9. In His Time
Hymns: 432 How Good Is the God We Adore 423 Follow, I Will Follow 333 Yesterday, Today, Forever
Study of the Book of Ecclesiastes
(Remember Now Thy Creator)
– In His Time
Ecclesiastes 3:11
11 He hath made every thing beautiful in his time: also he hath set the world in their heart, so that no man can find out the work that God maketh from the beginning to the end.
OUTLINE
- A Sovereign God (v11a)
- A Sense of Eternity (v11b)
- A Scientific Limitation (v11c)
INTRODUCTION
This morning, we were studying the Life of Joseph, in the “Beginnings of the Hebrew Nation” series. We saw Joseph in prison in Genesis 40, a man in his twenties. Two men, a butler and a baker were cast into prison for offending Pharaoh. Joseph’s was assigned by the captain of the prison to serve them. The Bible says these two men “continued a season in ward.” Then it was recorded that they each had a dream by night. The next morning, Joseph who came to wait upon them found them with a sad countenance. They shared their dream with Joseph. Although in prison, a most trying time for a young man, he has a close relationship with the God of Israel. The Lord God of Israel showed Joseph the interpretation of the dream. He was able to tell the baker that he would face the wrath of Pharaoh, losing his life whilst the butler would be restored. Joseph thought it would be an opportune time to be released from prison by the help of the grateful butler. Instead, the butler, when he was restored to the palace, forgot about Joseph.
I entitled the devotion “In His Time” with two thoughts, Hope Alive and Hope Dashed saying to our bible study group that we find ourselves in the inadvertent seasons of life. A time of hope and a time of disappointment was Joseph’s lot in life during turbulent early years. I said, if we have not God in the equation in Joseph’s life, we might have thought those to be “wasted years” in Joseph’s life. But we saw that God was in charge of ordering Joseph’s life and He makes no mistakes in ordering the lives of people and this created world.
I said, “We can trust God through the seasons of life – a time in prison, a time out of prison. This is a “winter season” in Joseph’s life. And it is in this winter seasons of life when we need to exercise faith in trusting God as He works out His good will in our lives. We are to know that the winter season soon ends, and spring and summer will come. It is through the winter seasons of life that we become wiser, deeper and stronger. And the winter season is the time to look up, be still and discover anew that He is God, to draw close to Him in personal devotion and prayer and know that He is doing “whatsoever He pleases” in your life. Joseph certainly has a deeper walk with God with God revealing to him the future to him, what great access he had to the mind of God, to the will of God. It would stand him in good stead when he would be called to interpret Pharaoh’s dream of the 7 years of plenty and 7 years of famine. The fortune of Joseph is going to turned and he is not going to remain in prison forever. He will look back with gratitude at how God would turn around his situation to use him to provide a home for His people in Egypt for the next 400 years.
We look at Joseph’s life with hindsight, being reminded of Solomon’s words in Ecclesiastes 3:11a, “He hath made every thing beautiful in his time…” Not Joseph’s time but God’s time. God has a good plan and purpose for all the events in Joseph’s life. God has a good plan and purpose for your life. Time, as Stephen F. Olford said well, “a time for every purpose under heaven…Primarily, the word “purpose” or “pleasure” has to do with God’s design for the creatures of His hand.”[1]
The time and seasons of life take on meaning and significance Solomon tells us when we understand that there is God seated enthroned in heaven in charge over all the affairs of men. In man’s life, there is no place for chance or accident but all in the good hand of God
Three thoughts to consider from this precious verse:
- A Sovereign God (v11a)
- A Sense of Eternity (v11b)
- A Scientific Limitation (v11c)
(1) A Sovereign God (v11a)
11 He hath made every thing beautiful in his time:…
The word “beautiful” literally means “beautiful” or “lovely”. When we have God in perspective of life, as one pastor puts it, “our times become “sensible” and “meaningful” When all that falls together, when the pieces of the puzzle fit into one another, beauty emerges”.
