Ecclesiastes 3:1-8, A Reason For Each Season
1. Discern The Season That God Has You In
2. Learn How To Walk With God In Each Season
3. Learn How To Be Content In Each Season
4. Make Each Season Count For Eternity
Ecclesiastes 3:1-8, A Reason For Each Season
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As we begin looking at the Book of Ecclesiastes, I wanted to take a moment and begin with something I shared with you a while back.
As we got into the Book of Job, I shared with you this image of a street and you might remember if you were around for that that I asked you to guess.
To the best of your ability, what the speed limit was?
For this street now, there's no sign posted, at least not visible that you can see here. But if I were to venture a guess, I would guess that all of you could very accurately predict the speed limits for this street, and that, of course, is 25 miles an hour for a residential zone.
Now that's for our, you know, location.
Different regions might have different responsibilities, different speed limits, and different expectations.
But we're all familiar.
We hit this kind of area and we know by the context of the street that we're on and what's happening on that street.
Right?
The speed limits that should be applied now.
I also shared this example and this is a road that is up in Northern Nevada near my parents house in Carson City, and you can look at that and you can make a reasonable guess.
The speed limit is probably going to be about 65 miles an hour, and as we did that test a few weeks back.
There was a good degree of accuracy everybody.
Was able to guess within a you know, plus or minus 5.
Range the the correct speed limit for that road.
Here's a road back in Virginia.
A place, probably none of you have ever been.
And yet looking at it you can see and understand that the speed limit I'm trying to look for it 'cause I don't remember it off the top of my head and I.
Know it's on there but I can't see it.
Really not proving my point here.
There it is. 45 yes woo.
My Jesus healed my eyes OK.
Then there's this.
Road in the middle of the desert heading through the middle of Nevada and you can look.
At that and guess.
Probably pretty accurately the speed limits about 70 mph on that, even when the speed limit sign is broken down and barely on the ground.
Here's a road not too far away, 40 miles an hour over there on Indiana and La Sierra.
So the whole objective in looking at these things and illustration that I'm seeking to.
Really highlight here is that we have learned by experience.
To understand and estimate the speed limits of the roads that we're on, based on the context of what we are seeing based on the size of the road, the types of buildings, the, the types of things that are happening along the side, how many lanes are in the road that that we have developed, this perception and discernment to be able to.
Pretty accurately estimate.
Now you know we like to pretend ignorance when we get pulled over, as if, oh, I had no idea the speed limit, was that right, but but the reality is, most of us pretty.
Much can tell.
What speed is the appropriate speed?
Just by the experience of being on the roads in those various contexts, and I think that's a really good illustration to help us understand that when we come to the scriptures, we need to develop a similar type of discernment as we understand the context.
And what's happening in the passage.
The type of passage that it is, and the things that are happening around the passage.
Really gives us a good idea of the speed limit that we should have when we're hitting these things and then applying them to our lives.
And so when you hit the poetic books.
We have to learn to process them a bit differently than some of the other books.
The teachings of Jesus, the red letters in your Bible.
You know they're direct commands, and there there's not a lot of parsing and a lot of context, and figuring out that you have to do because it's there.
Just direct and clear words.
From the Lord.
Very easy for us to.
Work through and receive from, but then when you hit some of these books, like the poetic books or the prophetic books, that will be in, there's there's some other efforts that need to be taken and we have to slow down.
We have to work through some other ideas and concepts to really get the full picture of what the Lord is saying in the scriptures that he has.
Recorded for us.
And that's really important as we come to.
The book of.
Ecclesiastes because Ecclesiastes is another book like the Book of Job where I would caution everyone from quoting from the Book of Ecclesiastes.
If you don't have a good grasp on.
Right?
Many times the Book of Job is quoted very poorly because most of the book of job is nonsense by design, even though it's in the scriptures. Even though it is God's word and similarly a lot of the book of Ecclesiastes is nonsense.
But it's in the scriptures for a good reason, and it's valuable for us to work through it, even though there's a lot of nonsense because what the book of Ecclesiastes does is record the journey.
Of a once wise man who tried to find fulfillment and satisfaction in life on his own and apart from God.
And so the result of trying to find fulfillment and satisfaction apart from God is going to be a lot of nonsense, and so that's recorded for us.
One of the purposes perhaps is that we don't have to pursue these things ourselves, but we can learn from the example of Solomon here.
This book was written by Solomon who was the son of David.
