What gain has the worker from his toil? I have seen the business that God has given to the children of man to be busy with. He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also, he has put eternity into man’s heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end. I perceived that there is nothing better for them than to be joyful and to do good as long as they live; also that everyone should eat and drink and take pleasure in all his toil—this is God’s gift to man.
I perceived that whatever God does endures forever; nothing can be added to it, nor anything taken from it. God has done it, so that people fear before him. That which is, already has been; that which is to be, already has been; and God seeks what has been driven away.
Ecclesiastes 3:9-15
God created each of us for something, but what is that something? If eternity is written on our hearts, each of our lives must reach farther than just this terrestrial place. It’s more than physical and tactile, it’s spiritual and ethereal.
When I begin to view my life from an eternal scope (as best as I can), I begin to understand that less and less of what this earth values actually matters. Justice matters. Righteousness matters. Relationship matters. Politics, possessions, preferences, particulars - those things matter less than we give them credit for.
Not convinced? Then look at Job’s life. Everything but his soul was stripped away from him. Once a prosperous and faithful man, he became a poor and faithful man. In the midst of his struggle and frustration, God did not answer as to why everything had been taken away. God answered with this:
“I am the Lord, your God. Am I enough for you if you have nothing else? Am I enough?”
That’s a heavy question to answer. When God becomes enough to you, nothing else matters.
Paul said in his letter to the Philippians “Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him.”
Eternity was written on Paul’s heart, so much so that he only desired Christ. In success and suffering, Paul rejoiced in God. God gave Paul a heart for the Church and for the unreached. His ministry stretched him physically and spiritually and had him face death on multiple occasions. Paul forgot what personal ambition and security felt like for the surpassing pleasure of knowing God faithfully.
My God-given task is the same as yours. It’s to know and trust God, enjoying the blessings that he graciously gives us and enduring the sufferings he lovingly pulls us through. It’s all to His eternal glory.
Yes, God is intimately invested and interested in you, but you’re not the only one. There’s a world full of people who have not yet come to know the one true God. So God is also radically moving towards them by extending love their way, even through you. You are God’s ministry to the unloved and unreached.
Let’s sit with the last paragraph of the passage from Ecclesiastes for a bit...
I perceived that whatever God does endures forever; nothing can be added to it, nor anything taken from it. God has done it, so that people fear before him. That which is, already has been; that which is to be, already has been; and God seeks what has been driven away.
Whatever God does endures forever.
God has done it, so people would fear before him.
God seeks what has been driven away.
So be it Lord, Amen.
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