He continues to say, “Does it not remind you of a chorus of worship? Christians love to sing when they gather. It was born out of this statement in the book of Ecclesiastes.
In His time, in His time
He makes all things beautiful
In His Time.
Lord, please show me every day
As You’re teaching me Your way
That You’ll do just what You say
In Your time.”[2]
I was reminded of a poem that the late Elder Tow Siang Yeow wrote in his reflection of this passage:
Time, thou unfathomable entity
Inscrutable and intangible
Beginning in the midst of antiquity,
Lasting till the end of time.
Variously described by sages:
“Illimitable, never resting thing
rushing swift and silent”,
“The subtle thief of youth”,
“An ever flowing stream that
bears all its sons away”.
Yet, a gift of God to all as
It is the stuff that life is made of.
For does not Solomon intone, “There is a season
And a time for every purpose under heaven,
A time to be born and a time to die”?… (Eccl. 3:2).
A time when we were young and naughty
Viewing the world through blinked eyes.
Ensconced with doting mums and dads…
A time to leave the roost!
Learning to fly the hard way –
One day soaring aloft; the nest is empty,
The scene is over: time to reminisce!
It’s God’s allotted time to run the race
Patiently and unswervingly to victory –
Or straying from the straight and narrow
Path, regretfully, falling by the wayside!
So teach us, O Lord, to “number our days
That we may apply our hearts unto wisdom” (Ps. 90:12).
Ever prepared to be on time for
that “blessed hope”, the glorious
appearing of our Saviour Jesus Christ
and at the last trump,
to ever be with the Lord. Amen.
- Elder Tow Siang Yeow (6 Nov. 1927 – 25 Nov. 2015 Age: 88)
At the tombstone two bible verses – “I love the Lord because He hath heard my voice and supplications. (Psalm 116:1) and “Precious in the sight of the Lord is His saints” (Psalm 116:15).
There is the Creator God who loves us and made us and placed us here upon earth. Whom we shall see face to face in the heavenlies when this passing world is done and we stand with God on high, looking over life’s history, then Lord shall I fully know, not till then how much I owe (Robert M. Mccheyne).
Where is the prophetic clock ticking, I believe ticking toward the time of our blessed hope when Jesus will return to receive the church to glory. It is no accident that God gave us our church name “Blessed Hope BP Church” as an end-time, last hour witness for the Lord, now located in a building in the shape of Noah’s Ark. “Creepy, come to think of it”. But we serve a sovereign God who knows what He is doing.
Israel has been in the land now for the last 68 years. It can’t be long before our Lord will have to return. Could we be the last generation to see the rapture? Not unlikely, all the signs pointing to the imminence of Christ’s return are all there! A time of consummation is coming. A fearful time of judgment for the unbelieving I the Great Tribulation but a blessed time of reigning with Christ is coming for believers in the Millennium where the earth will return to its Edenic state, where the wildness and ferocity of the animal kingdom will be taken away, there the lamb will dwell safely with the lion for 1000 years. And then eternity will begin. This present heaven and earth will be destroyed and God will re-create a new heaven and a new earth wherein there shall be no more sorrow, no more tears, no more pain, no more sin, no more judgment, “for the former things are passed away…He that overcometh shall inherit all things; and I will be his God, and he shall be my son.” (Rev. 21:4, 7).
In our generation, we can view life like the Enoch of old before God took him bodily to heaven. The Bible says, “Enoch walked with God and he was not for God took him.” (Gen. 5:22a, 24). Twice God said, “Enoch walked with God”. He lived a life of fellowship and close communion with God. This is the kind of life we ought to live in the days leading to the rapture of the church.
When we know the prophetic clock in God’s calendar for this world, we would be as Peter said, “nevertheless, we according to His purpose, look for new heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness…Beloved, seeing ye look for such things, be diligent that ye may be found of Him in peace, without spot, and blameless…But grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ” (2 Peter 3:13, 14, 18).