David, of course, was a godly man who knew God well.
And Solomon started out in a similar path knowing God and calling out to God, but he didn't seem to have the same relationship with God.
And after he was established he decided to go on.
A bit of a journey.
And this book is recording that journey.
He's evaluating life under the Sun and under the sun.
Is repeated throughout the book.
Where he's trying to evaluate life apart from the revelation of God.
He's not denying the existence of God, but he's just.
Saying, you know?
I don't know if I can really buy into all that supposed revelation of God and I I think I need to try to.
Figure out life on my own.
Solomon says I've got a lot of.
Wisdom I've got.
A lot of resources.
In fact, Solomon, you could think of it this way had unlimited resources.
He could do anything he wanted.
Unlimited Power, unlimited resources.
And he thought, you know what?
Let me try to find.
The meaning, the purpose and the value of life.
And so he tried all kinds of things.
He tried education, he tried pursuing pleasures, he tried building and and you know, establishing really great things.
And he kept coming back to the conclusion.
Vanity of vanities.
All is vanity, or as I like to say, when I teach there.
Ecclesiastes bubbles and bubbles everything, it's just bubbles.
It's just there for a moment and then pop and it's gone and it vanishes.
And and there is nothing left and.
Solomon, in trying to find meaning and purpose apart from God.
He would find moments of pleasure, moments of value, but it wouldn't last, and it would just be gone it.
Would just vanish.
And that's the reality for all of us.
If you try to find meaning.
In your life.
But you do not look to the revelation of God.
Then you will end up.
Having maybe some great moments that just fade and vanish.
And you're left with nothing.
And so that's kind of the theme in the background of the book and the whole book is really this record of the journey.
Well in chapter 3.
He's looking at the whole of life and he's looking at all of these different seasons in life and all of these different times and different activities and and types of things that are happening in everybody life.
And so there's a time to be born and a time to die.
That happens for everybody.
And it's outside of our control.
We don't really.
Have a lot.
Of, say, about the time that we're born or the time that we die.
There's a time to plant and a time to harvest.
What was planted?
Again, that's just part of nature.
And we do our best to try to manipulate things to our advantage.
But the reality is, the more we work In Sync with the natural progression of times and seasons.
The better that crop is, the better the result is of that harvest.
And he's going down through these different things and thinking about them.
And you can see there's these opposites.
Birth to death planting versus harvesting, and he's going back and forth.
Considering all of these things and understanding theirs.
This variety, but but it's not just variety, it's also their opposites.
Of each other pastor.
William McDonald puts it this way.
This list is made up of opposites 14 are positives, 14 negatives.
In some ways they seem to cancel each other out.
So that the net result is 0.
And that really captures the sentiment of Solomon here.
We could look at these verses in isolation and make a beautiful song out of it, or a beautiful poem.
Out of it.
And and kind of try.
To make it mean something beautiful, but.
Solomon heart in this is not like oh, this is so great that there's this time to to be born and a time to die at a time to be silent and a time to speak isn't it just so amazing?
That's that's not his heart, as he's writing this.
And you can see that again, as you understand the context, we had to slow down on this road and understand where he's at and what he's going through.
You look at the verses around you.
Look at the chapters before and after.
He's still working his way through.
His search for meaning and purpose apart from God.
And he's observing these times and seasons.
About life but.
But he's not finding a lot of value in it.
You can see that very clearly in verse 9.
When he says, what profit has the worker from that in which he leavers?
If you add 14 and then subtract 14 and then you get to the end, he says it's zero.
So what profit is there in all of this?
What value is there in any of this?
And going back to Ecclesiastes chapter one verse two, he concludes vanity of vanities.
Everything is vanity.
Says the preacher.
It's just bubbles and bubbles and bubbles.
They're here.
For a moment.
And they do not last.
And then you're left with.
Nothing. Now that's Solomon's conclusion. That's where he's at on this journey. But as we look at this passage this evening.
I think we can do better than that.
And so I want to look at this passage, not so much to.
Try to figure out everything Solomon was thinking or everything he had in mind in each of these elements of these verses, but.
But to think of these verses, these observations that he is making in light of the revelation of God, Solomon is attempting to do this, ignoring the revelation of God.
But let's look at it in light of what God has said.
What God has revealed.
And so we're going to walk through a few things here.
Considering the the verses that are before us, I've titled The Message a reason for each season.
