Everything Is Beautiful in Its Time

Automated transcript of the sermon audio, generated with OpenAI Whisper (small.en). It has not been checked against the recording and may contain errors, especially in names and Scripture references.

Well, you can take out your copy of God’s Word and turn to Ecclesiastes chapter 3. And I acknowledge there is a sense in which the message of Ecclesiastes overall is obvious. In fact, last week we covered chapter 3 verses 1 through 8, that poem, the establishment of a sovereign God worldview. I was talking with Mr. Saar at the open house they had last Sunday night. He kind of commented that this is Christianity 101. You learn about God being sovereign, being in control of everything, as one of the very basics of the foundations of Christianity. God is blatantly and obviously obviously in control. That’s the message not only of the entire book of Ecclesiastes.

In fact, that’s the message of all the Bible. And certainly that was the message that Solomon established in this poem, verses 1 through 8, chapter 3. However, as obvious and as basic as God being in control is, as obvious as that truth is, we are often in a battle to learn the obvious, or at least to remember the obvious, or to apply the obvious. For all of Solomon’s wisdom, here’s the most wise guy that God says was ever living up to that point and would ever live, the most God-given wisdom person, and he apparently had forgotten that God was in control of all things for at least a certain season of his life. The beginning of chapter 2 describes how he was trying to be God and be the the joy provider in his own life. All of the things he went out and did and tried to accomplish and tried to accumulate for himself, thinking that that is what would give him joy. Even though Solomon had all that wisdom, Solomon apparently forgot or ignored the truth of God’s sovereignty, again, at least for a certain season in his life.

Of course, none of us do that, though. We know that God is sovereign, and we live with that perspective constantly, moment by moment, each and every day. We never act like we’re in control of our lives. We never get exasperated or frustrated that one of our plans didn’t work.

never think that we’re interrupted or that you know something is not going our way because we’re always thinking about God being in control moment by moment or we’re not. Samuel Johnson, an English poet and literary critic said the following, he said quote, people need to be reminded more often than they need to be instructed unquote. And probably they need both. We do need instruction, undoubtedly we need to learn new things and how to accomplish different goals that we have. Yeah, but oftentimes it is an issue of just being reminded of the things we already know. Peter talked about always being ready to remind them of some of the crucial things in one of his letters to his readers. People need to be reminded more often than they need to be instructed and so even though there is some truth in the observation that this is rather basic, obvious stuff. I want to suggest to you that it may not be as obvious and as basic as it should be based on how many of us are so miserable because we’re not applying it. If it was so obvious, if it was such foundational truth

that God is sovereign and in control of everything and we are not, then why are we so miserable? If it really was that basic, why are we so miserable? It’s because we either don’t know it or we’re not meditating on it and living our lives based upon it. So in his poem here at the beginning of chapter three, Solomon establishes that the times of our lives, these are the days of our lives. Solomon establishes that the times and the seasons of our lives are out of our control. O-O-O-C. Not just out of control, out of our control, and they are in whose control? Thanks, Tony. They are in whose control? Gods. He is utterly sovereign over everything. We do not have the authority or the power to manage or direct our own life and for that matter our own death. An example, King Ahab thought that he could thwart the prophecy of God going out into battle by just taking off the king’s garb. Do you remember that story from first Kings? He thought that if he just got out of the the king’s clothes, then he

would be able to escape the prophecy that he was going to die. And you remember what happens to Ahab? A random arrow just coming out of the sky hit him by chance right in the the gap in his armor, and he died. It wasn’t his plan. In fact, he was doing everything he could to escape that, And yet a random arrow by chance hit him in just the wrong spot and took his life. Every arrow, every bullet follows the path that God has ordained for it. Every flat tire has lost the amount of air God has decided. I mean we could go on and on and on. When it comes to business or other plans in life, every plan you ought to make should include the little phrase, what?

If the Lord wills, we will do this or that. Because ultimately, whatever you will may or may not happen. It’s whether the Lord wills it that makes the difference, because He alone is in charge. chapter 4 verses 13 through 17. Some people make a lot of money, others lose a lot of money. Doug Wilson says prosperity is his gift and so our stock market crashes. It’s all up to God. You can’t control it. Everything is covered under the banner of God’s control. There are no exceptions. And And this morning we move into the next paragraph verses 9 through 15 and here we move from the establishment of a sovereign God worldview to the explanation of the sovereign God worldview that all of us are to have.

