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More | Week 2 · Rewind

Rock Point Church

69 min

Pastor Bill Bush · Apr 18, 2018 · 4 min read · 69 min listen

The big idea

More is less — chasing pleasure, possessions, and control for meaning always gives less, not more, because only a relationship with God can satisfy the eternal longing He placed in us.

In this message

The big idea
Point 1 of 7Solomon had everything — ultimate wisdom, wealth, and power — and used it all to chase pleasure as the meaning of life.
Point 2 of 7He tried to medicate his emptiness with alcohol and pleasure-seeking.

Point 3 of 7He tried possessions and wealth to feel significant and secure — and it still wasn't enough.
Point 4 of 7He used people — slaves and concubines — to gain pleasure and control, the same pattern that shows up today in controlling relationships and pornography.
Point 5 of 7After getting everything, Solomon declared it all meaningless — because temporary things can never satisfy an eternal longing.
Point 6 of 7People can look religious while actually being pleasure-seekers instead of God-seekers, which is why their faith collapses when it stops feeling good.
Point 7 of 7Loving God with everything, and loving others as a result, is what actually turns less into more.
Take it into your week
Transcript

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Scripture in this message

Ecclesiastes 2
Ecclesiastes 2:4
Ecclesiastes 2:6
Ecclesiastes 2:7
Ecclesiastes 2:9
Ecclesiastes 2:10

Rewind AI drafted the Big Idea and some point headings shown here from the sermon transcript. Always trust the sermon itself over anything here. How Rewind uses AI

Pastor Bill Bush · Apr 18, 2018 · 69 min watch · 3 min read

More | Week 2

In this message

Big Idea
Key points
Application

Scripture in this message

Ecclesiastes 2
Ecclesiastes 2:4
Ecclesiastes 2:6
Ecclesiastes 2:7
Ecclesiastes 2:9
Ecclesiastes 2:10

Big Idea Key points Application

Big Idea

More is less — chasing pleasure, possessions, and control for meaning always gives less, not more, because only a relationship with God can satisfy the eternal longing He placed in us.

God built us with a longing for eternity that only He can fill, so chasing pleasure, wealth, or control for meaning will always leave us wanting more. Solomon proved this by getting everything a person could want and finding it meaningless, but when we love God fully and live His way, even the small, temporary pleasures of life become truly satisfying.

Key points

1
1Solomon had everything — ultimate wisdom, wealth, and power — and used it all to chase pleasure as the meaning of life.
Pastor Bill introduces Ecclesiastes as Solomon's late-life reflection, noting he was the wealthiest and smartest man who ever lived, worth an estimated $2.2 trillion in today's dollars, who used all his resources to search for meaning apart from God.
2
2He tried to medicate his emptiness with alcohol and pleasure-seeking.
Reading Ecclesiastes 2:1-3, Pastor Bill shows Solomon turning to wine and foolishness to try to manufacture happiness, calling it an attempt to feel good through medicating rather than through God.
3
3He tried possessions and wealth to feel significant and secure — and it still wasn't enough.
Pastor Bill walks through Solomon's homes, gardens, reservoirs, herds, and stockpiles of gold, noting everything is plural, showing that no amount of accumulation satisfied him; he connects this to our modern hoarding of money for a false sense of security.
4
4He used people — slaves and concubines — to gain pleasure and control, the same pattern that shows up today in controlling relationships and pornography.
Pastor Bill points out Solomon owned about 150,000 slaves and 300 concubines, arguing that pleasure-seeking always leads to using and controlling others, drawing a direct line to modern marriage conflict, slavery's persistence today, and pornography.
5
5After getting everything, Solomon declared it all meaningless — because temporary things can never satisfy an eternal longing.
Reading Ecclesiastes 2:9-11, Pastor Bill explains Solomon denied himself no pleasure yet called it all "chasing the wind," teaching that God planted eternity in our hearts and only relationship with the Creator can meet that longing.
6
6People can look religious while actually being pleasure-seekers instead of God-seekers, which is why their faith collapses when it stops feeling good.
Turning to 2 Timothy 3, Pastor Bill warns that Paul described church people who act religious but reject the power of godliness because they love pleasure rather than God; he applies this to worship style preferences, giving, and serving that stop the moment they're no longer enjoyable.
7
7Loving God with everything, and loving others as a result, is what actually turns less into more.
Citing Jesus' words in Matthew 22, Pastor Bill teaches that loving God fully and loving others as ourselves are equally important commands; when we go all in with God, giving and serving become freeing rather than depleting, and the temporary pleasures of life become genuinely enjoyable gifts.

A story from life

Pastor's account of moving 342 yards within the same neighborhood after in-laws contributed money for landscaping upgrades

Application

Pastor Bill frames it as a choice between chasing meaning in things or sticking your head out the window of life like a happy dog, simply enjoying what God gives.

