‘He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end.’(v11) Ecclesiastes 3:9–14
Grasping God and His ways lies well beyond the capacity of our human understanding. We wrestle too often with the question, ‘Why?’ Certainly, this is the question that most often unsettles us: ‘Why did my relationship end?’ ‘Why did I lose my job?’ ‘Why did I do what I knew was wrong?’
There is seldom a satisfactory answer. God invites us to turn inward and consider the seed of eternity planted within our heart. Whilst mortality comes with its own expiration date, unknown yet unavoidable, we carry within us the seed of purpose that flourishes throughout eternity. Death merely offers the threshold beyond which we enter into the fullness of our redemption.
True faith is revealed in our resilience to reframe our life experience against that backdrop of eternity. This won’t shield us from life’s painful realities, yet will empower us to live with our face uplifted within all such harsh realities (Acts 7:55–56). Indeed, such experiences present opportunities from within which a window may be opened into God’s kingdom.
It is in learning to discover God in the unremitting, unexciting details of daily life that trains us to reflect the life of God in our thoughts, words and deeds. Life provokes us, and we respond either in ways that reveal God to a watching world, or that question the viability of our Christian proclamation.
RELATED SCRIPTURE TO CONSIDER: Isa. 43:1–7; Dan. 6:1–23; 1 Tim. 6:6–16; 1 Pet. 1:3–9.
AN ACTION TO TAKE: Seek to find creative ways to look beyond the immediate situation and focus upon the seed of eternity planted within your own heart.
A PRAYER TO MAKE: ‘Lord, when situations are beyond my understanding, may I be content to entrust myself to Your care. Amen.
