Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 is such a popular passage that everyone who has ever attended a funeral is familiar with it. For some time, I listened to the song “Turn, Turn, Turn” when I was in high school, but I didn’t know it was from the Bible. It is probably one of the most beautiful pieces of poetry ever written. It’s even versified as such in the Hebrew Text. The preacher, presumably Solomon, wrote a poem! Ryken says about this, “Everyone recognizes the beauty of these lines—their rhythm, their repetition, and their orderly completeness.” I suppose that’s what moved Pete Seger to put it to music. Some argue, like the Abingdon Bible Commentary, that this poem is a pessimistic view of life. It even titles this section as “Hopelessness of Struggle Against an Arbitrary God.” The problem, it seems, is that we are somewhat uncomfortable with the sovereignty of God. That’s what this passage is about: God is sovereign over the events in our lives.
We must remember that chapter 2 ended with the idea that all things are gifts from God, as is the ability to enjoy them. Work is a gift from God, and focusing on God rather than the gift makes life all it is supposed to be. The one who is intimate with God receives all His blessings in time and eternity. To wrap up God’s sovereignty, Solomon says in 3:11, “God has made all things beautiful in its time.” Life is not all bad, and it’s not all good. Charles Dickens began his “Tale of Two Cities” with the line, “It was the best of times, and it was the worst of times.” Life is filled with positive and negative experiences that we must pass through on our journey to eternity. They are inescapable. I’ve wondered if Paul was thinking of Ecclesiastes 3:11 when he wrote Romans 8:28. “God makes all things work together for good for those who love Him…” Not all things are good. There’s a time to cry, to mourn, to lose and a time to die. But God works the good and the bad together into a recipe that will result in ultimate good for each of us “who love God and who are called according to His purpose.”
When God’s people were in the worst of times, he sent them a prophet named Jeremiah. He preached to the people at the time when Babylon conquered Israel, and the nation was scattered all over the world. Many were taken as slaves to Egypt and Babylon. He spoke to the people for God. That’s what prophets did. He said, “I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you; plans to give you hope and a future.” I’d argue that throughout our lives, God has a plan and purpose for us as well. It’s also one to prosper us and give us a hope and a future. There is a time for every purpose under heaven, and God will work out His purpose in the life of everyone who puts their faith in Him. I’ve heard some preachers take this verse away from modern believers, arguing that it was only meant for the children of Israel at that time and referred only to their return to their own land after 70 years. This hermeneutic, or way of interpreting the bible, removes all the promises of the Old Testament from our experience today. If we are in Christ we have those promises. I like the way one writer put it, “All the promises of God ‘find their yes in him’ (2 Cor. 1:20). If we are in Christ, then all the horrors of judgment warned about in the prophets have fallen on us, in the cross, where we were united to Christ as he bore the curse of the law (Gal. 3:13). And, if we are in Christ, then all of the blessings promised to Abraham’s offspring are now ours, since we are united to the heir of all those promises (Gal. 3:14–29).