Solomon came to the conclusion it's all worthless vanity, it's zero, it's pointless.
But this evening, I would encourage you to not come to that conclusion, but instead come to the conclusion that there's a reason.
For each season.
For each different portion of life, as you experience each of these things, there's there's a reason for each season now.
As I've often shared, this is a different kind of passage than we often get to experience in working our way through the Scriptures, and so because it's a different kind of passage, this is a different kind of message.
It's a little bit different Bible study than we might typically have.
But we would note that Solomon here is making some valid observations.
He's not completely foolish.
He's just ignoring God's revelation.
There are seasons and times and each one does have its place.
And as we understand what God has revealed of himself.
We can understand it even better than Solomon could knowing that there is meaning and value.
In each one of those seasons.
And times in our lives.
God often works in our lives in seasons.
I like to remember and consider Genesis chapter one there at the beginning when God is creating all things.
He says let there be lights in the firmament.
That they divide the day and the night.
And let them be for signs and seasons for days and years.
From the very beginning, God meant for there to be seasons.
For there to be the course of the Earth in its rotation, it's.
Wrote not rotation, but orbit around the sun.
He he intended for there to be this variety and and to be these seasons that we experience here on this earth.
He's he's always intended for that, and so he even built all of creation.
To play into the variety of life that would happen to us.
Day by day, month by month, and year by year it it's part of his design.
It's part of the way that God works and he works in new ways and much variety.
And many times it's blocks of time together.
You can think about seasons in farming.
There is the appropriate time to plow.
There's the appropriate time to plant.
There's the appropriate time to water and to nurture.
And then there's the appropriate time to harvest if you try to do those in.
A different order.
You're going to be all messed up.
You're going to have all kinds of issues.
You try to plant.
In the middle.
Of winter when the ground is frozen hard and solid, you're going to have some problems, right?
Like there's there's the appropriate season that is in the weather that is happening.
There's the appropriate season in the course of life for each type of vegetation that you might be growing.
And then for each vegetation there's the appropriate.
Some things are better planted in summer and summer, better planted in spring, and some bear fruits in the fall.
And some bear fruits in the winter.
There's all of these different seasons, and each one has its own course its own.
Plan and purpose.
That God has established for it.
There's a reason for each season in our lives as well.
By seasons I'm
Talking about durations of time in our lives that are appointed by God.
Portions of lot of time durations of time that perhaps the Lord is working on a specific aspect.
Of our heart and mind, there is a specific work he likes to accomplish or wants to accomplish.
He's focused on something.
There's perhaps an overarching theme.
That God is speaking to us for a certain time.
Or a certain objective that God is working us towards.
There's these seasons in our lives where God is working for days.
There's other seasons where God is working for weeks.
There's other seasons where God is working on a specific thing for months or years or decades.
That there's these segments of time grouped together that God has some specific things to work in us and accomplish through us.
Think about this in the example of the blind man in John Chapter 9.
In John Chapter 9, it tells us.
Jesus hanging out with his disciples, he saw a man who was blind.
From birth.
And it stirred up a question in the minds of the disciples, they said, hey?
Who sinned?
This guy is blind from birth.
Did he sin in the womb?
And that's why God cursed him with blindness?
Or did his parents sin and so?
God says, I'll.
Show you parents and made the sunblind to pay the parents back for their sin.
That's what the the disciples are wondering.
That's what they're thinking.
They have bad theology.
And so Jesus says neither.
This is not the direct consequence of sin.
But instead that the works of God should be revealed.
In him man who goes my throat again?
There's a season for talking and.
A season for drinking.
Not that kind of drinking, just water.
I'm just talking about water.
Jesus said, nobody sinned to cause this God.
Allowed this.
And intends to use this and so for this guy.
There is a season of blindness.
In order for God's work to be accomplished.
And then for this guy there.
Was a season of sight.
And we of course love the season of sight.
We want to skip ahead to that right the?
Good part.
But the season of sight.
Would not have been so meaningful if there was not the season of blindness.
And and God's work would not have been fulfilled the same way if there was not the season of.
Blindness that preceded the season of sight that that both seasons were necessary in this guy's life in his parents life and in all of his friends and family who would ever know him in their lives. These two seasons were crucial and important.
And this is important to understand because.
Seasons don't have to be caused by sin.
Hard things or difficult things.
Seasons of blindness.
Sometimes there's repercussions for sin and we experienced.
