Ecclesiastes 3 - Time for Everything

Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 - A time for everything. (Is it possible to read this passage without Simon and Garfunkel running through your head?) Good to remember, we cannot be happy all the time, there are times for sadness. Nor can we speak out all the time, there is a time for silence. If times are bad, take heart, this too shall pass, if times are good, enjoy them but be sober, it's time too shall pass.

Ecclesiastes 3:12 - "... here is nothing better for them than to be joyful and to do good ..." yet, we find reasons to not do good, that somehow it's better to pursue something other than simply doing good.

Ecclesiastes 3:13 - "...everyone should eat and drink and take pleasure in all his toil—this is God's gift to man." There it is again - pleasure in our work is God's gift to man.

Ecclesiastes 3:16-22 - Dust to Dust. Solomon did not have the understanding that we do, the knowledge of the promise of eternity. Jesus had not yet come to declare it, so he says (v. 21) "Who knows whether the spirit of man goes upward and the spirit of the beast goes down into the earth?". Who knows? We now know.

Ecclesiastes 3:18 - "... God is testing them that they may see that they themselves are but beasts." God is testing us to see if we will understand who we are, mere beasts. We like to see ourselves as superior, gifted with intelligence, free will and opposable thumbs. But the truth is that we are mere beasts with little more control over our destiny than any other animal. We cannot stop our own sin, we are not nearly as free as we'd like to believe. God wants to know, will we get it? Will we humble ourselves before Him, understanding who we are and understand that we truly do need Him? I've written of this before, He's calling us in this. In our frailties he's telling us that we are nothing without Him, we need him.