"Most often, I go back to the ten-page wisdom tract called Ecclesiastes, which is the Greek word for 'preacher,' but can also mean teacher, spokesman, philosopher, or pundit. Sheer bracing delight is the reason: Ecclesiastes does me good. What he says, sadly and beautifully, about the pain of brainwork (the more you know, the more it hurts), about the boredom of the supposedly interesting and the hollowness of acclaimed achievement (all pointless! like trying to grasp the wind!), about the crazy-quilt character of life, about our ignorance of what God is up to, and about death as life's solitary certainty, grabs me deep down. I felt all this as an adolescent, and I still do.

What he says about life's best being an enjoyment of the basics - one's work, meals, marriage - makes me want to laugh and cheer, for this, too, is what I have felt all my adult life. My built-in makeup as an anti-Pollyanna, reality man anchors me in
Ecclesiastes' corner, where realism is the name of the game. I know, of course, that feelings, in the sense of emotionally charged intuitions - especially gloomy ones - can be quite unrealistic. So it gives me a large charge to fine that some of my own deepest reactions belong to biblical wisdom." -J.I. Packer Answers Questions For Today

I, too, discovered Ecclesiates as a teenager. It is my most read and favorite book in the Bible. It resonates within me as truth about life. Who knew I was a realist?