The explanation. The poem has ended and the preacher now explains the implications of the truth of God being at the center of everything in our lives. The explanation, the implications. The main point of the poem is that God has established the times and the periods and the seasons of our lives. And so now we get to the question, okay, so what do we do? How do we respond to that? What are our lives and our choices and our understanding of our own human life and human life in general, how is that to be changed and impacted based on having this sovereign God worldview? What is the relevance of, beyond the obvious I think, what is the relevance of God’s control for our daily lives?

I mean you can meditate on that one all day long and twice on Tuesday and not run out of things to consider, how God’s control over everything is relevant to all those red lights, to your sickness, to the good and the bad times in your life. Well here’s the bottom line of this paragraph 9 through 15 and really I think of the entire book of Ecclesiastes.

is the point of the paragraph. Maybe the point of, like I say, Ecclesiastes overall. Man is offered a life that is joyful, but not self-sufficient. Man is offered the chance, the possibility, the prospect happiness. The possibility that you could enjoy life is out there, but not autonomously. That is not independently. That is not on your own, under your own control, making your own rules. God offers to all of us a life of joy, but not independent of Him. If you try to govern yourself, if you try to determine your own life, you will not come away with joy. You will come away with Habel, Hebelim, Hakol, Hebel, vanity of vanities. All is vanity if you’re trying to do it on your own. But if you submit and depend on God, there can be joy. Well, let’s get in the paragraph. Four points that go back and forth a little bit between man and God than man and God. The first is Solomon’s question about man’s toil in verse 9. What gain has the worker from his toil? Now I have to admit to you that as I was studying this paragraph for the last couple weeks, I

have had trouble, or at least had trouble at the beginning, trying to catch the connection even between the various sentences in the paragraph itself, let alone seeing how it was related to the paragraph that comes before it in verses 1 through 8, let alone how it fits with chapter 2, 24 through 26. I struggled, I prayed for illumination, I was beating on it with all of the tools I could get to see if it would give its meaning. That was one of things I think either Luther or Calvin said. In fact, Luther, when he was teaching through Ecclesiastes, made some comment about how the preacher was reluctant to give up his message, but that he would eventually yield. And I am feeling some of that pressure or that at least lack of understanding as we go through, but I think, I come to you this morning with great confidence that these are all intricately connected. That in fact there is a purposeful flow here. We’ve just gone through this poem that establishes that God is in control of the times and seasons, and so what can man

profit from all his toil? This is the first response to God being in control. If in fact God is in control, then what does it matter what I do? I can’t change anything. I can’t get profit out of what I’m wanting to get profit out of. Since there is a season for everything and a time for every matter under heaven that is out of our control, what is the point of our work? This is the exact same complaint that he raised over in chapter 1 verse 3. What does man gain by all the toil at which he toils under the sun? And the point of that opening poem was that life is vanity, all is vanity, vanity of vanities. Here he repeats basically the same question. Now that he has established even more so that God is in control, what is the the prophet from my work? From all our labor and toil. And this is a truism. This is one to grow on. Write it down, stick it in a book, put it in a safe deposit box. Under your mattress, I don’t care. From all your work and your toil, you are guaranteed jack squat. It doesn’t matter how hard you work, how smart you work. You are

not guaranteed nothing. Oftentimes, God has a plan that those who work hard receive the benefit from it. Sometimes he has a plan that that doesn’t happen. Most of the time when you’re lazy and you don’t do anything, you read the consequences from that. Occasionally the lazy person, you know, gets some benefit. Ultimately that’s because God is in control. All we do is conditioned by the change of times and circumstances and relationships that are beyond our control. Oh, but we try to control it. We try as hard as we can to control what takes place in our lives, and you are going to, if that is your perspective, if that is your goal, is to control your life, at some point in time you’re going to get to ask this question yourself. Man, what did I gain out of all that?

What have I profited from all that work that I just did? Note that there is something very different about this question than how we’ve been talking about enjoying the process. There’s something very different here than finding joy in toil. Look at the change in the preposition.

What gain has the worker, what, from his toil? Verse 9 looks to the produce, the results, the fruit of our work. And if you are looking to the results, if you are looking to the profit, to the gain, to your work product, that’s a fancy word, you know, that you sometimes here on TV or whatever, you know, typically on lawyer shows, you know, your work product can’t be used against you you know it’s whatever. If you’re looking to your work product to bring you satisfaction, man you’re in trouble because you can’t be in control of what profit you get from it. There is no warranty that you can get from any job that promises you success. That’s what we’d like to have. You know we’d like to get a warranty from our math teacher that says not only will you use this later in life but it will help you make more money and therefore have a happier life. And if we could just get that warranty, the math teacher to sign it, then we’ll be happy to do our part. You know, investments. If we could just get somebody to guarantee that you give me a dollar, I’ll give you back two in

five years, you know, or whatever it is. If we could just get somebody to guarantee those things for us, you know, we’d do a lot more things. And yet the fact is, there are no guarantees. There are no guarantees, except for death and taxes, which are due in less than a week. No matter how hard, how smart you work, God is in control of whether you accumulate or you lose, of whether you get rich or forfeit at all. If you are looking to your work product or to the proceeds and to the pay dirt from what you’re trying to accomplish, you will forever be looking and you will forever be frustrated because it is out of your control. And I tell you what, from an under-the-sun perspective, this This question is miserable.