Stop medicating, accumulating, subjugating, or fornicating for meaning
Pastor Bill names the four patterns people run to instead of God — alcohol, possessions, controlling people, and sexual pleasure — and asks people to honestly see which one they're running after.
Love God with all of you, not just part
Drawing from Matthew 22, he asks people to stop deciding how much of God to follow and instead go all in with heart, soul, and mind, trusting that His love for us (shown at the cross) makes Him trustworthy.
Love others as an equal, non-optional part of loving God
He challenges people to serve, give, and reach out to others rather than just attend and sit, since loving God and loving others cannot be separated.
Give generously instead of hoarding for security
Pastor Bill asks people to let go of the lie that more savings equals more security, trusting that God provides, and to experience how giving less to yourself actually produces more freedom and peace.
Let go and simply enjoy what God gives instead of overanalyzing it
Using his wife's realization about the landscaping, he asks people to receive God's temporary gifts — home, work, relationships — as blessings to enjoy rather than sources they demand ultimate meaning from.

Take it into your week

Rewind AI contributed study material from the sermon transcript; church-authored wording and verified sermon quotes keep their own source. Always trust the sermon itself over anything here. How Rewind uses AI

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Scripture in this message

From the transcript
“here we are in chapter two of Ecclesiastes and it says this, I said to myself, now whenever somebody talks about themselves in the third person, I don't think it's gonna end well”
From the transcript
“But then he goes on in verse four and says, I also tried to find meaning by building huge homes for myself. So now he goes, the first thing is he's trying to use alcohol to feel happy”
From the transcript
“And then look at this verse six. I built reservoirs to collect water to irrigate my many flourishing groves. Reservoirs? How many of you have a reservoir”
From the transcript
“Well now, here's the problem. When you start to go after just pleasure, it gets even darker at times. Because verse seven says this, I bought slaves both men and women and others were born into my household”
From the transcript
“And look what he ends up saying. Verse nine, he says, so I became greater than all who had lived in Jerusalem before me and my wisdom never failed me”
From the transcript
“Now here's the thing you understand. Verse 10, if you have your Bibles underline this. Anything I wanted, I would take. I denied myself no pleasure”
From the transcript
“He created us. He put eternity, planted it in our hearts, it says in chapter three. And what he's learning, what the whole book is trying to say is, there is a longing and a thirst”
From the transcript
“I wanna turn to second Timothy. Timothy is this is a letter. This is the last thing Paul ever wrote before he was killed and he knew he was gonna die”
From the transcript
“here's what he says. He goes, you know this, you should know this, Timothy, that in the last days there will be very difficult times. For people will love only themselves and their money”
From the transcript
“If you go back to Ecclesiastes in in verse, 24, he says this, so I decided there's nothing better than to enjoy food and drink and to find satisfaction at work”
From the transcript
“And here's what he said in Matthew 22 verse 37. Jesus said this, you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind”
From the transcript
“Now here's the thing, the reason a lot of us struggle with it is because of what it says in first John. The only way we can truly love God is because he loved us first”
From the transcript
“That's the the first and greatest. But then verse 39, he goes, a second. The second part, he goes, is equally important. Some of you've heard this verse a million times”

Rewind AI contributed study material from the sermon transcript; church-authored wording and verified sermon quotes keep their own source. Always trust the sermon itself over anything here. How Rewind uses AI

7-day devotional

A personal reading plan from this message — scripture, reflection, and prayer for each day.

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Day 1

Solomon was not a casual experimenter. He was the wisest, wealthiest, most powerful man of his era, and he ran the experiment of pleasure with everything he had. In Ecclesiastes 2, he describes turning to wine, laughter, and indulgence — not in ignorance, but with open eyes, testing whether any of it could answer the ache inside him. The verdict came back the same every time: meaningless. Not sinful in the moment, necessarily, but empty in the end. The pleasure would land, and then it would fade, and the ache would still be there, maybe louder than before. What strikes most people when they first sit with this passage is how honest it is. Solomon does not write from a distance. He went there. He tasted everything the world calls satisfying, and he tells us plainly what he found. That kind of honesty is a gift, because it names something most of us already feel but rarely say out loud — that the thing we thought would finally be enough never quite is. If that resonates with you today, you are not broken. You are simply human, and Solomon was there first. The good news is that his experiment did not end with despair. It ended with a discovery. But we need to sit with the honest diagnosis before we can appreciate the cure.

For reflection

Which area of your life right now — something you are pursuing, consuming, or holding onto — do you secretly hope will finally feel like enough?

Pray

Pray for the honesty to name the places where you have been running Solomon's experiment in your own life.

