“There is a time for everything…” Ecclesiastes 3:11

“He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also, he has put eternity in their (our) hearts, except that no one can find out the work that God does from beginning to end.” This line comes from the very well-known and well-used passage at the beginning of the 3rd chapter of Ecclesiastes: “There is a season for everything, a time for every occupation under heaven…” (verse 11).

This is a powerful reflection of the human idea of time. Because we are finite creatures, we understand time, in three ways; past, present, and future. We know by experience, and by the fact of our temporal nature, that the past is real, it happened. We have experienced it, it is in our memory. We know the present is real. It is in the present moment that we make our decisions and we experience their real consequences of pain and pleasure, suffering and joy. It is in the present moment that we “see” and experience the truth of things as they are at this moment in time.

But, as Ecclesiastes tells us here, none of us can know the future. God, though, has blessed us with intellect, which is capable of knowing, contemplating, and learning from the past. He has given us an imagination with which we can conceive concepts and ideas that are not immediately present to our senses. He has given us a conscience with which we can come to know good and evil, and free will with which we can decide to cooperate with His will…or, sadly, not.

We Christians know that we are ignorant and weak and in constant need of God’s grace, mercy, and forgiveness, therefore, we endeavor to live each moment humbly, bending our wills to that of God. In other words, we know our humble dependence on the generous love and grace of God.

As believers we know the history of God’s action in time through the scriptures. We know that he created all things, seen and unseen. We know that he sent his only begotten Son to enter time with us, live with us, suffer and die for us, to make eternity with him possible for us again. And we believe that His Holy Spirit continually plants hope in our hearts and the desire to finally enter into the eternal now of His holy presence.

We cannot know the day or the time of our deaths, or of his return in glory. That is not for us to know. What we are called to do is to remember what God has done for us, and to live each moment as if our entrance into eternity depended on it. We do this by consciously, willingly, and humbly living our daily lives in imitation of Christ. That is the way to the eternal “Now” that God has prepared for each one of us. And we can trust that God is present to each one of us, in every moment. Listen! Be Attentive! Know that you are loved and choose to live each day, each moment, in humble thanksgiving.

If we choose to trust in God’s love and to commit ourselves to loving one another as he loves us, we can trust that through his grace, in the fullness of time, we will come to live in the presence of our God Who Is Love forever and ever. Amen.