If you’re stuck looking at life unto the sun and that’s it, then this question is producing dismality. What profit is there? Well, there is none from your toil. You can’t guarantee anything because God is in control. Solomon’s question about man’s toil, verse 9. Secondly, Solomon’s observations on God’s work. We’ve got man in verse 9 as the subject. Verses 10 and 11 get God back as the subject. Then we’ll see man as the subject and then God as the subject as we keep going through these verses. Solomon’s observations on God’s work. 1 verse 10, God gives men an unhappy task to do. Right there in verse 10, I have seen the business that God has given to the children of man to be busy with. Look back over at chapter 1 verse 13. I applied my heart to seek and to search out by wisdom all that is done under heaven. It is an unhappy business that God has given to the children of man to be busy with.

Verse 10 is kind of developing the thought of verse 9 a little bit that God is in control and he has made us, he has given us the responsibility of working And if you’re hoping that from that work you’re going to get profit and gain and satisfaction, you’re in big trouble. And it is a very unhappy business that he has given you to frustrate your work and to keep you from getting satisfaction out of it. An unhappy business. This is a, again, from the under the sun perspective, a very depressing observation. I have seen, kind of indicates that this was an examination that he made. This was an investigation and his analysis is that this is an unpleasant kind of work if you’re trying to secure your own results. This is again a fairly negative statement. God has appointed men to work. God has appointed the ground to be cursed that men work all the way back in Genesis. God has made it so that we have to work and he’s made it so that our work will be cursed and we have to sweat and ultimately God

has made it so that we’re going to be tired and that’s an unhappy business if then you don’t get any guarantee that you’re gonna get something out of it. I mean I hope that that weighs on you, that should. And too many of us are right there with that perspective that what we are going to do is going to make a difference that will accomplish what we want and that will make us happy. And we’re trying to do that to things that are out of our control. God’s work is to give us a task to do. But secondly, not only is God giving us a task to do, but God makes everything beautiful in its time. This is a lovely little phrase here. There are some songs that include this in it. There’s, I think it’s a Ray. Man, I can’t think of his name. My parents used to listen to it all the time. Ray, no, not Ray Bolts.

Ray Stevens. Everything is beautiful in its own way. And it’s really kind of a self-esteem kind of song is really what it that that one is meant to do. But we have one that goes in his time. In his time. He makes all things beautiful. In his time. And it’s kind of a little sing song. You know you just kind of want to way back and forth kind of song. The phrase is very nice, but how does it fit here? How does it work in this paragraph? God is in control of life and death, of gaining and losing, and you are out of control of those things. If your perspective is stuck under the sun, you’re going to ask what prophet is there in all this work that I’m doing. And this is a really unpleasant work that God has given us to do with no guarantees of fruit or success. And then he gets to, he has made everything beautiful in its time. This is a transition in perspective. If your perspective is stuck underneath the sun, you can’t make this statement. In fact, you would say that God makes everything miserable

in its time if you’re not submitting to him. This kind of statement could only be made by a person who is submitting to and being dependent on the God who is in control that has the sovereign God at the center of their worldview. Otherwise, everything is miserable and frustrating in its time, not beautiful. Now, I know that the NAS translates it, he has made everything appropriate. and I say boo boo to that translation. The word beautiful is used many times in the Old Testament and this is the only place where the NAS makes it to be appropriate. Every other time the NAS does some form of beauty or beautiful. The NRSV has suitable and I say baloney the word is beautiful.

Yaphe is the Hebrew word for everybody who wants to go look it up later this afternoon.

