Ecclesiastes 3:9-22
Today’s reading offers the Preacher‘s most positive perspective yet. Having observed that [f]or everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven (Ecc. 3:1), he recognizes gifts from God. He sees that:
- God has made everything beautiful in its time (v. 11)
- God has put eternity into man’s heart (v. 11)
- There is nothing better for [people] than to be joyful and to do good as long as they live (v. 12)
- Everyone should eat and drink and take pleasure in all his toil (v. 13)
- All of this is God’s gift to man (v. 13)
In contrast to the transient works of man and the repetitive cycles of nature, the Preacher recognizes the permanence of God’s works: whatever God does endures forever … so that people fear before him. (v. 14) And rather than just perceiving injustices, he sees that God will judge the righteous and the wicked, for there is a time for every matter and for every work. (v. 15, echoing v. 1) God is surely testing us, because death comes to man just like the beasts. (v. 16) All go to one place. All are from the dust, and to dust all return. (v. 17)
Note that all of this perspective comes not despite death but because of it. Death is the one thing we all most definitely have in common. It is what allows us to see how ridiculous our striving is. Without death we would continue down paths of illusion, each one forever looking for permanent significance, satisfaction, and happiness but only finding ongoing frustration. Death gives us the lens we need to put things in focus and see clearly. So I saw that there is nothing better than that a man should rejoice in his work, for that is his lot. (v. 22)
One more thing…
Kathy H. gave me a book the other day, Living Life Backward: How Ecclesiastes Teaches Us to Live in Light of the End, by David Gibson. I am not a fast reader, so I have made it through only the first couple of chapters, which goes to say that I have not yet caught up to where we are here in our own walk through Ecclesiastes. But I have to say that the book is excellent. In fact, I am tempted to simply quit writing any commentary here and just advise you to go read that book and come back here on November 21 for Song of Solomon. Alternatively, I am tempted to just quote the book extensively, but I’m afraid we don’t have space for that, and the copyright police would probably frown on that. I’ll do my best to avoid both of those temptations, but do yourself a favor and find a copy of Living Life Backward. You’ll be glad you did.
Oh, and thanks, Kathy!
I very much appreciate that you have included a link to these verses. While scrolling down today, I accidentally touched the speaker icon and was delighted to have the verse read to me! I shall be looking for that button from here on out! Thanks again, and for the recommendation of the book Kathy gave you.
For those Scripture links, you can thank Crossway, the publishers of the English Standard Version. They put together a WordPress plugin that automatically converts any Scripture reference into a smart link to the ESV, complete with audio, as you discovered. And that makes it trivially easy on my end!