Spiritual Manipulation: Ecclesiastes 5:1-7

One of the ways we humans try to guarantee a positive future is manipulating God. Oh, we don’t call it that. We call it making a vow. It seems very spiritual. After all, Jacob did it: Then Jacob made a vow, saying, “If God will be with me and will keep me in this way that I go, and will give me bread to eat and clothing to wear, so that I come again to my father’s house in peace, then the Lord shall be my God” (Genesis 28:20,21, I can just hear God going “Whoopie!”…not). And God made provision for it in the Law of Moses (Leviticus 7:16; Numbers 6:1-21; Numbers 30). But Deuteronomy 23:21 is very poignant: “If you make a vow to the LORD your God, you shall not delay fulfilling it, for the LORD your God will surely require it of you, and you will be guilty of sin.”

The Preacher has seen people take advantage of the vow, believing that the very act of making it will give them the resolve they need to do better or to keep from sinning. Maybe they are manipulating themselves. But by making it a vow they are involving the Lord, and that puts them in danger of misusing the Lord’s name. The vow is made in God’s name, staked on His honor, and to fail to fulfill it brings His name into dishonor. So the Preacher warns against this form of seeking to know the end from the beginning, this form of manipulating God to secure a better future.

Guard your steps when you go to the house of God. To draw near to listen is better than to offer the sacrifice of fools, for they do not know that they are doing evil. Be not rash with your mouth, nor let your heart be hasty to utter a word before God, for God is in heaven and you are on earth. Therefore let your words be few. For a dream comes with much business, and a fool’s voice with many words.

When you vow a vow to God, do not delay paying it, for he has no pleasure in fools. Pay what you vow. It is better that you should not vow than that you should vow and not pay. Let not your mouth lead you into sin, and do not say before the messenger that it was a mistake. Why should God be angry at your voice and destroy the work of your hands? For when dreams increase and words grow many, there is vanity; but God is the one you must fear. (Ecclesiastes 5:1–7, ESV)

I have a blog called Ask The Pastors in which I answer people’s questions (yes, I am the only pastor so the title of the blog is a little misleading, but I originally intended it to have several pastors answering and that never worked out). I’ve gotten a disproportionate amount of questions about vowing. Here are a couple of them with my answers. Do you see what Ecclesiastes is talking about?

Question: i have unprotected intercoursed with my gf and i was worried that she will be pregnant. . so i went in a hanuman temple and promised god that plzz god she wouldn’t be pregnent this time plzz god.. and promised that i will never do this thing means sex with any girl before marriage. and then she dont get pregnent. But now i want to sex.. what to do…what i promise to god and what i say to god …

My Answer: What you should say to God is, “God, I am a selfish man who makes promises to you when I am scared but is unwilling to fulfill them when I am out of trouble. You are a convenience to me God, not my Master and Lord. You have made it plain to us that our sexual drives are not to rule us but that You are. You made sex to be a beautiful part of marriage but I want to enjoy it without the commitment of marriage, no matter what happens to my girlfriend. I am a selfish, selfish man. Please, Lord, help me to submit my will to yours and find in Jesus the Messiah my salvation for all my sinful ways. Help me to understand that He died in my place, for my selfishness and rebellion, so that I might have life with You as a free gift. I humbly receive Your free gift of eternal life as I repent of my disloyalty to You.”

Reply: sir u said that i say to god again that i m selfish and no matter what happens to my gf.. how can i say that … i love her and dont want to give her any hurt .. u know.. why i promised above thing last time cause i love her and dont want to see her in pain…. so if i say that i m selfis and no matter with gf then god will do something to my gf…

My Answer: God is not after your girlfriend as much as He is after you. You asked me what you should say to God and I am encouraging you to repent of your selfish attitude and of your willingness to use her for sex even if it gets her pregnant, and to repent of your willingness to use God for your own convenience, being willing now to break your vow to Him after He delivered you. Do not trifle with Him and do not trifle with your girlfriend. Repent, my friend, and stop rationalizing your behavior.

I know, sounds kind of rough, but I think this was this guy’s only hopes for getting straightened out.

Question: Hey! I have a question I have been  wanting to know for awhile now and I was wondering if you could answer it?  Okay, so does God still love you and forgive you even if you have made a promise to stop committing a certain sin but then you break that promise? Will he still love and forgive you after you’ve broken that promise and you still keep making the same mistakes?

My Answer:  I suppose we could ask ourselves if we would still love our child after he or she promises over and over to stop doing something wrong.  And even if we would answer yes, we would have to recognize that God’s love for us is even greater than a parent’s love for his child.  I like the passage in Psalm 103:13,14, which says, “As a father has compassion on his children, so the LORD has compassion on those who fear him; for he knows how we are formed, he remembers that we are dust.”

It is Jesus who taught us that we should love our enemies (Matthew 5:44) in order to have as perfect a love as the Father has (verse 48).  And Paul tells us that when we were still God’s enemies, still sinners, God proved His love for us by letting Jesus die for us (Romans 5:8).  And Jesus taught Peter that if someone sins against him seventy-seven times he must forgive that person.  So it is impossible that God would not do as well or better than what He instructs us to do.  In fact, Romans 8 makes it perfectly clear that for the one who has trusted in Jesus for salvation there is no condemnation (8:1) and that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love (8:37-39).

We are perfectly safe in God’s love.  But because He loves us so much and because we love Him in return, we want to experience obedience to Him as a token of our love.  And we want to trust Him that the commands He has given us are for our own protection and welfare.  So when we recognize that our own promises to do better fail it might be time to try some additional aids to obedience.  For example, it may be that a trusted counselor could help you see a pattern to your disobedience and help you break that pattern.  Or it might be helpful to have someone to whom you are accountable and who will pray for you and encourage you toward obedience.  Or it might be useful to memorize some Scriptures that pertain to the particular disobedience you are struggling with.  Or all of the above. 

God longs for us to have freedom in our conscience before Him.  That is why Jesus came (Hebrews 9:14; 10:22).  That is why we can come to His throne boldly, whenever we have need, and find grace (Hebrews 4:16).