A Time for Everything
Scripture Reading — Ecclesiastes 3:1-17
God will bring into judgment both the righteous and the wicked, for there will be a time for every activity, a time to judge every deed.
I recently retired after serving for 25 years at Back to God Ministries International, and my wife, Doris, retired around the same time after working in special education for over 20 years. As you might imagine, retirement has brought many changes to our lives—emotional, social, financial. And especially our daily routines have changed.
In today’s passage, the writer of Ecclesiastes says, “There is a time for everything”—and that surely includes working and retiring. Earlier in the book, the writer reflects on his life situation and on life’s many changes. As he ponders, the writer concludes that there is “nothing new under the sun”: “What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again” (Ecclesiastes 1:9).
As I made plans for retirement, I also reflected that I have faced significant changes throughout my life. But they were not always so big or so many as the ones I have encountered in retirement.
Still, as I continue to reflect on the Bible’s wisdom about life changes, I hope to be able to be called a “good and faithful servant” (Matthew 25:21) at the time when God will bring us all into judgment.
Come, would you like to join me on this journey and listen for what the Lord may have to say to you as well?
Heavenly Father, give me the ears to listen and the eyes to see what you are teaching me each day. In Christ’s name, Amen.
About the author — Jimmy Tai-On Lin
Rev. Jimmy Lin is the Chinese ministry leader of The Back to God Hour. With his staff in Palos Heights and Hong Kong, Rev. Lin has ministered to over 1.3 billion Chinese-speaking people around the world for 16 years through radio, literature, CD/DVD, Internet, and text message. His wife, Doris, is one of the translators of Today into the Chinese language, which now has a circulation of more than 45,000 copies.
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