Those for a season.
But at the same time, they're not always caused by sin.
It's not always God trying to pour out some judgments.
This wasn't sin on the blind men part of the parents part, it was just.
Something got allowed to accomplish his purposes.
And so there's these different seasons in this man's life.
In our lives as well.
There's a reason for each season.
We're going to see how much the Lord wants me to share tonight, OK?
Point number one.
Discern the season that God has you in.
Can you give me some tissue please?
This one is empty.
Discern the season that God has you in.
From verse one.
To everything there is a season.
A time for every purpose under heaven.
A time to be born.
And a time to die.
A time to plant.
And a time to pluck what is planted.
A time to kill and a time to heal.
A time to break down and a time to build up.
A time to weep and a time to laugh.
Time to born and a time to dance.
Time to castaway stones.
The time to gather stones.
Time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing.
A time to gain and a time to lose.
A time to keep and a.
Time to throw away.
A time to tear and a time to sew.
A time to keep silence.
And the time to speak.
A time to love and a time to hate.
Time of war.
And a time of peace.
As I mentioned, these are valid observations from Solomon.
There's various times and seasons.
Do you know what season you're in?
Do I know what season I'm in is?
It the season to talk.
All right, bare minimum.
Jesus rebuked the multitudes.
Luke chapter 12.
You can discern the weather.
But you don't know what time it is.
You're missing the Messiah.
You're missing the work of God in this time as.
Jesus was there.
How can you discern and be so savvy?
With the physical things.
And so ignorant about the spiritual.
OK.
Discern the season that you're in. OK, I'm going to share with you a few examples. Jeremiah 29.
The Jewish people in captivity in Babylon.
They didn't want to be there.
They wanted to be back in Jerusalem.
They had false prophets, telling them they're supposed to be back in Jerusalem, and God is going to take them back to Jerusalem.
But God says no.
That's not the season that you're in.
You're misunderstanding, you're not discerning the season.
This isn't the season to fight Babylon.
This isn't the season to rebel.
In this season, God tells them build houses.
Get your kids married.
Have grandkids plant vineyards?
It's not the season to run away to get out, that's not.
The season that you're in.
But the Jewish people were not discerning the season.
Paul the Apostle in 2nd Corinthians 12.
Had to readjust his thinking.
He wanted to be in a season of strength and victory and glory.
But the word gave him a.
Thorn in the flesh.
And he pleaded with the Lord.
Three times.
Please let this throat issue get away from me.
Take it away.
Well, it said.
My strength is made perfect in weakness.
Yeah, that's not the season you're in, Paul.
You're not in the season of strength and glory and victory.
While this season for you is, it's the time to be sick.
It's the time to be weak and my grace is sufficient.
I'm with you through it, I'll give you what you need but you need to understand the season that you're in so that you receive from the Lord what you need.
First, Timothy 5 Paul tells Timothy.
No longer drink only water, but use a little wine for your stomach sake in your frequent infirmities.
Timothy, it's time to take medicine.
We've been praying for healing.
The Lord's chosen not to hear you that way.
You've been trying to stay away from wine, not to stumble anybody, and.
Not to have any of those issues or hard discussions.
It's not that time, Timothy.
You need to take your medicine.
To take care of yourself and do what's good for you to do what's right.
Yeah, the.
How is going crazy?
Paul told the Romans in Romans chapter 13.
As he goes through a list of all the.
Things that we ought to.
Have as Christian character and and nature.
He says, do all this knowing the time.
It's high time to a week.
Out of sleep.
It's not the time Paul says to the Romans.
Of kind of the.
Comfortable luxury of just cruising in your spiritual life.
There's a time to really wake up and be intense about your walk with God about your service to the Lord.
You need to discern the time Paul tells them.
Wake up and get to work.
Think about the instruction of Jesus to the disciples in Luke 22.
He says, remember when I sent you guys out before?
I told you not to take a knapsack, don't take extra sandals.
Did you lack anything?
The disciple said we didn't like anything.
Then Jesus said.
But now new season that was an old season.
And sometimes we fall into that pattern.
We fall into that trap of the old way.
Is the pattern that's the way it's always going to be?
Jesus says no, it's a new season.
If you have a money bag, take it.
If you have a knapsack ticket.
And if you don't have a sword.
You need to sell something and get one so that you can defend yourself.
It's going to be a new season.
You want it to be a season of easy ministry.
Always of course yes.