Day 2

The scale of what Solomon built is almost impossible to picture. Houses, vineyards, gardens, parks, reservoirs. Servants, flocks, silver, gold. Entertainers. A collection of pleasures that dwarfs anything most of us will ever encounter. And verse 10 is striking in its candor: 'Anything I wanted, I would take. I denied myself no pleasure.' He is not describing secret shame here — he is describing total access, total permission, total acquisition. And then he says it: 'But as I looked at everything I had worked so hard to accomplish, it was all so meaningless — like chasing the wind.' The image of chasing the wind is exactly right. You can run hard after it. You can feel it on your face. But you cannot catch it, hold it, or keep it. The sermon named four patterns Solomon tested — medicating with alcohol, accumulating possessions, subjugating others through control, and sexual indulgence. Most of us are not running all four at once, but most of us are running at least one. The honest question is not whether we chase things — we all do. The question is what we are hoping those things will finally give us. Meaning? Relief? A sense that we have arrived? Solomon had more than anyone, and it was not enough. That is not a warning to avoid good things. It is an invitation to look past the gift toward the Giver.

For reflection

Which of Solomon's four patterns — medicating, accumulating, controlling, or sexual indulgence — do you recognize most in your own tendencies, and what void are you hoping it fills?

Pray

Pray for clear eyes to see which pattern has the most pull on you, and for the courage to be honest about it.

Day 3

Here is the turn. After cataloguing everything that does not satisfy, Solomon names the reason none of it could: 'Yet God has made everything beautiful for its own season. He has planted eternity in the human heart, but even so, people cannot see the whole scope of God's work from beginning to end.' That phrase — 'planted eternity in the human heart' — is the key to everything. The restlessness you feel is not a design flaw. It is not anxiety or ingratitude or weakness. It is a signal built into you by God Himself, pointing you toward something no created thing can provide. C.S. Lewis said it this way: if we find in ourselves a desire that nothing in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that we were made for another world. Solomon is saying the same thing centuries earlier. The problem with pleasure is not that it is bad. Much of it is genuinely good — God made it. The problem is that we try to use finite things to fill an infinite space. It cannot work. The eternity in your heart will not be quieted by the next purchase, the next drink, the next achievement, or the next relationship. Only a real, ongoing connection with the eternal God can speak to that part of you. That is not a religious slogan. It is the conclusion of the wisest man who ever ran the experiment.

For reflection

Where do you feel that deep, unnamed restlessness most often — and when was the last time you brought it directly to God instead of reaching for something else?

Pray

Pray that God would meet the eternity He planted in your heart with His own presence today.

Day 4

Paul's warning to Timothy lands uncomfortably close to home. He describes people in the last days who are 'lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God' — and then adds the detail that stings: they will be 'acting religious.' This is not a description of people far from the church. It is a description of people inside it. The sermon put it plainly: the danger is not that we stop going to church or stop using Christian language. The danger is that our religious activity becomes another form of pleasure — something we do because it feels good, makes us feel safe, or keeps up appearances — while we quietly push away the power of the gospel that would actually change us. That is a convicting mirror. It is possible to sing the songs, attend the gatherings, and use all the right words while the heart is still fundamentally organized around self — what feels good, what I want, what I can control. Paul calls that 'a form of godliness.' The form is real. The power is missing. The invitation here is not guilt. It is a question worth sitting with: Is my faith in God shaping my desires, or am I shaping my faith around my desires? The difference between those two things is everything.

For reflection

Is there an area of your spiritual life where you are going through the motions but quietly resisting the part of the gospel that would ask something real of you?

Pray

Pray for the kind of honest self-examination that leads to freedom, not shame — and for openness to the Spirit's power rather than just the form of religion.

Day 5

After all the searching, Solomon lands somewhere surprising. He does not end with asceticism — a life stripped of pleasure — or with despair. He ends with this: 'So I decided there is nothing better than to enjoy food and drink and to find satisfaction in work. Then I realized that these pleasures are from the hand of God. For who can eat or enjoy anything apart from Him?' The gifts are still gifts. The food is still good. The work still has meaning. The difference is where they come from and what they point to. When pleasure is received from the hand of God — with gratitude, within the life He designed — it is genuinely enjoyable. When it is grabbed and hoarded as an end in itself, it curdles. The same glass of wine that Solomon tested as a numbing agent becomes, in a different posture, a simple gift at a dinner table with people you love. Solomon's conclusion is not 'stop enjoying things.' It is 'stop expecting things to be what only God can be.' That shift in posture — from grasping to receiving — is what the sermon called the difference between being a pleasure seeker and a God seeker. It is a small adjustment in the heart that changes everything about how ordinary life feels.

