One can find beauty in anything. Beauty seems to be hiding just behind the corner waiting for you to notice it. God placed little bits of beauty all around for us to see and remember that He is with us. He is with us in the pain. He is with us in the quiet moments of healing and the jubilant moments of worship. He is with us.
Chapter 11 starts with “Cast your bread upon the waters, for you will find it after many days”. As a child hearing this verse, all I could see were the ducks coming quickly to gobble up the bread. I didn’t want to find it again after that. Time brought the meaning into focus. Bread is something good that people need. If you have good things, share them. Share them with many people. In time, the blessings will come back to you.
This chapter gathers many wise and good sayings together and weaves them into a beautiful, pain tinged fabric. Do good. Notice the weather and work with it. Think before you act because it is hard to redo. All that comes in the first four verses.
Then comes one of my favorite verses: “As you do not know the way the spirit comes to the bones in the womb of a woman with child, so you do not know the work of God who makes everything” v 5.
I think the preacher wrote this to remind himself. He was a very wise man. He was a man who had thought through so many things. He had tried a million ways to bring meaning to this life. He didn’t get it though. After all the thought, the pleasures, the delicacies, he had to come to the same conclusion that Job came to- we are not God and we cannot understand His workings. Even in an age where scientists can manipulate embryos, we do not know how the spirit enters the body. We do not know why some people get cancer and others live in chronic pain. We do not know why.
The preacher exhorts us to work, for we do not know which seeds will take. We do not know the plan. We can take joy in the good days but we have to know that there will be days of pain. We have to know that we can enjoy life. We also have to know that there will be judgment for our sins.
Life is not an easy thing. (This is where the mournful sound of Kenny Rogers’ voice fills my head ..”You got to know hold ‘em. Know when to fold ‘em. Know when to walk away. Know when to run…And the best that you can hope for is to die in your sleep”) The gambler and our preacher knew the pain of life.
You know, there are a million people walking around out there today thinking the best they can hope for is a good hand of cards and a peaceful death. How sad. We have the key to a most amazing life. We know the secret to a life of joy. It is time for us to cast that bread upon the waters. We have to tell them about our Jesus. We have to tell them there is more to life than what they can see. We have to tell them that even though this life hurts, we have a healer who can heal any hurt.
No comments:
Post a Comment