But Jesus says guys.
Now you're headed into a season of hard ministry.
Where you have to work hard and provide for yourself and defend yourself.
It's going to be a different.
Throughout Jesus life.
In his ministry.
He would often say my time has not yet come.
But then there came the change.
Where he set his face to Jerusalem.
His time had come, the season changed.
In a similar way, we all have different seasons that God has appointed in our lives.
And they may not be the seasons we want.
We might want the seasons of easy.
The seasons of victory, the seasons of Health and wealth and blessing, but what God may have apportioned for us is a season of difficulty or a season of challenge.
And there's the tick in the talk.
The birth and the death.
The gathering stones and the casting of stones.
Each one is a season.
None of them are permanent.
You know, many times we kind of have this idea where we're trying to like reach that pinnacle and then.
Stay at the peak.
We we make it to easy Street.
I don't know if that's.
Saying anybody else understands anymore, but I remember that always when I was young.
It's like you always want to.
You're trying to make it to easy street and then and then once you're there.
Then it's just life as you're just coasting.
After that it's this easy after that.
Listen, God may give you a great season on Easy Street.
And then he may give you another season that's.
On downhill drive that you're off the pinnacle, you're not up there anymore, but it's a new season and then there'll be another season that's the uphill climb and then there'll be another peak and then they'll be in it like.
It's important for us to not try to insist on enforce upon our will.
What we want and what we desire.
But for us to be discerning and to think about God.
What season do you have me in?
What is it that you are working?
In my life.
At this time.
Pastor Thomas Constable says the significance of this section is that man is responsible to discern the right times for the right actions.
And when he does the right action according to God's.
Time the result is.
The objective is to work with God in the midst of his season, and then it's like catching a wave.
If God is trying to work this in your life, and you discern that and you realize, OK, God wants me to.
Experience a season of strength.
Then I'm going to look to him and be strong.
If God wants me to experience a season of.
Weakness then I'm going to look to him and learn how to be weak and rest in him.
And you kind of catch the wave and you work with him.
In him accomplishing his work in your life, so discern the season that God has you in.
The second thing I'd ask us to consider this.
Evening is to learn how to.
Walk with God in each season.
So it's one thing to discern this season.
But we need to learn how to relate to God.
As we experience each season.
Is it time to be born?
And it's time to die.
We have a VBS coming up.
Where we'll be doing our best.
To help those.
Who have newly been born?
You know those younger children?
To learn how to know God and walk with God.
But that's just one season of life and it's one thing you kids need to learn how to know God and walk with God and relate to God.
But if you follow that.
Child up through the years.
It's one of the challenges for kids raised in a Christian home.
Because there's the changing of seasons.
Elementary age kids go into junior high.
And junior hires have to learn how to walk with God all over again.
And then junior hires graduated into high school and then high schoolers have to learn how to walk with God all over again.
And then high schoolers go to college.
Or drop out of school and then have to learn how to walk with God all over again.
And then we enter into the workforce.
Or into the armed forces.
Or into some other course of life and we have to learn how to walk with God in that course as well.
It's not the same, it changes.
It changes from season to season.
There's growth.
Required on our part too.
Be able to.
Continue to develop our relationship with God in each of these seasons that we go through.
Now that's talking about seasons of life and that that the age ranges and things like that.
But that's also true of all the other types of seasons that we face.
Solomon says there's a time to break down.
And the time to build up.
There's times in our lives that are breaking down times.
It's time to take things apart to remove them, to put them away.
And we need to learn how to relate to God in those times and to walk with God in the midst of those times.
And maybe that's not easy and we're sorrowful and crying as we remove things out of our life that.
We once had there and wanted there and were hoping that they would grow to become even bigger things.
And then there's a time to build up, and then we have to learn how to walk with God in in the building phases of our lives as well.
And verse voice says there's a time to weep.
And a time to laugh.
And of course we would just say remove all the times of weeping from our lives and just give me all the times of laughter.
But that's not what God has apportioned for us.
There's some seasons of your life that are going to be.
Predominantly weeping.
And in the midst of that God.
Is able to meet you there, but you need to learn how to walk with him in the time of weeping. There's that great Psalm. Psalm 84.
Bless it is the man.
Whose strength is in you whose heart is.
Set on pilgrimage.
As they pass through the valley of Baca, the word Baca literally means weeping.
As they pass through the valley of weeping, they make it a spring.
