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LaGrave Live
LIVE Morning Worship Service 08-16-2026
The Way of Wisdom: Wisdom from the Family Skeptic
About The Service:
We will continue our Way of Wisdom sermon series, a series which looks at some of the wisdom literature in the Bible. Next week we will leave the book of Proverbs. Pastor Jonker will preach on the remarkable book of Ecclesiates.
Order of Worship:
https://lagrave.org/wp-content/uploads/2026-8-16-AM-Order-of-Worship.pdf
About the Church:
We are a traditional CRC church in the middle of Downtown Grand Rapids, MI, worshipping at 8:40am, 11:00am, and 6:00pm. (10:00am and 6:00pm during the summer months)
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The August special offering is for Covenant House. Covenant House Michigan (CHMI) provides shelter and hope to young people aged 18-24 who are experiencing homelessness or victims of trafficking in Grand Rapids and Detroit. Their mission is to serve all youth who come to their doors with unconditional love, absolute respect, and relentless support.
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When Wisdom Questions Everything: Ecclesiastes and the Search for What Lasts
Rooted in What Lasts
The service opens by contrasting life rooted in the ways of the world with life rooted in Christ, using the imagery of wastelands and streams of living water. The congregation is invited to confess the ways it has turned from God and to trust again in God’s mercy, patience, and love. This theme of rootedness becomes an important foundation for everything that follows. The opening also introduces the continuation of The Way of Wisdom sermon series and its move from Proverbs into Ecclesiastes. The service frames Ecclesiastes as a book that questions what has lasting value when God is not at the center. That tension between temporary pursuits and enduring meaning becomes the central concern of the sermon.
Faith Publicly Claimed
A major portion of the service centers on Callan, Philip, Victoria, and Ashley as they publicly profess their faith. The pastor explains that although all four are making the same basic commitment to follow Jesus, their paths to that moment have been different. Philip, Victoria, and Ashley are described as having grown up in the church and returning to the baptismal font where they were baptized as children. Callan’s path is described differently: he sought out faith, studied the Reformed tradition, joined the congregation, and is baptized during the service. The pastor presents profession of faith as a decision to root one’s life in Jesus and to make Christ’s story one’s own. The participants are welcomed into the full fellowship of the church with the reminder that a faithful life includes both joy and difficulty.
Different People, One Church
The children’s sermon uses different kinds of footwear to explain why differences within the church are valuable. Dress shoes, running shoes, winter boots, and an ice skate each have different purposes, and none is ideal for every task. The pastor applies that illustration to the church, where preaching, singing, playing the organ, repairing things, and many other forms of service require different gifts. Rather than wishing everyone were the same, the children are encouraged to see diversity as useful and necessary. The Holy Spirit is described as bringing different people together into one church. The illustration reinforces the broader service theme that people can have different roles and journeys while still being united in Jesus.
The Skeptic Beside the Sage
The sermon emphasizes the sharp contrast between Proverbs 31 and Ecclesiastes 1. Proverbs ends with a picture of the wife of noble character, who embodies wisdom, flourishing, competence, and honor. Ecclesiastes then opens with the Teacher declaring that everything is meaningless and describing life as a repetitive cycle under the sun. The pastor calls this contrast “biblical whiplash” and compares Ecclesiastes to a skeptical, curmudgeonly uncle at a family reunion who refuses easy optimism. In that illustration, the cheerful advice of Aunt Gladys and Aunt Agnes is interrupted by Uncle Hank, who insists that life is harder than their encouraging sayings suggest. The preacher argues that Scripture intentionally includes both voices and that believers need to listen to both the hopeful wisdom of Proverbs and the difficult questions raised by Ecclesiastes.
Death, Dissatisfaction, and the Empty Cathedral
The preacher identifies death and dissatisfaction as two major sources of the Teacher’s skepticism. Death can interrupt even a disciplined, wise, hardworking life, as illustrated by the story of two ministers who retired after decades of work and died soon afterward. Dissatisfaction presents another problem because wisdom, pleasure, power, wealth, and achievement may fail to provide the deep fulfillment people expect. The sermon compares this pursuit to racing dogs chasing a mechanical rabbit that always stays just out of reach, then suggests an even greater disappointment would come from finally catching it and discovering that it is fake. The Teacher’s grief is interpreted as evidence of a deeper human need for meaning, pictured as an empty cathedral inside the heart. Ecclesiastes, in the preacher’s view, strips away idols and false sources of satisfaction so that people can feel the longing for something more.
Beyond the Sun
The sermon ultimately interprets that longing as a sign that human beings are made for eternity and fellowship with God. The preacher argues that “under the sun” is not the whole of reality and that death is not the final ceiling over human existence. A spaceflight story is used to illustrate a person confronting awe, fragility, and a longing for spiritual language after seeing Earth from space, with the cross becoming a powerful symbol in that moment. The sermon then turns decisively to Jesus, presenting Christ as the one who breaks the closed circle of death and gives lasting significance to faithful acts of love, hope, and service. The Teacher asks whether anything is truly new under the sun, and the sermon answers with the New Testament image of a person in Christ becoming a new creation. The final message is that Ecclesiastes’ skepticism is worth hearing, but Jesus is given the last word: people are beloved, their lives matter, and they belong to an eternal story.