Yaphe. Abraham called Sarai his wife beautiful and that’s why he was afraid that the Egyptians would want her and so that’s why he asked her to say that he was her brother. You know, she’s appropriate. My wife is very suitable. That is why all the Egyptians, you know, are going to want her for their wife. No. Beautiful. Jacob saw Rachel and she was quote, beautiful in form and appearance. Yeah, she was, she was appropriate. No, I mean it’s the picture of, wow, ridiculously good-looking. The Proverbs say that, and I didn’t really need to include this one in here because it’s really already covered by the other ones I mentioned but I like the verse, like a gold ring in a pig’s snout is a beautiful woman without discretion. Fourteen times in Song of Solomon he cries out to his love, you are beautiful, you are beautiful my love, you are beautiful. Later on the Lord compared Israel to an olive tree beautiful with good fruit. In another verse, singing is described as beautiful. It is way beyond just appropriate or fitting or suitable and like you

can walk away from it not really caring. You can walk away neutral. You can see that’s appropriate. You know, like that clock right there. You look back at the clock, that’s appropriate. Maybe we’re in a classroom, you know, you can see it from anywhere in the classroom, it’s keeping accurate time. It’s appropriate for a classroom, it’s suitable. You know, it doesn’t stand out. I don’t really have any impression about it. It doesn’t make me want to, you know, I don’t love it so much. I want to steal it and take it home. I don’t hate it so much. I want to throw rocks at it. It’s just, it’s fine.

But to call something beautiful is not to be able to walk away being unaffected by it. God has made everything not just appropriate in its time, but beautiful in its time. Now, he’s the one who’s deciding the right time. And I tell you what, most of us think a lot of things are pretty ugly. And you know why? It’s because we’re not looking at it in God’s time. It’s really ugly for our time, but it’s beautiful in God’s time. If we got our perspective in line with his, we will be able to say that everything is beautiful in its time. And if you are trying to be in control of your life, nothing, or at least very rarely are you going to get to a time where you’ll be able to say it’s beautiful. You know Pastor Z’s illustration of your ship comes in. When your ship comes in then then my life will be beautiful. Man, well it’s going to be ugly for a long time then until your ship comes in, which it may never come in. Or it may come in and go right through your your house in its season, in its time.

And it’s not like we’re unaware of this when we sing songs like, whatever God ordains is right. Like we just sang. Is your sickness right? Is it beautiful in its time in its own way under God’s control?

is what Solomon at least says that’s the case. When your life is in chaos and nothing is where it’s supposed to be and you work all day only to end up in the same place or maybe a step further back. Is that beautiful in its time? Solomon says that it is and it will be for you if God is at the center of your world view. If God is not at the center, even if He’s on your radar but on the periphery, it’s not going to be the same. Everything is beautiful in its time. You cannot and will not be able to make this claim if He’s not at the center. The sovereign God not at the center. Well not only as we continue to observe God’s work, does He give men a task to do? Does He make everything beautiful in it’s time, but third, God puts eternity in each heart. Continuing on in verse 11, also he has put eternity into man’s heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end. Why do… why does everybody other than junior high boys want to figure out the meaning of life? There’s like a

season in life where guys at least, you know, just give us our coke or our Mountain Dew and our video game and say la vie, whatever. But up to that point and after that point in a man’s life, ladies lives, why do people want to figure out the meaning of life? Do you know it’s because God has put that in their heart, God has made us to be in relation to Him. And since He is beyond the Son, all of us instinctively know that there is something beyond the Son. Whether we try to ignore it or suppress it, we know that there is something bigger than us. God has not only assigned us to a time in history He has also put in our hearts and in our minds that there is something more than where we are in history.

There is an impulse that leads us beyond what is temporal toward the eternal. Now that is absolutely profound. I mean that is, that is worldview kind of stuff. That’s evangelism kind of stuff. To know that God has put that in somebody else’s heart. They may not acknowledge it. In fact, most of them are probably scared to death by it, because they have this sense that something else is out there, that something bigger than them and beyond them is there, and they don’t know what it is, and it scares them. In some cases, it may make them angry, because they’re trying to figure it out so that they can arrange their lives and everything in its order and step so that they can get what they want. The innermost part of man is not satisfied with what is here under the sun.

We may try to be, but ultimately we’re not. It is our instinct that there is something beyond this world. All of us have an inherent hunch that something is bigger than us that’s going on.

We are made with that capacity for things beyond us. This is why we have a concern for the future, because we know it’s out of our control. We naturally want to understand the beginning to the end, the meaning of life. Augustine says, maybe you’ve heard this before, you have made us for yourself and our hearts are restless until they find peace in you. And And that’s because God has done that. You can read Romans chapter 1 18 through 23 about the fact that not only do men know that there’s something of Eternity beyond them. They actually know that there’s a God and they know his eternal power and Divine nature they they see God even though again the point in Romans 1 is that they suppress that truth But here’s the real kicker Even though we have this dissatisfaction with life under the sun that’s built in, God has kept us from understanding it.

