Ecclesiastes: making sense of suffering

When I think about the pain of grief and suffering, I come to this conclusion: anything which wakes me up out of my apathy and loosens my grip on this world, and increases my longing for the next, is an act of God's mercy and grace in my life. I may not like it and it may not be comfortable, but, like a fire drill, it is essential to prepare me for my heavenly home.

I think this is the main thrust of the book of Ecclesiastes. Suffering, toil and grief on the earth remind the philosopher that everything on earth is, in a sense, 'meaningless': that is, it lacks an eternal value, and in the sweep of even human history many of our endeavours turn to dust just like our mortal flesh. Life is beautiful, precious and fragile; it is also frustrating, unfulfilling and painful. The life we experience as fallen beings is not the life we were designed and created for. We are terrified and unsatisfied with the concept of death because we were never meant to taste it. The futility of our lives and our world was not there in the beginning, and one day will be removed. Only in God's new creation can we really know true life, life to the full, life in abundance, life without limits.

So the main point of Ecclesiastes is the necessity of fearing God in a fallen, and frequently confusing and frustrating world (ESV study notes). The book is full of penetrating observations which spur the listener on to deeper thought and reflection.

'He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end.' (Ecc 3:11)

Every human being wants to find out and understand all the ways of God in the world, but he cannot, because he is not God. Yet the faithful do not despair but cling to Him: 'fear God and keep His commandments (Ecc 12:13). This is true wisdom.

Rather than becoming embittered by what God has not granted, we should enjoy all the gifts He has given.

'There 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' (Ecc 3:1-4)

'In the day of prosperity be joyful, and in the day of adversity consider: God has made the one as well as the other, so that man may not find out anything that will be after him.' (Ecc 7:14, ESV)

Let suffering do its work - let it teach you of your own mortality and fallenness. May it drive you to the feet of your Saviour, and make you cling to His love alone above all the securities this world can offer. May it open your eyes to see Him more clearly and understand something more of eternity.

Are non-believers accountable to God? A response

Recently I received this extended comment on my post 'Being Good Part 2':

Someone who isn't a Christian will not 'struggle' with sin. They'll just do it, without caring what God thinks.

Does this in some ways mean that they are not to blame for this sin, and thus can incur God's forgiveness, as it is not a struggle, since they in effect have nothing to struggle against?

I am having many, many problems with "No-one comes to the Father except through Me" at the moment, and I think this is related.

This, to me, implies that knowledge and acceptance of Jesus is a prerequisite to salvation. This brings up the problem, however, of those who do not 'know' (I find know very limiting in English!- it's the French distinction that I need!) Jesus being necessarily 'damned', although for want of a better word, as I understand that this should not be passive, but active, as in someways damning is done to oneself with God. In my mind there are three groups of people that this affects: those pre-incarnation; those who, because of remoteness have no access; and those who are not exposed in the correct way to the Gospel (I think Gandhi is the best example, being turned away from a church). for the first group, I can see that this is filled by an "implicit" belief in Jesus through faith. The second and third groups, however, seem to be excluded from Salvation because of the exactness of this passage - "no-one".

I cannot reconcile this with my faith!

Hope you can convince me otherwise!

Loads of good questions raised here! And I think they are indeed closely related.

Are non-Christians to blame for their sin? Are they held responsible? Are people who don't know about Jesus damned?


The book of Romans is a good place to turn to here. Romans 1 argues that all men are accountable for their rejection of God: 'For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities- His eternal power and divine nature- have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.' (v20) Paul argues that 'Jews and Gentiles alike are all under sin' (Romans 3:9)- the Jews, because they had God's law and knew what was right and wrong and yet failed to obey; the Gentiles, because God's glory is evident through creation and they 'suppressed the truth by their wickedness' (Romans 1:18). Quoting Psalm 5, Paul writes 'There is no-one righteous, not even one' (Romans 3:10). And because God is holy and just He cannot tolerate sin. He must punish it because it would go against His nature to ignore it.


But God has made a way for us to be seen as righteous in His sight, through sending Jesus. With Jesus' sacrificial death on the cross, if we trust in Him, we can come before God and God will see Christ's perfection, not our sin. This is what Paul means when he says 'all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by His grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented Him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in His blood. He did this to demonstrate His justice, because in His forbearance He had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished- He did it to demonstrate His justice at the present time, so as to be just and the One who justifies those who have faith in Jesus.' (Romans 3:23-26)


Now there are still people out there who have never heard the good news about what Jesus has done. God will judge them and I cannot say what He will say to them. I do know that He is perfectly just, more just than our puny human souls can fathom or imagine. Jesus says that 'And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.' (Matthew 24:14) This means that God will wait until all people groups have been reached with the gospel before the Final Judgement. It also says that 'The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance' (2 Peter 3:9). The reason Jesus hasn't yet returned is because God wants more people to be saved. So we can safely trust that God is not rejoicing in the fact that people don't know the gospel. He desires more people to come to believe in Him. That is why it is so important for Christians to tell others about the good news of Jesus, and support mission work overseas too.


