“To everything there is a season, a time for every purpose under heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die.” —Ecclesiastes 3:1–2 NKJV
It has been said that men talk of killing time while time quietly kills them. According to the Bible, we live our lives for a certain period of time—not a moment longer and not a moment shorter.
Solomon wrote, “There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens: a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot” (Ecclesiastes 3:1–2). The problem is that we spend a lot of our lives doing things we would rather not be doing. For example, the average American will watch 1,700 hours of television every year. We have control over some of these things, but not all of them.
C. S. Lewis said, “The future is something which everyone reaches at the rate of 60 minutes an hour, whatever he does, whoever he is.” We live by time. But God lives in the eternal realm. His interpretation of time is quite different than ours. He has His own timing.
As we get older, we eventually realize that many of the bad times will, in retrospect, turn out to be good times. It is through those so-called bad times that we will learn some of life’s most important lessons.
If I decided how my day would go, I would never experience crisis. But we are not in charge of our own lives. God is. And He will let “bad” things happen. But as time goes by, you will find the important lessons you have learned in life did not come from the good times. They came from those times of crisis when perhaps you were more dependent on God.
As Solomon observed, there is a season for everything. We are not victims of the fickle finger of fate or dumb luck. If you are a Christian, then you have come into God’s providence, which means that He will guide and direct your steps. It means that your times are in His hands
