Parallel Bible results for "ecclesiastes 5"

Ecclesiastes 5

The Message Bible MSG

1 Watch your step when you enter God's house. Enter to learn. That's far better than mindlessly offering a sacrifice, Doing more harm than good.

2 Don't shoot off your mouth, or speak before you think. Don't be too quick to tell God what you think he wants to hear. God's in charge, not you - the less you speak, the better.

3 Over-work makes for restless sleep. Over-talk shows you up as a fool.

4 When you tell God you'll do something, do it - now. God takes no pleasure in foolish gabble. Vow it, then do it.

5 Far better not to vow in the first place than to vow and not pay up.

6 Don't let your mouth make a total sinner of you. When called to account, you won't get by with "Sorry, I didn't mean it." Why risk provoking God to angry retaliation?

7 But against all illusion and fantasy and empty talk There's always this rock foundation: Fear God!

8 Don't be too upset when you see the poor kicked around, and justice and right violated all over the place. Exploitation filters down from one petty official to another. There's no end to it, and nothing can be done about it.

9 But the good earth doesn't cheat anyone - even a bad king is honestly served by a field.

10 The one who loves money is never satisfied with money, Nor the one who loves wealth with big profits. More smoke.

11 The more loot you get, the more looters show up. And what fun is that - to be robbed in broad daylight?

12 Hard and honest work earns a good night's sleep, Whether supper is beans or steak. But a rich man's belly gives him insomnia.

13 Here's a piece of bad luck I've seen happen: A man hoards far more wealth than is good for him

14 And then loses it all in a bad business deal. He fathered a child but hasn't a cent left to give him.

15 He arrived naked from the womb of his mother; He'll leave in the same condition - with nothing.

16 This is bad luck, for sure - naked he came, naked he went. So what was the point of working for a salary of smoke?

17 All for a miserable life spent in the dark?

18 After looking at the way things are on this earth, here's what I've decided is the best way to live: Take care of yourself, have a good time, and make the most of whatever job you have for as long as God gives you life. And that's about it. That's the human lot.

19 Yes, we should make the most of what God gives, both the bounty and the capacity to enjoy it, accepting what's given and delighting in the work. It's God's gift!

20 God deals out joy in the present, the now. It's useless to brood over how long we might live.

King James Version KJV

1 Keep thy foot when thou goest to the house of God, and be more ready to hear, than to give the sacrifice of fools: for they consider not that they do evil.

2 Be not rash with thy mouth, and let not thine heart be hasty to utter any thing before God: for God is in heaven, and thou upon earth: therefore let thy words be few.

3 For a dream cometh through the multitude of business; and a fool's voice is known by multitude of words.

4 When thou vowest a vow unto God, defer not to pay it; for he hath no pleasure in fools: pay that which thou hast vowed.

5 Better is it that thou shouldest not vow, than that thou shouldest vow and not pay.

6 Suffer not thy mouth to cause thy flesh to sin; neither say thou before the angel, that it was an error: wherefore should God be angry at thy voice, and destroy the work of thine hands?

7 For in the multitude of dreams and many words there are also divers vanities: but fear thou God.

8 If thou seest the oppression of the poor, and violent perverting of judgment and justice in a province, marvel not at the matter: for he that is higher than the highest regardeth; and there be higher than they.

9 Moreover the profit of the earth is for all: the king himself is served by the field.

10 He that loveth silver shall not be satisfied with silver; nor he that loveth abundance with increase: this is also vanity.

11 When goods increase, they are increased that eat them: and what good is there to the owners thereof, saving the beholding of them with their eyes?

12 The sleep of a labouring man is sweet, whether he eat little or much: but the abundance of the rich will not suffer him to sleep.

13 There is a sore evil which I have seen under the sun, namely, riches kept for the owners thereof to their hurt.

14 But those riches perish by evil travail: and he begetteth a son, and there is nothing in his hand.

15 As he came forth of his mother's womb, naked shall he return to go as he came, and shall take nothing of his labour, which he may carry away in his hand.

16 And this also is a sore evil, that in all points as he came, so shall he go: and what profit hath he that hath laboured for the wind?

17 All his days also he eateth in darkness, and he hath much sorrow and wrath with his sickness.

18 Behold that which I have seen: it is good and comely for one to eat and to drink, and to enjoy the good of all his labour that he taketh under the sun all the days of his life, which God giveth him: for it is his portion.

19 Every man also to whom God hath given riches and wealth, and hath given him power to eat thereof, and to take his portion, and to rejoice in his labour; this is the gift of God.

20 For he shall not much remember the days of his life; because God answereth him in the joy of his heart.