Ecclesiastes...Pastor Phil Strong

Part 12

5-8-11                                    

Texts: 3:1-11

Life is “seasonal”: I grew up in a region of the country which offered us (4) distinct seasons: cold and snowy in the winter, wet and stormy in the spring, hot and humid in the summer and cool and colorful in the fall.

Some seasons seemed way too short; others seemed brutally long.

● Although certain and distinct they were unpredictable. It was hard to know for sure when the transition took place (e.g. first official day of summer usually didn’t look like summer), but there were signs--- indicators of a different season.

In every season, there are appropriate and unsuitable responses.

There are some activities which prove to be totally unproductive and completely futile, given the season (e.g. I don’t cut my grass in 2-feet of snow and I don’t keep the snow-blower revved up in July. I would say we don’t wear shorts and sandals in the winter, but this is the Pacific NW!).

● So, it would seem that the challenge of any given season/occasion/circumstance is to recognize it (understand the signs) and discern the appropriate response.                                                                                            

● There are not only seasons as in the cycles and rhythms of nature, but “seasons of our hearts”. Solomon seems most concerned about how the seasons affect our hearts.

“time” (Heb)- definite time; appointed time; set time; fixed time.

“season” (Heb)- experiences, occasions, circumstances, intervals.

● So, there are fixed times (over which we often have little control) and there are seasons--- opportunities, occasions, which invite our response. These are the circumstances/occasions over which we have a great deal of control.       

“everything beautiful in its time” (Heb)- appropriate; fitting

            So, the beauty of a season seems to have less to do with the quality of the actual circumstances and more to do with the appropriateness of our response. Therefore, what we would consider demeaning and ugly, can become beautiful.

“… God has placed eternity in our hearts…”

Solomon says that, in contrast to all that appears random and all that appears chaotic, God is working, according to design, his good purposes for his creation.     

“…yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end…” (Scope)

            3:11…“see” (Heb)- detect; discover; recognize; fathom

 ● “Scope”: allows you to identify everything necessary for realizing a specific end. Without it, we are pre-occupied with what’s going on right in front of us.

            It’s what allows us to see what’s happening in spite of what’s happening. It allows us to choose our response and, therefore, take responsibility for our future.

 (2 Corinthians 1: “We don’t want you to be uninformed about the hardships that we suffered… In our hearts, we felt the death-sentence, but this happened so that…”)

Taken in isolated pieces, life causes us to conclude everything is random and pointless. Life understood within the ‘scope’, allows us to recognize the necessity as well as the beauty (fitting- which suggests its place in the entirety) of each isolated piece.

● Winter is the season we are considering today and the one being profoundly addressed by the Sons of Korah in Psalm 88.

            Dark, cold, inactivity, enduring (long winters); silent, lonely, death. Winter seems to take more than it gives. Everything appears lifeless.

Most of us assume that this season contributes nothing of benefit to the process.

● Although the season would be described as unfruitful and unproductive, there are some things that seem to “grow well” in what we will call the “soil of winter”:

Resentment (88:2): toward life and toward God.

Soul-trouble. It’s what happens when what’s going on around you gets in you. It’s the season in which we ‘lament’: we wonder how we got here and when we can expect to get out.

Just as in the natural season of winter, we seek temporary escapes in the winter season of the heart (e.g. books, conferences…anything to offer a glimpse of light and warmth to sustain us).

Isolation (8, 18)

Admittedly, it’s easy to lose God in the dark.

What exaggerates your circumstance is that not only does God seem distant, but so does everyone else.

Sometimes it’s real, sometimes it’s imagined. Either way, it feels real to us.

● I suppose there are a number of different reasons: certain level of discomfort we feel with other’s pain, especially if we are convinced that it has been ‘self-inflicted’; frustration over our inability to offer a remedy and the wounded friend’s lack of responsiveness to our sincere efforts.

Impatience (15)

            The season seems so perpetual; so all-consuming. Life gets exaggerated.

“From my youth I have been afflicted and close to death” (v.15)

● The season of winter becomes so consuming that it clouds even the memory of all of the good you have experienced. 

● This, I would suggest, is what makes the winter even that much more confusing, because we have history with God: we have experienced the closeness of his presence, which makes his seeming absence even more painful.

Authentic faith

The real marvel of faith is that it seems to flourish in less than ideal conditions. In fact, it almost demands them because it requires a way of looking at God, at life, which is not limited to what you can see or what you currently possess.

Faith is always defined by what you can’t already see and what you don’t already have. Otherwise, faith is not required (Hebrews 11:6).

Faith is the ability to look honestly at your confusing and often painful life-circumstance and believe that what we see is not all there is; that things can and will be different… better. Herein lies the chance for beauty… finding joy in the least likely places.

Vision: an image of a preferred-future.  

Have you ever noticed how much time we spend in winter imagining spring and summer?

Maybe what happens to us in winter is meant to be a catalyst for fruitfulness? Maybe it is meant to cultivate growth and health?

Have you ever noticed how sometimes waiting doesn’t necessarily breed “impatience”, but actually intensifies “longing” and creates joy in our hearts as we imagine the time when our desires will be fulfilled?

It is in that expectancy and preparation that our hope is to be found.

We give increased attention to preparation and we begin to live as if it’s true; as if it’s going to happen.

When you are unwilling to abandon God in the midst of some pretty painful and confusing life-circumstances, that’s trust; the result of trust is hope… the kind that doesn’t disappoint you (Romans 5).

‘disappoint’ (Gr.) disgrace; make ashamed (blush with shame); to be shamed because some hope has deceived you (you’ll never be left looking stupid for having believed in love).

● Love makes you say and do a lot of irrational things--- even believing that winter, that hardship, can result in a deepening of love and hope.

I think in the winter of our heart, our objective should not be “more” faith, but “better” faith: a more robust, more ample faith [the last thing we want is more of the same].