But on the 'pre-Incarnation' point, Jesus Himself made it clear that His death paid for sins past, present and future. He spoke of Abraham as alive, rebuking the Sadduccees' dismissal of the idea of resurrection of the dead. (Matthew 22:32) The only way Abraham could be with God was through Jesus' redemption for him on the cross. The writer of Hebrews also talks about the great people of faith in the Old Testament. They were saved because of their faith that God would justify them... which would happen on the cross in the future.


I hope that helps slightly. Keep seeking and you will find! Although perhaps sometimes we should not simply seek answers to our questions, but a peace of trusting that God knows what's best and accepting that sometimes we don't understand everything. Thank you for your comments!

A message for Jade Goody

It is a certain sort of privilege that the nation is able to follow Jade's struggle with cancer and watch as she gets married, builds up a trust fund for her sons, not taking for granted any of her days on this earth.

Jade said, after her wedding, that she was ready to go to heaven now.

I hope she is placing her trust in Jesus, because the Bible says that is the only way we can be sure of going to heaven. He is the way, the truth and the life, and no one comes to God except through Him (John 14:6).

Jade, I pray for you that you will know God's peace and forgiveness, and hand your life over to Him.

Your story teaches us all not to take a moment of our life for granted.

Godless life... as a Christian? (Phil 3)

'Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is on earthly things.' Phil 3:19

Here is the absolute antithesis of what we, as Christians, should be. And yet we are so often guilty of thinking in that very same mindset. Paul here writes four phrases about the ungodly. Here is how we can fall into the same traps:

1. Destiny of destruction. We often fear what we do not need to fear- death and destruction. How you view death provides a good reflection of your faith. If our faith is strong, we need not fear death ('Where, O death, is thy sting?'- 1 Cor 15). Jesus is risen, and we have the gift of eternal life.
On the other hand, we must not become complacent about those who have not accepted Jesus. Paul reminds us here that their destiny is one of destruction. It is very tempting at times to mince the Word so that it is more palatable, more acceptable to our views of what a merciful, loving God should be. Instead, we are called to accept the truth of God's Word -after all, it is by this Word that we know we are saved- and endeavour to spread the Gospel and explain it to those who need it most- non-believers.

2. Their god is their stomach. Marlowe's play Dr Faustus contains this profound statement: 'The god thou serv'st is the god of thine own appetite.' I don't think this phrase applies merely to gluttony. It describes the ungodly as those who follow their own desires above God's desires for them. They do what they want to do without considering God's expectations of them. How much worse is this for a believer, who knows what God expects of them, and still deliberately follows his own desires? Sometimes we even try to justify ourselves before God: 'God wouldn't want me to be unhappy.' We need to be on our guard that we don't try and cover up self-indulgence with the label of God's will.

3. Glory in shame. The ungodly revel in doing the forbidden, in rebelling against morality and taking their own independent stand. Surely we as Christians cannot be guilty of this? Unfortunately we probably are. We all commit sin due to our fallen nature, and every time we do it, it always seems more attractive than the reality. But the phrase 'glory in shame' doesn't just mean sinning, it means glorying in sin. Perhaps that is harder for us as Christians to apply to ourselves- we usually have that nagging voice in our head reminding us that what we're doing is wrong, and we usually experience guilt as soon as we err. But some sins actually glory in shame itself, like gossip.
Gossip is not only a sin in itself, but it also involves us revelling in other people's sins. We are then glorifying shame. Perhaps sometimes we don't take a strong stand against things that God's Word proclaims to be wrong, because we don't want to offend people or be controversial. But silence is often construed as agreement. If we don't add a Christian input to a conversation, not only does it look like we agree with any non-Christian sentiments that are being expressed, but we are denying the Holy Spirit within us who calls us to witness whenever we can. A recent survey revealed that many people are disillusioned with the Church, not because it takes a controversial stand on contemporary issues, but because (in their view) it takes no stand at all. Are we, as the voice of the Church and of Christ on earth, fully representing our faith? Or do we leave this to the ministers, or for when we're not around people who are hostile to our views?

4. Mind on earthly things. This is perhaps the easiest one of all to relate to ourselves. We worry about bills, money, our homes, cars, studies, work... So many things preoccupy our minds when we're supposed to be keeping our eyes on Jesus. Paul writes about staying focussed in order to win the race he is running as a Christian. You'll never finish the race if you don't stay focussed. And the more and more focus we have on God, the more and more our perspective widens and we understand how irrelevant our earthly preoccupations are, in comparison to God's plan for us and our eternity with Him.