A Time For Everything Lord, thank you for this time to get together to study, fellowship, comfort one another during these times of trials, and to rejoice with the things that you are doing. We ask that you give us patience and endurance to get through all these things you are bringing upon the body. And that you would help us to understand that it is all working for good, even if we don t like what you are doing at the moment. We ask that you bless this study and give us great understanding. In Christ name, Amen. Alright everybody, welcome back to our Monday night study. It s been a little while. But we ve had some great studies from Victor. So I ve been pondering on, you know, what am I going to say? It s kind of been a very dry season in many different regards. I ve just been enduring and hanging on, and not a whole lot of Some times you sit down to write studies and you can t move your fingers fast enough to get them out, and other times you can t seem to get two words. This has been one of those, can t get two words out, kind of times. The Lord did give me one little thing, I ve been thinking a lot about Ecclesiastes chapter three, which is talking about how there is a time for everything. So I m going to read through part of Ecclesiastes chapter three, a little bit of twelve, plus I ve got a poem to share with you based upon this. I ve going to pause a lot while reading this chapter three to explain some of the spiritual significances behind the physical things that King Solomon is talking about. To give you some of the background, Ecclesiastes is written mostly by King Solomon who was probably the richest man, physically speaking, to ever live. Hundreds of wives, hundreds of concubines, palaces, horses, and everything you can possibly think of having, in the physical, this man had. He lived through it all, and at the end of it, his conclusion was, it s all vanity. The only thing that is worth anything is to fear God, and keep his commandments, because everything else comes to naught. We should certainly use the things the Lord gives us as tools to serve him with, but whether we have much, whether we have little, whether in riches or poverty, we should in time, with the spirit, learn to be content in all of those circumstances. And Ecclesiastes three really breaks down that process of swinging to these two great extremes. (Ecc 3:1 NKJV) To everything there is a season, A time for every purpose under heaven: (Ecc 3:2 NKJV) A time to be born, And a time to die; Spiritually speaking, being born is a positive thing. You re being born new with Christ in the spirit. That s a time we re going to overcome and have progress. Also, there s a time to die. There s a time where you re reaping what you re sowing.
You re seeing your old man, and it s not a pretty thing. You are having to die to that flesh, as the Lord brings it up. A time to plant, And a time to pluck what is planted; So again, sometimes you ve sowed good seed and you re sowing more good seed. Yeah the harvest is here; this is going great, we re doing the right things, we re sowing to the spirit. Then you realize sometimes you ve been sowing to the flesh, and you ve got to go rip that thing up by the roots. That is not as joyful a time as when you re going to plant in hope of what s going to come. (Ecc 3:3 NKJV) A time to kill, And a time to heal; A time to break down, And a time to build up; It s the same thing. The Lord comes out sometimes and just slaughters us in our trials. Other times he totally binds us up, restores our spirit and carries us on. We can see this through the prayer request of the body. Some people are getting healing. Some people are getting deliverance from job situations. Marriages are restored. All these good things happen. Overcoming happens. Then we hear prayer request such as, job is terrible, health is terrible, and all these plagues are coming. We get both sides, and we all have to go through both sides. (Ecc 3:4 NKJV) A time to weep, And a time to laugh; A time to mourn, And a time to dance; It s very important that we mourn with those who mourn and rejoice with those who rejoice, to be sensitive and learn how to do that. Not everyone in the body is at the same place at the same time. We gather together, and one person has just overcome and had this great victory. They are on their highest high. Then the next person sitting next to you is in the pits of despair, in the middle of the valley of the shadow of death. We need to be sensitive to where different people are and be able to sit down in the ashes when we need to, or to rejoice. It s hard to rejoice with someone when they are being blessed and you are suffering. That s hard to do. In the same way, it s hard to put the damper on your happiness, and go sit down with this other person who is not at that point. That s how the body bears each other s burdens. (Ecc 3:5 NKJV) A time to cast away stones, And a time to gather stones; We ve seen this in the body recently. We have those stones, those bricks, being brought into the body of Christ, new people coming in. Then, there are times when some need to be turned over to Satan for the destruction of the flesh. You have to cast away some stones when that is manifest.
