21Apr
In the middle of Solomon’s declarations, “everything beautiful in its time” and “yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end” (Eccl. 3:11 NIV), how does one “find satisfaction in all their toil?” (3:13) The key that unlocks this mysterious door is the phrase between his two declarations. “He has also set eternity in the human heart.” The consciousness of the existence of eternity may not explain the nuances of life. Still, it becomes the North Star by which we navigate the unpredictable, unkind, and unfair nature of life “under the sun.”
In days of old, travelers navigated by the North Star. No one went to the North Star, but utilizing it, they found their destination. “Under the sun,” there are hints of eternity. The repeating cycles that Solomon has described suggest it. But we do not fully experience eternity “under the sun.” When we navigate this life following the “eternity in our hearts,” having found confidence in the North Star of God’s sovereignty, we find satisfaction in our labor. There is a season for everything, and everything is beautiful in its time.
As we, because of and through Jesus Christ, experience the eternal consciousness that God has placed inside us, we begin to sense the beauty concealed under challenging times. Solomon reveals that we are surrounded by the infinite, “I know that everything God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it. God does it so that people will fear him.” (3:14 NIV)
When through Jesus Christ, we begin to see the sovereign hand of God in good times and bad, we will find satisfaction in our toil. These dredge up a chorus from my youth:
When you can sing, when it seems, there is nothing to sing about,
Then I’ll know, that you know, my Savior.
When you can pray, when others say, there is no use in praying,
Then I’ll know, that you know, my Savior.
Though clouds arise and fill the skies, and you still look to Heaven,
Then I’ll know that you know my Savior.
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