“For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted; a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; a time to seek, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away; a time to tear, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; a time to love, and a time to hate; a time for war, and a time for peace.” Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 ESV
The plain meaning of our text is that God is sovereignly in control of every detail of our lives. Many of us have a mistaken humility, or modesty, in that we figure that so great a God is too important to be bothered by life’s mundane details. We think of the Creator as we would a senator or CEO who is too busy to take our call unless we’re “connected.” This is the way the world works, after all. Even with the most noble ruler, or benevolent business owner, there are limits to their time.
Not so with the Lord.
Nothing happens, nor comes to pass, without His knowledge and permission. Such a thing as this, glorious and awe-inducing, will radically change the manner in which we live if our faith is bold enough. James says:
“Come now, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit’— yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.” As it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil.” James 4:13-16 ESV
One’s faith is directly proportional to one’s theology of God’s sovereignty. To know the God of Scripture, the One who has revealed Himself to us, is to know the Almighty One who isn’t impacted nor controlled by anything.
To say a time and season is to say all that passes and this is interesting in itself because it means that the Lord’s workings aren’t scattershot. His works aren’t one-and-done; He controls events so that they fit into a much larger narrative than we can possibly fathom. Joseph saw this in Genesis 50:20 when he said, “you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good…”. God’s will is never circumvented or abridged because of anything. The greatest tragedy and even the smallest slip are used by Him to meet much greater goals than we know. Joseph saw this and it’s exactly this knowledge that powered his amazing faith through betrayal, kidnapping, slavery, imprisonment and rejection.
There is no faith without knowledge of God’s absolute sovereign control of His creation. And there is no peace in that faith unless we also know that each time and season is governed, not by chance, but by the loving Savior of our souls. To know that whatever is not of faith is sin (Romans 14:23) is to know that since we’re made righteous by faith we’re also to live by faith (Romans 1:17) and the manifest goal of our life is to bring about the obedience of faith (Romans 1:5).
To know that all times and seasons are known and directed by God is the answer to depression and anxiety. To say, “O Lord, God of our fathers, are you not God in heaven? You rule over all the kingdoms of the nations. In your hand are power and might, so that none is able to withstand you (2 Chronicles 20:6),” is to have peace. True peace amidst the storms and perturbation. Indeed, to know that in His hand is the life of every living thing and the breath of all mankind (Job 12:10) is to rest because a God who isn’t sovereign over every single thing is a contradiction in terms. If one thing escapes Him, there is no security; if one era at all, one season, passes by Him, ignoring Him, drifting along like a falling leaf He can’t catch, then all is lost.
So, we rest in this even though that rest sometimes is accompanied by stress and trouble. Spurgeon said that if we’re crushed to the dust and to our knees, worship there! It’s the heart of man that plans his ways, but the Lord establishes his steps (Proverbs 16:9). The lot is cast, the dice are rolled, the numbers are chosen, but every decision is from the Lord (Proverbs 16:33). Joe Biden may do this or that, Hamas, Russia, China, the EU…all the king’s hearts are in the hand of the Lord; He directs the ways of all, powerful or small (Proverbs 21:1).
Not only does this famous passage teach us unequivocally that we shouldn’t be Deists who believe that God is an absentee landlord and the world is just humming along under its own inexorable power, but it also answers the Stoic “it is what it is” philosophy as well. Christianity doesn’t teach us to accept change as dispassionately but as the opportunity to galvanize our faith…even if through suffering.
Seneca once wrote, ”We are more often frightened than hurt, and we suffer more in imagination than in reality.” He was absolutely correct, of course, showing that the word of the Lord is written on our hearts. Another Stoic, Epictetus wrote, “It’s not what happens to you, but how you react to it that matters.” Such things as these are, perhaps, fallen man’s highest contemplations upon the pains of change. Bruce Lee, echoing the Taoist philosophers said, “to change with change is the changeless state.” But you see, the goal at the bottom of these sayings is self-preservation. It’s the attempt to protect the heart, to steel it, to put man at the center. They’re good because they accept that man can’t make straight what God made crooked. But they’re bad because they attribute variance to blind, impersonal fate. Stoicism destroys the beauty, awe, love, and fellowship meant for us in Christ. And all of this is possible because Christ is the Alpha and Omega, the first and last (Revelation 22:13). We don’t know what tomorrow holds but we know the God who knows all things.
“For I the Lord do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed.” Malachi 3:6 ESV
“Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.” Hebrews 13:8 ESV
“God is not man, that he should lie, or a son of man, that he should change his mind. Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not fulfill it?” Numbers 23:19 ESV
“The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever.” Isaiah 40:8 ESV
“Of old you laid the foundation of the earth, and the heavens are the work of your hands. They will perish, but you will remain; they will all wear out like a garment. You will change them like a robe, and they will pass away, but you are the same, and your years have no end.” (Psalm 102:25-27)
“Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.” (Matthew 24:35)
The fear of change, which is the trepidation of tomorrow, is, in truth, lack of true meditation upon the wonderful reality of God. Such fear can lead to crippling self-doubt on the one hand, a life of paralyzing anxiety and lack of assurance, or bureaucratic legalism on the other.
The life of fear says in its heart, “God is great but I am small; He is all-knowing but I’m not worth knowing…therefore, I’m unsafe.” Such is the life that shrinks in laziness, never risks anything, nor attempts great things. The house falls in disrepair, the roof leaks, poverty comes like a thief, because of lack of great trust in Him who saves the soul of sinners and owns all things.
To the other who rejects God’s absolute sovereignty, they see in their mind the vicissitudes of life, the risks, and those exceptions to the common rules, and they don’t trust the Lord so they busy themselves with a thousand regulations. Legalism and life by hard regulation is the putrid pool that flows from the covetous heart that doesn’t trust God. Faithlessness demands control of tomorrow. Thus, the amazing freedom in Christ is lost under an avalanche of bureaucracy and administrative legalism.
Modern politics is shot-through with this form of messianic legislation. Humanistic man dreads and fears tomorrow because, to him, there is no good and sovereign God in control of it. Consequently, he seeks assurance through governmental and legal controls.
The root of most conflict between believers is that we don’t trust God with our tomorrows so we place burdens on our neighbors in various ways to avoid the life of faith.
The mind that’s set on the Spirit (Romans 8), on the other hand, rests in the all-encompassing love and power and wisdom of the Lord. It cries, “Abba, Father…” when the waves of change pound the ship, yes…we cry out to Him in our weaknesses and fears. And we love Him. And we trust Him. And we follow Him who said,
“I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.” John 16:33 ESV
“Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways! “For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?” “Or who has given a gift to him that he might be repaid?” For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen.” Romans 11:33-36 ESV
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