Tag Archives: Ecclesiastes 3

Chapter-a-Day

The Inescapable Fact

1 Comment

The Inescapable Fact (CaD Ecc 3) – Wayfarer

All go to the same place; all come from dust, and to dust all return.
Ecclesiastes 3:20 (NIV)

Like most people, Wendy and I spent much of the year of COVID finding old television shows to watch. We found ourselves falling in love with a handful of British series. There is a bit of a formula that the Brits have mastered. First, you set the show in a gorgeous, remote landscape. Second, you find a protagonist detective who is just a bit broken. Third, you surround the protagonist with team members who have their own unique issues. Then, of course, people in this gorgeous, remote area of the United Kingdom die all the time in strange ways.

It’s predictable, but it works. It always works. Death is the number one ingredient in our stories. Protagonists are constantly threatened with death, escaping death, and chasing a perpetrator of death. Antagonists are constantly threatening people with death, initiating the death of others, and they often become victims of death in the end. Television, movies, novels, and comic books are filled with death.

I am going to die.

This is an inescapable fact.

I have probably been around death more than most people. I have stood over individuals as they took their last breath. I have officiated many funerals. I have buried loved ones and complete strangers, individuals and couples, infants and aged.

Along my life journey, I’ve observed something ironic. We entertain ourselves ceaselessly with stories in which death is the main ingredient, yet most of us want to pull a Houdini when it comes to this inescapable fact. We want to avoid thinking about it. We want to avoid talking about it. We want to put it off as long as humanly possible.

The ancient Sage of Ecclesiastes wants me to stop trying to escape this fact. He want me to stop running from the inevitable and look this inescapable fact straight in the eye. He makes it a matter-of-fact statement:

There is a time to be born. Check. April 30, 1966. St. Luke’s hospital in Sioux City, Iowa.

There is a time to die. Date unknown. Location unknown. Still inevitable.

I mentioned back at the beginning of this chapter-a-day trek through Ecclesiastes that the Sage is pushing into what is really of value in this life. In the quiet this morning, I hear him telling me that there is value in considering my day, this very day, in light of this inescapable fact. David Gibson wrote about it in his book Living Life Backwards:

I am convinced that only a proper perspective on death provides the true perspective on life. Living in the light of your death will help you to live wisely and freely and generously. It will give you a big heart and open hands, and enable you to relish all the small things of life in deeply profound ways. Death can teach you the meaning of mirth.

I want to persuade you that only if you prepare to die can you really learn how to live.

In the quiet this morning, I find myself pondering two things as I things as I prepare to press on into this day:

One: I think I should allow the inescapable fact of my impending death to inform what I value.

Two: A disproportionate number of arcane murders seem to occur in gorgeous, remote areas of the UK, if one believes what one sees on the telly.

If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.

Chapter-a-Day

“Wait for it…”

1 Comment

Ten days later the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah.
Jeremiah 42:7 (NIV)

Just yesterday I was reading a fascinating article about Peter Wohlleben the scientist and forester who wrote The Hidden Life of Trees. How fascinating to find that Tolkien’s characterization of trees as living characters is more true than I ever thought possible. Science is discovering that trees connect to one another through a vast underground network. Trees act communally, share resources, communicate danger to one another, and care for their young. The more I learn about creation, the more amazed I am by it and our Creator.

Take time and space, for example. I, like most people, have spent most of my life journey stuck in the paradigm of time being flat and linear. Physicists (thank you, Einstein), have come to understand that both time and space bend. There is far more dimension to it than a linear plane. Depending on the school of thought to which one prescribes there are at least 10, perhaps 11 or even 26 dimensions of space and time. This does not shake my faith any more than Galileo’s discovery that Earth wasn’t the center of the universe. Rather, it only expands my faith to consider and discover new facets of Life, Spirit, and eternity.

In today’s chapter of Jeremiah, the armed contingent who rescued the captives of the governor’s house in yesterday’s chapter have decided to head to Egypt. They are afraid that when the King of Babylon finds out about his Governor’s assassination that head’s will literally roll. Before leaving, they decide to ask Jeremiah to inquire of the Lord what Word He has for them. Jeremiah agrees to do so, and the Word comes to Jeremiah ten days later.

Ten days. Why ten days? Why not immediately? Was there something wrong with Jeremiah’s antenna or spiritual satellite dish? Were solar flares creating signal interference? What’s up with having to wait ten days?

As I meditate on this question there are two major thoughts that come to mind.