Stephen F. Olford observed well, “the Bible teaches God’s purpose in relation to this planet is threefold.
There is the creative purpose of God “He hath made every thing beautiful in his time:… This was the divine verdict on everything that God created. He saw everything that He had made and “it was very good” (Gen 1:31). That is why Solomon says, Ecclesiastes 3:14 “I know that, whatsoever God doeth, it shall be for ever: nothing can be put to it, nor any thing taken from it: and God doeth it, that men should fear before him.” Into that paradise of beauty, however, Satan came and spoiled it all. The plain fact is that Romans 5:12 “Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:” Heaven’s answer to this marring of God’s creative purpose was immediate and redemptive.
Following the call of man, therefore, there was introduced the redemptive purpose of God.”
This leads us to our second thought.
(2) A Sense of Eternity (v11b)
11 … also he hath set the world in their heart,…
This word “world” means ‘eternity’. It is an old English word that means not the “world” as we know it but rightly as the King James translator used when we sing the Gloria Patri, ‘world without end‘ as referring the age to come, eternity.
God has placed in man created in His image a higher sense in our hearts. God puts in us a sense of God, of eternity, and of judgment. You notice since the beginning of man’s history, man seeks to worship a being that is larger than himself that he could find help, refuge, prosperity in life.
Olford said well, “Only the New Testament can interpret these words, for it is the gospel alone that tells us that because of the Saviour’s work on the cross and His triumphant resurrection, God can put not only eternity, but life and life more abundant into man’s heart.”
John 10:10 The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly
If and when this redemptive purpose is rejected by man, then the solemn consequence is the corrective purpose of God.
Ecclesiastes 3:15 That which hath been is now; and that which is to be hath already been; and God requireth that which is past.
Ecclesiastes 3:16-17 And moreover I saw under the sun the place of judgment, that wickedness was there; and the place of righteousness, that iniquity was there. 17 I said in mine heart, God shall judge the righteous and the wicked: for there is a time there for every purpose and for every work.
God’s judgment is the awaits the unbelieving and impenitent.
Time is not only relegated to the fulfillment of God’s purpose, but time is relegated to the achievement of God’s glory. There is a time to every purpose under the heaven. Those two words “under heaven” are not only a reference to this earth, they are also a reminder that everything that happens on this planet is under the eye of God, and therefore, to be done to the glory of God.”[3]
The Apostle Paul rightly observed that man is culpable if he chooses to reject His Creator God:
Romans 1:19-20 Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them. 20 For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:
Romans 2:14-16 For when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these, having not the law, are a law unto themselves: 15 Which shew the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another;) 16 In the day when God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ according to my gospel.
God gives to us by natural revelation in His creation the knowledge to acknowledge His creative power and the conscience that he places in man to worship a being larger than himself is prevalent throughout human history.
(3) A Scientific Limitation (v11c)
11 …so that no man can find out the work that God maketh from the beginning to the end.
There is a limitation that God has placed to man’s knowledge, of science in understanding creation. God has given to us His Word, the supernatural revelation of God, to help us to know Him
Seeing the created universe through His Word, we can have an idea to understand God
Joseph realized at the latter years of his life God’s purpose. He said in Genesis 50:20 “But as for you, ye thought evil against me; but God meant it unto good, to bring to pass, as it is this day, to save much people alive.
Joseph had to wait upon God to lead him step by step in his life to fulfill His good will for his life. In hindsight, Joseph saw the All-wise, All-power, All-present God guiding, caring and blessing him in life as he abides in Him.
Jesus says to His disciples in John 15:5-8 I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing. 6 If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned. 7 If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you. 8 Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be my disciples.
CONCLUSION
May God help us to live for His glory as we await our redemption! Amen.
[1] Stephen F. Olford, A Time for Truth, AMG Publishers, 1999, 5.
[2] Charles Swindoll, Living on the Ragged Edge, W Publishing Group, 2004, 65.
[3] Stephen F. Olford, A Time for Truth, AMG Publishers, 1999, 6.