The idea behind Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 is that there is an appropriate time for all life’s experiences—the unpleasant, as well as the pleasant. These verses gather around three major divisions that correspond to the divisions of our humanity: body, soul, and spirit.
The first four pair deal with the body: “a time to be born and a time to die (Ecclesiastes 3:2).” This applies to our physical lives. None of us asked to be born; it was something done to us, apart from us. None of us (in our right minds) asks to die; it is something God determines. So, we should view these opposites as a list of what God thinks we ought to have. It pairs birth and death as the boundaries of life “under the sun.”
Then the Searcher moves into the realm of the soul with its functions of thinking, feeling, and choosing—the social areas—and all the things that flow from that. There is, “a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance.” All these things follow closely, and they are all appropriate. What is emphasized here is that, “No one is going to escape the hurts and sorrows of life.” God has permitted them as a result of our choice to utilize our sovereignty by disobeying Him (Genesis 3).
The last six of these opposites relate to the spirit, to inner decisions and commitments. There is “a time to search [for work, marriage, new friends] and a time to give up (Ecclesiastes 3:6).” There comes a time in life when we should curtail certain friendships or change our jobs; to lose what we had in the past. It is proper and appropriate that these times should come.
All these are part of God’s wonderful plan for our lives. The problem is that many of these various components are not a part of our plan. Our plan for our lives would have no unpleasantness at all. But in God’s plan for us—which we do not fully understand nor can we fully explain—that would ruin us. Rather, by faith, we accept that these things are designed to mold us into the people God desires us to be.
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