Here are some questions based on last Sunday’s sermon text (Ecclesiastes 7:19-29), in case they’re helpful to you for personal growth or group discussion…

• [19-20, 29; see also Genesis 6:5; Romans 3:10-12] The Christian doctrine of “Total Depravity” is well defined here by Ecclesiastes: “Surely there is not a righteous [person] on earth who does good and never sins” (7:20). God reveals that, from his point of view, all people (even “apparently good” people) are unrighteous by his standards, having rejected and rebelled against our relationship with him. By believing what God says about us in his Scriptures—including the truth of our Total Depravity—we are made wise in ways that bring a humble strength, our confidence being in God rather than in ourselves. How do you feel when you hear verse 20, and realize that it’s talking about you? Do you believe it? How do you survive honestly believing something like this about humanity and about yourself without despairing?

• The reason why God tells us about our Total Depravity is not to crush us, but so that we will recognize our Total Need for his Total Forgiveness. In spite of our thoroughgoing sinfulness, God loves us, and Jesus went to the cross to die for the forgiveness of our sins. How does it strengthen you to know that, in Christ, you enjoy God’s Total Forgiveness? What does this strength, this confidence in your relationship with God as a gift of his grace, look like in your daily life? How can believing this change the way you live?

• [21-22] Are you concerned about what other people think of you or say about you? Why, or why not? Does it bother you when other people “curse” you, gossip about you, slander you, or otherwise speak evil of you? “Your heart knows that many times you yourself have cursed others” (22)—can you relate to sinful, unrighteous people? Can you relate to people who sin against you in ways that hurt you? Do you care more about what God thinks/says of you than what other people think/say of you? Do you find freedom from the fear of others in God’s Gospel declaration that you are forgiven, beloved, righteous? Do you find that this freedom helps you to have compassion on those who curse you?