Ecclesiastes 3
Seasons of our life
Seasons from birth to burial
1For every scene to come,
There’s a moment that waits.
For every event under heaven,
There’s a season.
A time to die.
A time to plant crops.
A time to harvest.
3A time to kill.
A time to heal.
A time to tear down.
A time to build.
4A time to cry.
A time to laugh.
A time to grieve.
A time to dance.
5A time to throw stones.
A time to pick up the pieces.
A time to meet.
A time to stay away.
6A time to search.
A time to stop searching.
A time to keep what we have.
A time to throw it away.
7A time to tear.
A time to repair.
A time to speak.
A time to listen.
8A time to love.
A time to hate.
A time to fight.
A time to make peace.
Rx for life: be happy
9What do people get for all their hard work? 10I’ve seen how God builds into us the drive to stay busy. 11He has a schedule, an appropriate time for everything. But we don’t have any idea what it is. We have a sense of time—of the past and the future. But we don’t know what God has done or will do. We can only guess.12But I do know this. There is nothing better in life than to be happy—to enjoy life as long as we live. 13Happiness is God’s gift to us. He wants us to enjoy the food we eat and drink along with the work we choose to do.
14I know this, as well.
Whatever God does will last forever.
Nothing is added, nothing removed.
God did this for everyone to see,
And to realize he deserves their devotion.
Has happened before.
Whatever will happen
Is happening now.
God recycles. [1]
Uneasy neighbors: good and evil
16I noticed something that’s the same no matter where you live—anywhere under the sun:When you find justice, you’ll find dishonesty.
When you find goodness, you’ll find the worst evil.
18I said to myself, “God is testing humans to reveal their limitations—so they’ll see that they’re more like animals than anything else. 19Humans and animals are very much alike. They breathe, they die, then they’re dead. Their journeys end at the same place. That seems crazy. It makes no sense.
To dust we return, like animals do
20Everything comes from the same rolling dust. And everything dissolves back into that dust. What a waste.21Who knows if the spirit inside a person will rise after death, in that last exhale of breath? [2] Who knows if the spirit inside animals will stay here, to sink into the earth?
22So, I decided that there’s no better way to spend a lifetime than to enjoy our work. For we’ve got to work if we want to survive. Work is our way of life. That’s because we don’t know what’s waiting for us next season.
Footnotes
The phrase is unclear in the original language of Hebrew. It’s perhaps most literally (and obscurely) translated something like this: “God seeks what has been pursued.” Yeah, figure that out. Some scholars guess that what God is pursuing is the past, so he can reuse it in some form, in the future. The point of the verse seems to spin around the idea that God’s in charge. He’s got control of the past, present, and future. And he knows how to use them.
The Hebrew text says, more literally, “Who knows if the human (adam) spirit (ruah) rises (ala) up (maal).” We’ve added “that last exhale of breath” because the word for spirit, ruah, can also mean “breath.” It’s the same word used to describe God’s work in creation: “God’s Spirit cruised through the darkness, above the water” (Genesis 1:2). It’s the word used to describe the death of people and animals during the Flood: “If it lived on land and drew a breath it died” (Genesis 7:22). Even in New Testament times, wind and breath symbolized life. “Jesus breathed on them and said, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit’ (John 20:22).
Discussion Questions
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