"The Great King"

 "There was a little city, and few men within it; and there came a great king against it, and besieged it, and built great bulwarks against it:" (Ecclesiastes 9:14 KJV)

  ""I asked you to come here today so we could get acquainted and so I could explain to you that I am bound with this chain because I believe that the hope of Israel - the Messiah - has already come." They replied, "We have had ne letters from Judea or reports against you from anyone who has come here. But we want to hear what you believe, for the only thing we know about this movement is that it is denounced everywhere."" (Acts 28:20-22 NLT)

 Whether or not this, "great king," was an actual person, or an actual king from a local country, or from afar; this specific encounter might seem to be a little over the top; if that is, it was happing as Solomon shows it to have happened. On the other hand, if it represents something else, like something that represents a spiritual context or that embodies a sinful nature, then it takes a little bit of wondering to figure it out.

 One thing is for sure, whatever it is that Solomon is speaking about is something great: which really doesn't mean it is either bad or good, but that it is large in magnitude; something of great importance; loud and older; of God Himself! In other words, it is higher and greater than we might know.

 By the way, I was thinking about those four Advents: Hope, Peace, Joy, and Love. There is something about where they come from that reminded me of something I might have heard or believed, but that had somehow slipped my mind: He is our HOPE, PEACE, JOY, and LOVE; therefore, we absolutely must keep abiding in Him; if we want to experience all that is has for us, it is found in Him... 

""My thoughts are nothing like your thoughts," says the LORD. "And my ways are far beyond anything you could imagine. For just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so my ways are higher than your ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts."" (Isaiah 55:8-9 NLT)