The rain also covers it with pools.
And the idea here is that there's this season of weeping.
This valley of weeping.
The Valley Pictures a hard time, a difficult time.
There's these.
Dark shadows in this hard time and there's this intense weeping.
But the ones who have their heart set on pilgrimage.
They're walking with God.
There's a transformation that takes place.
And that valley of hardship and weeping.
Becomes a spring of refreshing.
Learning how to walk with God in times of weeping is essential for us.
But just as essential, just as crucial is learning how to walk with God in times of laughter.
That we need to.
Learn how to.
Have a relationship with God and maintain a closeness with God in the good times and the joyful times as well.
You know, some people only know how to walk with God when it's hard.
In the valley of weeping.
Hardship in life and difficulty in life and.
Many times natural for us to run to God in those times.
And we're reliant upon God in those times, and we only really know how to walk with God when it's difficult in our life.
And when good times come.
Our relationship with God goes out the window.
That's the example that we're.
Given in the book of judges.
Where generation after generation the children of Israel.
They would turn away from God and rebel.
In the times of luxury and the times of easiness and enjoyment.
And then as a result of their sin, they.
Would experience oppression.
They'd go through the valley of weeping and they would learn again and be reminded.
Oh man, we need to walk with God and they'd go back to the Lord.
But when times would get good again.
They didn't know how to walk with God.
In the good times.
And so they would abandon their walk with God.
They never learned that.
We need to learn both.
Some people only know how to walk with God when it's hard.
And conversely, some people only know how to walk with God.
When it's easy and then it's in the time of weeping that they give up on God and they feel like gods.
Abandon them and they're bitter against God, because how could God allow this and and they've lost their whole connection with God because they only know how to relate to God.
When it's easy.
And when there's laughter, and when things are pleasant and joyful.
God says, listen.
I want you to have a much deeper relationship with me than just if it's the perfect circumstances in one kind of season.
You need to learn to know me, to walk with me, to talk to me.
To hear from me.
In all kinds of seasons and building seasons.
In demolishing seasons and weeping seasons and laughter seasons.
In planting seasons and harvesting seasons.
Whatever kind of season that you might be in.
Learning to relate to God in the midst of that.
And walk with God what you're experiencing and the emotions that you have and the things that you're processing internally.
I think this is.
What Paul E Apostle is somewhat expressing in Philippians chapter 3.
When he says I do not count myself to have apprehended, but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.
I don't look back at the time of weeping and say boy, I learned.
How to walk with?
God and I know that, and so now I'm done.
And now in the season of laughter.
I don't need to press on.
I don't need to work so hard on my relationship with God.
I don't need to spend as much time with God.
I I learned all that in the old season.
In that past season.
Paul says no, those past seasons.
They're important instrumental in my life, but they haven't brought me to the.
Point where I've.
Apprehended, and so in this new season.
I don't count myself to have apprehended.
I'm saying I need to keep pressing.
Toward the goal.
Keep pressing in.
In a relationship with God, learn.
How to walk with God in each season?
Well, moving on to the third consideration for tonight and that is learned how to.
Be content in each season.
Let's consider a couple more verses. Verse 5-6 and seven.
A time to castaway stones and a time to gather stones.
A time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing.
A time to gain and a.
Time to lose.
A time to keep.
And a time to throw away.
A time to tear in a time to sow.
A time to keep silence and a time to speak.
Learn how to be content in each season.
There's different ideas about what Solomon might have meant about the casting away stones and gathering stones.
One idea is that casting away stones.
Is getting a.
Field ready so that it could be used for a crop used for farming.
Getting those stones out of there, other people say you know, casting away stones. Maybe there were times where you would. They would throw stones on an enemy's property to prevent them from.
Sowing and reaping and gaining from that and so perhaps Solomon, meant that.
Others say, well, maybe the casting waystones is like the taking down of some.
Removing them, you know something that was there and established, and the gathering of stones is building something, gathering stones together.
You can think about it all different ways.
But you know, in our lives there's times of.
Gathering there's times of casting away.
There's time of building things.
The whole idea here is not that every season is super specific and exactly detailed.
It's the idea that there are things in our lives.
It's kind of the the give and take of the the circle of life.
The cycle of life that.
Buildings that are built today.
Will be torn down 100 years from now to be rebuilt again, fresh and new to be torn down 100 years after that right? There's going to be the casting a way out with the old in with the new that's.