God has kept us from totally comprehending eternity and the beginning to the end. God has given us then a desire for something beyond our reach, or at least beyond the control of our reach. We are bewildered, perplexed, confused, bamboozled, hoodwinked, whatever word you want to use to describe it there. We don’t get it. We know that something is there to get, but God has actually arranged it in such a way that we’re more frustrated by it than actually benefited by it. This impulse towards the eternal is not fake. It’s not an illusion. It is something real, and it is something that God has put in us. One commentator said, God has put in each person a deep-seated desire, a compulsive drive, to know the character, composition, and meaning of the world, and to discern its purpose and destiny.

There is something there, something that burns inside everybody to know more, to understand what is going on.

And Solomon says, yet even though God has put that desire, that understanding to some degree or another of eternity into man’s heart, yet God did it in such a way that man cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end. Why? Because we think that if we could find that then we could replace God. That really was the first temptation. Well, as you know, just do this and then you’ll have some more knowledge and then you will be like God. Then you can control your life. And God has actually made it so that you will never understand anything that gets you into an autonomous position. You can never be independent of him and have happiness. He has made it that way. You can then either believe and trust God, or you can keep trying on your own to figure it out and you never will and you’ll always be frustrated. This is part of the reason why science and philosophy and any study and accumulation of human knowledge comes short in being able to provide real joy because it can’t answer the things that only God can answer and the things that we have to

take by faith. But we still would prefer not to live by faith. We’d prefer to live under our own control. So we’re frustrated. Well, that brings us to the third major point, Solomon’s conclusion on man’s toil. Back to man, and then he’ll give us his conclusion on God’s work as the last point. Solomon’s conclusion on man’s toil, verses 12 and 13. I perceived that there is nothing better for them that is for men than to be joyful and to do good as long as they live also, that everyone should eat and drink and take pleasure in all his toil. This is God’s gift to man. Here we have the superlative prospect of joy and toil and the sovereign giver of joy and toil.

Exactly like we found in chapter 2 verses 24 through 26 repeats the same kind of message. Nothing better than to get joy in toil. And that joy in the process only comes from God. And we will have to look more at that next week Solomon’s conclusion on man’s toil, Solomon’s conclusion on God’s work. We will try to to finish this next week and I’m gonna talk next week in combination with finishing up this paragraph. Comparing and contrasting GTD and ETP, and I came up with one more because next Sunday is Easter, CRS, GTD versus ETP and CRS. That’ll be the title for next Sunday’s message. Getting things done versus enjoying the process on or or through celebrating Resurrection Sunday.

The CRS, that’s, that’ll only do good one time a year. However, the GTD and the ETP enjoying the process, that’ll be important for all of our years, I think. So we’ll try to compare and contrast those, finish this up next Sunday morning. I guess as a I conclude though this morning before you go off to your small groups, there is a very fine line between you being absolutely miserable and you having another worldly kind of joy.

It’s a very fine line. In fact, I think that Solomon is going back and forth across that line, even in this paragraph in this book. A fine line between being absolutely miserable and having another worldly kind of joy. And the difference is whether God is at the center of your life or not.

Whether he is in the middle of your worldview. Whether then you are submitting to him moment by moment or whether you are trying to be autonomous, be independent and do it on your own. The difference between happiness and dismality is whether you are God in your life or God is God in your life. And what is scary, and it’s scary for me, as I assume it’s potentially scary for you, what is scary is how many times I’m over on the dismality side. Because you know what, the only reason I’m over on the dismality side, the miserable side, is because whether I have intended to do it or not, I have kind of nudged God out of the center and tried to move my bad self in and it doesn’t even work and yet I keep trying. Not only does it not work, it’s an infinite offense. It’s infinitely wicked to replace the worthy sovereign God at the center and try to inch my way into his position. It doesn’t work. It’s wrong. And yet, that is a battle. And that’s obvious. And yet, it’s a battle to live that way every day. Hopefully this book, this paragraph, this preacher, Solomon,

and God’s Spirit will help us to get it into apply. And Father, help us to do that moment by moment. moment through your spirit cause us to be submitting to you, to be dependent on you, and to perceive that you are clearly on your throne, that you are in control of the good and the bad. How dare we take the good and not the adversity when in fact the claim here is everything is beautiful in its time and it’s beautiful because it is working out glory for you and we are just missing opportunities to give you glory from our own hearts when we miss how beautiful what you’re doing is. It’s going to require a lot more teachability on our parts and a lot more flexibility that most of us have in our pride.

So break our hearts. You are more than capable of doing that. Break our hearts cause us to be dependent. Not only for the sake of our joy, but ultimately for the sake of your glory. We pray all this in Christ’s name. Amen.