First, the number ten is not without significance in the Great Story. It is a number of completion. Ten commandments, ten plagues, ten generations, ten as percentage of tithe, ten lepers, ten virgins, ten talents, and etc. So, the contingent having to wait ten days has spiritual weight. Would the fearful contingent display the completeness of faith to wait for God’s word from Jeremiah, despite the pressure of knowing Nebuchadnezzar’s wrath could arrive before then? The ten days was, perhaps, less about God being out on a coffee break, and more about the revealing of the contingent’s heart and motives.

Second, I have found along my own spiritual journey that the concept of time and season described by the author of Ecclesiastes (see Ecclesiastes chapter 3) is far deeper than mere poetry. In the complex fabric of time and space (which is far beyond my comprehension) there seems to be a spiritual weaving of circumstances, events, and places into the tapestry of the Great Story. Things happen at a particular time and place in our journeys. We call them happenstance, coincidence, and fortune. As a believer, I have faith that these things aren’t random. God exists outside of time, and I’m beginning to understand that our Creator has layered and bent time and space in ways my finite mind cannot imagine.

At the end of this morning’s chapter Jeremiah’s words suggest that by the time the Word from the Lord came to him, the contingent who asked for it were already packed for their escape to Egypt. How often has that been true in my own life? I say I want to ask for God’s guidance and direction, but my will was decided before I asked. I really don’t have the patience to wait for God’s time and season. The sand is slipping through the hourglass, baby. I can’t wait anymore. Gotta head on down the line. Gonna make something happen!

This morning I’m feeling the need to admit the impatience that has dotted my own journey’s story line. As I take the final sip from my first cup of morning coffee, I’m reminded that at times I will wait ten days, ten months, or ten years for God to reveal, speak, move, or act in the space-time continuum He’s created for the telling of the Great Story (and my place in it).

Rest…breathe…chill…relax…flow….

Wait for it….

“God makes all things beautiful in their time.” (Ecc 3:11)

Chapter-a-Day

Hit Your Cue

3 Comments

southpacificThere 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,
       a time to kill and a time to heal,
    a time to tear down and a time to build,
       a time to weep and a time to laugh,
    a time to mourn and a time to dance,
       a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
    a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
       a time to search and a time to give up,
    a time to keep and a time to throw away,
       a time to tear and a time to mend,
    a time to be silent and a time to speak,
       a time to love and a time to hate,
    a time for war and a time for peace.
Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 (NIV)

 The musical was South Pacific and I was playing Captain Brackett.  One particular scene in the show begins with a meeting in Brackett’s office between Brackett and three other characters. As the lights came up on the scene that night it was clear that someone was not at the meeting. It happened to be the gentleman playing Commander Harbison, Captain Bracket’s next in command. There are few experiences more terrifying to actors on stage than when someone misses his or her entrance. My fellow actors, aware that something was desperately wrong, held their focus well, but I could see in their eyes that they were having the same “Oh shit” moment that I was.

So, I did what military officers do. I started screaming. I stood, slammed my hand on my desk, and went into a full out crusty sailor rant.

“Where’s Harbison?! WHERE THE HELL IS HARBISON!?”

I knew that Dayrel Gates, who played my admin Yeoman Quale, was standing just off stage because I’d passed him during the scene change.

“QUALE?! QUALE GET IN HERE!!”

Dayrel immediately ran in and stood at attention like a terrified sailor.

“FIND HARBISON AND GET HIM IN HERE NOW!!”

Dayrel was brilliant. He picked right up on what I was doing, gave me an “Aye Captain!” salute and exited. As soon as he exited the stage he started yelling in the wings. “Commander Harbison!? FIND COMMANDER HARBISON!” Others cast members who realized what was happening started yelling for Commander Harbison as well and you could hear their screams in the hallway outside the auditorium as if an entire platoon of personnel were scrambling around the camp looking for the tardy Commander. It didn’t take long before the actor playing Commander Harbison came running on stage. He was out of breath, sweating profusely, and in a full panic. It turned out he had stepped out between scenes for a smoke and didn’t realize it was his cue.

When you’re on stage you learn that one of the fundamental essentials is to hit your cue and make your entrance on time. It’s critical to the success of the show. Bad things happen when you miss your cue.

Solomon’s words are brilliant and powerful in the simplicity of the truth he communicates. Timing is critical to almost every season and to every element of life. There is a time for everything. I have learned, however, that attention, observation, introspection, and wisdom are required to discern the time you are in and to respond accordingly.

All the world is a stage, as the Bard said, and we are all players in it. It’s fundamentally critical to success that we hit our cues in life. Bad things happen when we don’t.