That's part of the seasons of life.
And we need to learn how to be content.
In each of those seasons.
I don't know much about sports, you guys.
Know that but.
I watched Hoosiers once or twice so I know the idea of like deconstructing a team right, kind of like bringing them back to the basics then then kind of rebuild them.
You can talk to Harvey about all that afterwards, so he'll fill you in on all the details.
Sometimes there's that need, though in our lives to kind of be broken down to kind of have stones castaway things removed from our lives.
And and you know, to have something that we thought was going to be a permanent part of our life.
Can be quite a challenging season.
I thought this was going to be part of my life for the rest of my life.
I expected this was a foundational stone that my life was built on and so now, how am I going to live without that job without that career without that person without that thing?
In my life.
There's the need for us to learn to be content.
To be satisfied by the Lord, even without.
Those foundational stones.
That we kind of based our lives around.
But that doesn't mean that's the end of our lives.
Forever, right?
That there will be a time we have to learn how to be content and.
Live in this season and walk with God in this season where that stone is removed, but.
But then there will come another time in the future where there will be a new stone lead, a new foundation, a new new work starting to be built.
And in both cases we.
We need to learn to walk with God.
And understand the season that we're in.
And learn to be content.
In the situation that God.
Has brought to us.
In Philippians chapter 4.
Paul walks through this.
With pretty.
Good clarity.
He's thinking the Philippians for their gift.
Financially, they've supported him and he says, I just I, I'm.
Rejoicing in that.
But then he goes on.
To clarify, I'm not saying.
That I I was desperate for it in the sense that if you didn't do that.
I would have died.
It's not that I needed it in that sense, but but I rejoice in it because.
I'm blessed that you were able to give and that you had.
The opportunity to give again.
But Paul says.
As for me, I've learned that whatever state I'm in, I can be content.
I know I'm where God wants me to be.
And if that means I'm a base, that means I have nothing and nobody is providing for me and there is no gifts coming in and I'm just surviving off of the dust of the ground.
I know how to walk with God like that.
I know how to be content and.
To be OK in.
My relationship with the Lord in my life.
Having just the dust of the ground and God, that's enough for me I.
Know how to be.
A base and I know how to abound.
I've been through both kinds of seasons Paul is saying.
And notice what he says in verse 11 I've learned.
In whatever state I am to be content, it's not a natural thing.
It's usually something we have to learn.
I've learned I've trained myself, I've taught myself.
To be content to be satisfied with what God has and to be trusting God to provide.
For the situation that I'm in.
And again, sometimes some people are.
More content.
There's not that covetousness and greed and things that are stirred up, as when those times of abounding happen in their life.
And sometimes it can be harder to be content when things are bound.
Than it is in those seasons where things.
Are absent.
Paul says either way I've learned.
To be full to be hungry, to bound to suffer need.
I know how to be content.
To be satisfied and trusting in God for everything.
That I need.
Learn how to be content in each season Pastor.
Warren Rowsby says.
It may not look like it now, but God will bring beauty out of all that happens no matter what the seed looks like.
The flower will be beautiful, so give God time.
To work.
No matter what the seed looks like.
The flower is not the seed.
The seed is planted.
It goes through the process of seasons and time to.
Grow and to.
You've got time to work.
Learn to be content in those times of being, uh, based or abounding there's an urgency many times to get out of the season.
I don't want to be in this season anymore, I don't.
I want to be done with this and over these temptations and over these challenges and over these difficult, I just want to be.
In the next season.
But you have to give God time to work.
Give time for those seeds to grow and to flourish and to.
Bring forth the beautiful work of God that he wants to bring forth in us.
Through each season.
Learn how to be content in each season while wrapping it up.
Fourth thing to consider.
Is to make each season count for eternity.
Solomon Point here is it's also temporary.
It just seems everything cancels each other out.
In the end, what profit do you have?
It's all worthless, it's all vanity.
It's all bubbles.
Is what Solomon says and to some degree.
There's a little bit of truth in that, right?
There's a lot of things that happen in this life.
You can spend 80 years of your life pursuing a career.
And end up on your deathbed with no money, no joy, no satisfaction like you can invest your life in things.
And see no return on it in this life.
That is a reality that many people face.
That's not the ideal. That's not God's design in each season. Again, if we learn to walk with God and learn to be content.
If we can discern what season we're in and understand the work that God is wanting to do in the midst of our lives.