A time to embrace, And a time to refrain from embracing; (Ecc 3:6 NKJV) A time to gain, And a time to lose; A time to keep, And a time to throw away; (Ecc 3:7 NKJV) A time to tear, And a time to sew; A time to keep silence, And a time to speak; That s a really hard one. It s hard to hold your tongue when you ve got these things welling up in you that you want to say, but shouldn t say. It s equally hard to say what you should say when you re full of fear and doubt and everything else. You can t confront what you need to confront. Those are equally challenging sides of that narrow way. (Ecc 3:8 NKJV) A time to love, And a time to hate; It s good that we love one another, but it s also good that we hate evil. To hate the evil in one another enough to speak an open rebuke, to say, Look this is harming you and those around you. Let s not do that anymore. Then there s a time to give them a big hug and be happy that the good fruit comes. A time of war, And a time of peace. (Ecc 3:9 NKJV) What profit has the worker from that in which he labors? (Ecc 3:10 NKJV) I have seen the God-given task with which the sons of men are to be occupied. (Ecc 3:11 NKJV) He has made everything beautiful in its time. So, looking back on all the trials and all the tribulation, it comes into focus, it makes sense, and it s beautiful to get us where we are. When you are in the middle of it, you can t see that. It s like talks about pregnancy and child labor. During that process the woman is not very happy, but then when it passes, the memory of all the trials disappears, and you re so happy that this child has been born into the earth. That s a picture of how when we go through these trials, we re miserable, we re struggling, we re in labor pain, and all these things. You re begging just give me the drugs, put me out of pain, just get this over with. But then it ends, Christ is born in us and we re like, Wow, that was all worth it. But you can t say that until the end. When you re in the middle, you can t see it. Then the more times you go through it, when you ve been through labor once, you re like, Oh, I m miserable now, but for the joy set before me, I m going to endure it to get to what s coming. Also He has put eternity in their hearts, except that no one can find out the work that God does from beginning to end. So, in our time, God does give us that hope of what is to come, that age abiding life that is on the horizon. Given that hope, we hold onto that old light, waiting for that
light to come forth and to set us free from all these things. As Paul says, this momentary light affliction is not worthy to be compared to the glory that shall be revealed. That s what we re hanging onto, hoping for, ascribing for, laboring for, through all this diversity of experiences and trials. Except that no one can find out the work that God does from the beginning to the end. We just don t always know what he s doing or why he s doing it, but we do know his end goal. We always know his end goal. We don t have to know how every little puzzle piece fits. We re going to be confused, mad and frustrated about them, but we know what the picture is supposed to look like. Trust that is why he s doing it; he will get us to the end. (Ecc 3:12 NKJV) I know that nothing is better for them than to rejoice, and to do good in their lives, Rejoice what? Rejoice always. That s what we re told to do. You have to be commanded to rejoice because you are not going to want to rejoice. You don t want to rejoice when you re afflicted, and the tearing down times are coming, hail is coming, the tearing up and casting away; all those things are going on. But the Lord has to give us that ability, to say, Lord, I count it all joy. This is for my good to get me into the kingdom. If this is what it takes, so be it. If this is what it takes, it s worth it in the end. (Ecc 3:13 NKJV) and also that every man should eat and drink and enjoy the good of all his labor it is the gift of God. Primarily, spiritually, this is talking about the spiritual labor in Christ, the labor to enter into that kingdom and to enjoy that gift of that good fruit that is manifested in ourselves, and others, as that is worked out. So then, in Ecclesiastes 12, he makes another really interesting point. As we re going through this process again, there are seasons and in some of those seasons, you feel excited. You can t wait to study. You can t wait until the next Bible study. You can t wait to open up the scriptures, to read and talk about it. It s like a honeymoon period; you re buzzing. Then there are times where it s like drudgery. You don t want to hear anything. You don t want to read. You don t want to talk to anybody. You just want to crawl in your cave and say, Just leave me alone. Part of that is in Ecclesiastes 12. (Ecc 12:9 NKJV) And moreover, because the Preacher was wise, he still taught the people knowledge; yes, he pondered and sought out and set in order many proverbs. (Ecc 12:10 NKJV) The Preacher sought to find acceptable words; and what was written was upright words of truth. (Ecc 12:11 NKJV) The words of the wise are like goads, and the words of scholars are like well-driven nails, given by one Shepherd.