For reflection

What is one everyday gift in your life — a meal, a friendship, a moment of rest — that you could receive more intentionally as coming from God's hand rather than just consuming it?

Pray

Pray for a posture of gratitude that lets you enjoy God's good gifts without needing them to be more than they are.

Day 6

When Jesus was asked which commandment was the greatest, He did not hesitate. Love God with everything — your whole heart, soul, and mind. And the second is like it: love your neighbor as yourself. The sermon pointed out that these two are inseparable. You cannot genuinely do one and neglect the other. What makes this significant in the context of Ecclesiastes is that Jesus is describing the exact opposite of Solomon's experiment. Solomon's experiment was organized entirely around the self — what I can taste, what I can build, what I can own, who I can control. Jesus calls us into a life organized around love for God and love for others. That is not a list of rules to follow. It is a description of the life our hearts were actually built for. When we love God with everything, we stop needing things to fill the space only He can fill. And when we love others as ourselves — genuinely, not performatively — we stop seeing people as means to our ends and start seeing them as people God loves. The sermon named this as the cure for what it called the 'eye problem' of self-centeredness. Loving others as yourself does not come naturally. But it does come — as a fruit of genuinely loving God first. These two commands belong together.

For reflection

Is there someone in your life right now whom you have been seeing primarily in terms of what they can give you or how they affect you — and what would it look like to genuinely love them this week?

Pray

Pray for love — not the feeling but the choice — for one specific person in your life who is hard to love right now.

Day 7

Looking back over this week, the arc of Ecclesiastes 2 holds together in a way that is hard to miss. Solomon tried more — more pleasure, more stuff, more control, more indulgence — and found less. Not less in terms of quantity, but less meaning, less joy, less peace. And the resolution was not in having less. It was in orienting toward the right thing. When we love God with everything and love others as ourselves, something shifts. Not all at once, and not without cost. The sermon was honest that going all in — giving generously, serving the church, pursuing purity, loving people who are difficult — will feel like less in the short run. But less truly becomes more. Less anxiety about what you have. Less hollowness after the next high. More genuine enjoyment of ordinary gifts. More freedom. More of what your heart was actually looking for when it started chasing everything else. That is not a formula or a transaction. It is simply what it looks like to live in alignment with how God made you — with eternity in your heart, and the Giver of every good gift at the center. Wherever you are starting from this week, the invitation is the same: stop chasing more of the temporary, and go all in with the One who satisfies.

For reflection

As you look back at this week, what is one concrete thing you want to do differently — one small step toward loving God more fully or loving someone around you more genuinely?

Pray

Pray for the courage and trust to take that one step — and for the joy that the sermon promised is waiting on the other side of it.

Rewind AI contributed study material from the sermon transcript; church-authored wording and verified sermon quotes keep their own source. Always trust the sermon itself over anything here. How Rewind uses AI

Small-group discussion guide

For leading a group conversation about this message.

Open

Solomon had unlimited access to wealth, pleasure, and power — and ran the full experiment. This message asks what he found on the other side, and what it means for us.

Discussion questions

1
In Ecclesiastes 2:1-10, Solomon works his way through alcohol, lavish building projects, wealth, control over people, and sexual relationships — and lands on the word 'meaningless.' What do you think he means by that word? What was he actually looking for that none of those things could give him?
2
Ecclesiastes 3:11 says God 'has planted eternity in the human heart.' How does that idea help explain why the things Solomon tried always seemed to leave him wanting more?
3
The message described four patterns — medicating, accumulating, subjugating, and sexual indulgence — as ways people quietly try to fill that God-shaped longing. What makes these patterns so easy to miss or rationalize, especially inside a church community?
4
In 2 Timothy 3:1-5, Paul describes people who are 'lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God' — and places them inside religious life, not outside it. What does it look like, practically, when someone's religious activity is driven more by what feels good than by genuine love for God?
5
Solomon ends in Ecclesiastes 2:24-26 by saying pleasure and everyday gifts can only be truly enjoyed through a relationship with God. How does that reframe the way we think about things like food, rest, friendship, or work — are they the problem, or is something else the issue?
6
The message pointed to Jesus' words in Matthew 22:37-39 — loving God with everything and loving others as yourself — as the path where 'less becomes more.' What might it look like for a community like ours to actually live that out together, rather than just agree with it?

Pray together

Thanking God that He is the Gift Giver behind every good thing, and asking Him to reorient our hearts toward Him rather than toward the gifts

Rewind AI contributed study material from the sermon transcript; church-authored wording and verified sermon quotes keep their own source. Always trust the sermon itself over anything here. How Rewind uses AI

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Week 2 · 6 messages

Where these passages are preached

Ecclesiastes 2 Ecclesiastes 3 2 Timothy 3 Matthew 22

Explore related topics

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