What’s up with Branson, MO? Read Eccl. 2:1-11

A few days ago we got home from Missouri, visiting dear friends who live near Branson.  If you don’t know, Branson is kind of “Las Vegas without the gambling and nudity.”  It is a very family friendly place with lots of amusements.

While we were there, in the course of my daily Bible reading, I read today’s passage.  It was day 10 of our 12 day trip.  In other words we had already enjoyed several shows and had two this last day before beginning our trip home.  We also travelled to Arkansas to the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art.  Every one of the shows we enjoyed were filled with patriotic themes and, to one extent or another, God-honoring gospel music.  That’s Branson: wholesome fun.  

I would say that Eccl. 2:1 accurately describes what we experienced: mirth and pleasure.  As v2 says, we laughed a lot.  And clapped a lot to show appreciation to the entertainers.  Let me be clear: we were not there to test whether or not this should be the aim of our lives.  We already know that amusement is incapable of satisfying the soul.  In that regard it is truly vanity, grasping for the wind and without profit under the sun.  

However, being there gave me the opportunity to ask and answer Solomon’s question in v2: What does it accomplish?  This is not simply an end justifies the means question.  It is an essential question that relates to my life-aim.  When, by God’s grace, I placed my faith in Christ I made a choice as to why I am here on this earth.  I chose to follow Christ.  I made Him my life and my vocation (calling, Eph. 4:1).  Faith in Christ is not one of many areas of my life; it IS my life.  Thus every choice and activity and conversation and sorrow and joy must be submitted to the question: what does this accomplish with respect to my following Christ?

We do not believe in asceticism, in the lifestyle of the medieval monk who swears himself to the avoidance of pleasure.  Perhaps we can say we do not believe that the asceticism of John the Baptist is the path we are taking.  Allow me to leave here three passages for meditation purposes which indicate a place for laughter and no place for too much laughter.  May the Spirit of God lead you to understand and live in the pleasure of following Christ.

Luke 7:33-34: For John the Baptist came neither eating bread nor drinking wine, and you say, ‘He has a demon.’  The Son of Man has come eating and drinking and you say, ‘Look, a glutton and a winebibber, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!’

James 4:9: Lament and mourn and weep! Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom.  1 Cor. 7:29-30: … the time is short, so that from now on even those who have wives should be as though they had none, those who weep as though they did not weep, those who rejoice as though they did not rejoice, those who buy as though they did not possess …