To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:  

Overwhelmed by Times and Seasons

Solomon says, “3v1 To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.”  

He is speaking from the despair and destruction that his own wisdom had brought him to and he begins with a simple undeniable statement that none can dispute. “Everything is subject to time and all things come in their season.” This relentless power of time and unstoppable flow of the seasons affects every event and ever plan under heaven.

In the next 8 verses Solomon will use the word time twenty-eight times and fourteen pairs of opposites to cover every experience of man under the sun.

He begins with that which we understand implicitly.

There is a time to be born and a time to die. These things that take place in our lives can't be denied or altered. They can only be acknowledged and experienced.

Then he says there is a time to plant and a time to puck up. We know this, you can't plant in the winter and you'd be a fool to pluck up the vines before the fruit has ripened because these events have seasons, and those season must be observed.

Then Solomon moves on to other times and seasons in which we only  play a small part, we don’t fully control these times and often they can overwhelm us.

He says there is, a time to kill and a time to heal. This is the killing of war or of capital punishment. No matter how the Bible misquoters try to twist the Bible into babel, it speaks plainly saying that there are times when war is necessary and when a life is forfeited as Genesis 9:6 Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed.

Solomon goes on to building and tearing down, weeping, laughing, mourning, dancing all these occurring in the times and seasons of life.

These events might seem to enter our lives haphazardly, randomly. We can’t control them, we can only recognize when they happen. It may make us feel helpless and at the mercy of the fates, or the phrase used to today, “the universe must hate me.”

We’ve heard people says, “I didn’t ask to be born” or when a loved one dies, “Why did they have to die?” This sense of helplessness is what Solomon was feeling. From his present viewpoint, it’s all meaningless, its all emptiness because nothing we do can make a bit of difference.

This is the end result of a person who has left God out of life’s equation. The final result of someone who has forgotten that God made the times and seasons and that He all things have a purpose under His heaven.

God’s Times and Seasons

Some can't or won’t accept the sovereignty of God over this world and its times.  They would rather rail at the wind and shake their fists at the thunder. At the graveside, they curse the God they don’t believe in. They can’t see the way He works in and through every circumstance and event of life because they can’t accept Him as their God.

But if we will turn from our own wisdom to the wisdom of God’s word, we can see that things aren’t chaotic, random or haphazard, but that God has actually determined the times and seasons.  

Seasons of Earth Genesis 1:14 And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years:

Seasons of Harvest Acts 14:17 Nevertheless he left not himself without witness, in that he did good, and gave us rain from heaven, and fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and gladness.

Seasons of kingdoms Daniel 12:21 And he changeth the times and the seasons: he removeth kings, and setteth up kings: he giveth wisdom unto the wise, and knowledge to them that know understanding:

Seasons of the Gospel John 4:35  Say not ye, There are yet four months, and then cometh harvest? behold, I say unto you, Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields; for they are white already to harvest

To understand how life makes any sense, I must see the times and seasons that God has determined. He has made those plans, therefore…

In everything I do I must acknowledge the purpose, place and plan of God

James 4: 13-16 Ye that say, To day or to morrow we will go into such a city, and continue there a year, and buy and sell, and get gain:  Whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away. For that ye ought to say, If the Lord will, we shall live, and do this, or that.

Acknowledge God in all things means I will see that God is working in the seasons of my life and then submit myself and live according to His will.

The farmer lives his life by the season. He plows in the late winter, plants in the spring, weeds and fertilizes in the summer and harvests in the fall. The more he understands the seasons and the weather they bring, the better his life as a farmer.

We should see that God has seasons that we live our life in, seasons of growing and harvesting, seasons of war and peace, of gathering and losing. The more I understand God's Word, the more I will understand those times and seasons and the better I will be able plant in faith and harvest in blessings.