your bread upon the waters”
a) This word may be described as proverbial advice.
b) Being a proverb, the language is a little more cryptic.
c) It cannot be taken wooden-literally.
d) Bread represents:
i) Livelihood
ii) It is important that one is diligent enough to make a living by working hard.
iii) It may be extended to refer to money.
e) One does not cast bread upon the water literally. For the bread would be spoiled.
f) The challenge is to use money well.
i) One good way is to practise generosity.
ii) To some, generosity is like casting bread on water literally.
In other words, the hard-earned money is wasted.
iii) To the miserly, generosity is hard to appreciate or to practise.
g) Solomon’s challenge was to use funds generously.
i) To help people in need.
ii) One may not see the value or the returns of generous acts.
iii) But these acts of generosity are not in vain!
2. “You will find it after many days”
a) The acts of generosity will reap good results one day.
b) We do not know how lives can be impacted and blessed.
c) But acts of generosity would never be done in vain.
d) Patience and perseverance must be exercised as one practises generosity.
These are challenging words of proverbial wisdom indeed!