(Ecc 12:12 NKJV) And further, my son, be admonished by these. Of making many books there is no end, and much study is wearisome to the flesh. Study is good. We need to study. We need to know the scriptures, but doing what God says is better. A lot of times we ve learned enough, we know enough, it s in our head; it s just time to go do. I ve had to learn that you don t feel guilty if you re not consuming a book of the Bible a day, and listening to hours and hours of studies. A lot of doing God s labor is enduring your suffering patiently, rejoicing in the trials, doing good to others. When you re doing those things, you don t have to time or the brain space to pack in another fifty hours of audio, or whatever it is. So again, just remember everything has its season. You don t want to totally neglect it, but just don t feel bad when the seasons change. (Ecc 12:13 NKJV) Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God and keep His commandments, For this is man s all. King James says, this is the whole man. So, when we are complete in Christ is when we are fearing God, we have reverence for him, we have fear of doing evil when we are running away from it, and we are keeping his commands. That s what brings peace. Sometimes keeping his commands is just sitting there and shutting your mouth, just being quite. Sometimes that s the best thing you can do, because there s nothing else to do. You just stand still and see the salvation of the Lord. There s not always something physically to get up and do. That s okay. It s an okay season to be in. (Ecc 12:14 NKJV) For God will bring every work into judgment, Including every secret thing, Whether good or evil. So what he s really concerned about is not that we just close our mouth, or do what we re supposed to do, but that our heart is right. And, that we can have joy, peace, and patience throughout those things. Another important thing to remember is that temptation is not sin. You re going to have times like Christ in the garden, where you re being tried. You re going to have some crazy thoughts going through your head. Satan is going to tempt you I wish I could just kill that person, strangle this one, or say this thing. But the victory is to catch that and say, You know what, that s not true Satan. That s not going to bring me victory, that s not going to bring peace. That s going to bring curses on me and everyone around me. Just having those thoughts is not sin.
Sometimes we get really discouraged and say, How could I think such a thing? We didn t think such a thing, Satan came and plopped it in your head. Your job is to say, You can t stay here. Go away. And sometimes it s an intense battle, where you are just like rejecting pretty much every thought that comes in your head. God does that to show us that we do have the discernment. Christ is in us enough to know that that is not the way. Your victory is just standing on that hill and not leaving. These solders fight for a hill and when they finally get up there, just hold the hill. Hold the place you ve reached in Christ. Don t let the enemy convince you to come down. That s victory. Then the Lord will take you to the next city when the time comes. There s a lot of peace that comes from knowing that, because the enemy does want to steal, kill, destroy and discourage, because, the most powerful way to destroy the most mighty army is to take their hope. If you can get their hope, I don t care how big their guns are or how big their horses, or how sharp their swords are, they re not going to do anything. That is why it says the hope of our salvation is our helmet. That s what we need, spiritual armor. Keep that hope on. Hold that shield of faith up to distinguish the fiery darts, and then the Lord will win the battle in due time. So, awhile back, I guess it was April 4, 2013, the Lord gave me this little poem here. The way this works when He usually gives them to me, it s not like I work on these for weeks and try to fix the words. I usually just sit down and write them in one sitting. They re just kind of like in my head. I haven t had one in a long time. This is one from a while ago. It says: This world is dying as flesh fades away, There will be great sorrow as long as we stay, The more we are given eyes to see, The more we understand the depravity and desire to flee, We d rather be with Christ and depart, Yet we stay for the body, to strengthen every heart. Some days are dark and the blackness thick, We cry for deliverance, that it would be quick. There are seasons that God withholds the rain, They seem to last forever, and bring much pain. Sing praises to the Lord, and raise a righteous shout, For the glory will appear to wipe away the drought. Every morning the darkness flees as the sun does rise, The rain will come as we press on towards the prize. The Lord always appears right on time, I often wish it would be sooner, but it is His will, not mine. The winter passes, and soon spring appears, Sounds of life and joy begin to fill our ears. We labor on through the summer time, Storing up for the mountains that we ll have to climb. We pass through fall on the way to the winter season, The time of trials and sadness happens for a reason. All becomes bleak and quite cold,
We are grateful our winter coats were not sold. Looking back, we eat what has been prepared, We are strengthened that our feet may not be snared. When we think we can endure no more, Then we hear the lion s roar. The spring is not far away, For another season we will stay. And on and on the cycle goes, As Christ within us slowly grows. So just keep holding on, The darkness of winter will soon be gone. That is our process through life, up and down, peaks and valleys, famines and feast until we get to the end. So wherever you re at, hang on for the ride. Pick up someone next to you who s in their famine. Go eat someone else s feast; there s always someone who s got something that you don t. That s how the body works.