Is a Christian denied a pleasurable life? Are we relegated to lives of drab monotony and duty? On the contrary, we are created to experience pleasure.

Because we live in a troubling world, our reserves of joy are probably somewhat low, perhaps making us feel that we are deficient in God's Holy Spirit.

The only kind of pleasure that fulfills comes from applying God's Holy Spirit in serving others. We must seek those permanent things which are from above.

The activities that Solomon put to the test and found wanting are exactly those things the world emphasizes: hedonism, silliness, mirth, and foolishness.

Solomon teaches that childhood and youth are vanity, and that having fun while forgetting God may create flawed character and permanent sorrow.

Few human faults can hinder Christian overcoming like self-indulgence. If we can learn to control our desires, we are a long way toward living a godly life.

God emphasizes Ecclesiastes during the Feast of Tabernacles to show the result of doing whatever our human heart leads us to do. The physical cannot satisfy.

Even though Christmas is supposed to demonstrate the value of giving, the over-satisfying of one's own carnal urges is often the outcome.

A major key to our spiritual survival is the control, regulation, and re-direction of our appetites from what is not good for us to what is good for us.

A lack of self-control, as well as the cultivation of self-indulgent perversions, will characterize large segments of our society living at the end times.

Godly joy is a fruit of the Spirit that does not come naturally. It takes a while to mature, but it is infinitely more intense than human pleasure.