Then there can be great value in each of those seasons. It doesn't have to be all meaningless and worthless, but it can be if we take Solomon's approach.
But another aspect of this is each of those temporary seasons.
They're just temporary.
They're not going to last forever, but we can make them count.
For eternity
And so we can get the.
The value out of it that we get from learning to walk with God and relate to God and.
Have fellowship with God in the midst of it.
But then we can also sow seeds.
That will grow.
And produce a harvest.
For all eternity to come.
Jesus encourages us in Matthew 6.
To not lay up treasures on Earth.
Those are temporary.
The only last rest season.
Until they're stolen until they're corrupted or destroyed.
But if you lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven.
They're eternal.
They last forever.
And you'll get to enjoy those rewards.
For all of eternity.
And so seasons of hunger.
And seasons.
Of abundance.
Seasons of weeping.
In seasons of laughter.
Seasons of gathering and seasons of scattering.
Seasons of mourning and seasons of Dancing in each of those seasons there are ways for you to invest in eternity.
Do things to make decisions to represent God.
To plant seeds in a way that.
There will be eternal reward and eternal benefit.
No matter what season you're going through.
You are going to experience a huge variety of seasons in life.
But don't be mistaken and think that you can only benefit eternally from.
The good ones and the times when you you know, maybe you look back on life and think, well, the good old days when you were able to be in church every Sunday and Wednesday 'cause your schedule was different and your family was different and you know things were different and and so oh.
Man there was.
So much eternal reward that you were.
Building up right?
So much you.
Were doing for God and then now it's like.
Oh, but I've got this.
Work schedule and these family conflicts and this drama over here and these things and I can't do the things that I used to do and so.
Making such a smaller impact on eternity.
You're in a new season.
And the way that you're showing the things that you're showing.
Absolutely, they're different.
But God has.
Ways for you to contribute.
To eternity to store up treasure in heaven in every season.
Of your life.
Not just occasional, not just those ideal seasons, those old seasons of you know past.
But every season of your life.
Has opportunity for you to serve God to know God, to love God, to walk with God.
And to make a difference, to make an.
Impact for all.
Of eternity
Make each season count for eternity.
Remember the blind man I mentioned back in John Chapter 9 at the beginning of the message?
Continuing on in that passage in John Chapter 9.
When Jesus says neither this man nor his parents sinned.
But that the works of God should be revealed in him.
He goes on to say I must work the works of him who sent me while it is day.
The night is coming when no one can work as long as I'm in the world.
I am the light of the world.
Jesus says this is my season to work.
And gadarenes, and in coordinated these things. The father coordinated these things so that this guy, this blind man's season of blindness was going to come to an end right at this moment when he encounters Jesus, who is there in his season of work, working miracles, bringing deliverance and healing. This guy who was born blind.
Had great discernment.
He knew exactly.
What season he was in?
It was the time for him.
To work to heal to do miracles.
To accomplish this, work in this man's life.
And so he made.
That moment count.
In that guy's life and for all eternity, 'cause he understood exactly where he was at.
We all are in this kind of condition.
We have this limited amount of time.
While its day the night's coming.
Our season of work will be over.
We won't be able to work any longer.
But right now, during the day we can make each season count.
For eternity
Solomon says it's all meaningless, has no value.
We end up with nothing.
But it's 'cause he's casting out the revelation of God.
What God has said in God's plans gives us a whole entirely different perspective.
Discern the season that God has you in.
So that you can work with God that you can join with him in the.
Work that he's seeking to accomplish.
And so you learn how to walk with God in each of those seasons.
You learn how to and develop that contentedness and resting and trusting in God in his provision for you in.
The midst of whatever.
Season that you face.
And then you look for those opportunities God has before you ways to contribute.
To eternity.
To make an impact that lasts forever.
No matter what season you're facing.
There's great value.
And great opportunity that you have in a relationship with God and in a walk with God there is.
A reason for the season.
And that's not just for December.
Every month, every day.
Everything that we face.
God has a purpose.
And there's great value in it.
Lord, we thank you for your word.
I pray that you would help us to discern our seasons.
To learn, Lord what you desire to teach us in the midst of them.
To be active Lord cooperating with you collaborating with.
To accomplish in our hearts.
In our lives, in our communities and our families and our workplaces.
The things that you want to accomplish.
Help us Lord to walk.
Through these seasons with you.
I pray this in Jesus name.