Word to the Wise
Friday, September 25, 2020 - Friday in the 25th Week in Ordinary Time
[Eccl/Qoh 3:1-11 and Luke 9:18-22]There is an appointed time for everything, and a time for every thing under the heavens. A time to be born, and a time to die........What advantage has the worker from his toil? I have considered the task that God has appointed for the sons of men to be busied about. He has made everything appropriate to its time, and has put the timeless into their hearts, without man's ever discovering, from beginning to end, the work which God has done. [Ecclesiastes]
This passage from Ecclesiastes will always set heads to nodding in a congregation if only because those of us who were young in the 1960's will remember the musical setting of it in TURN, TURN, TURN, which was recorded by many different artists, beginning with the group The Byrds. Although the passage fits in with the rather skeptical tone of the book, it has much to teach us about acceptance and perspective in life.
Ecclesiastes places the meaning of life squarely between the ant and the grasshopper of fable. Workaholism is rejected, as is laziness. There is a profound understanding of "time" that goes beyond the clock. We use the expression, "The time has come to....." But in Ecclesiastes, it is not the overconfident human who determines that "time." The ancient Greeks used the word kairos to distinguish that idea from chronos, as in "What time is it on the clock?" All time is in the hands of God.
On retreats, then, I have challenged the participants to ask, "What 'time' is it in your life?" Some folks speak of this in terms of a "mid-life crisis" when one takes a look at one's life and tries to make sense of it and reaches frantically for a means to understand. Ecclesiastes offers good advice on this. To the person of faith, perhaps the best response is the one that Dag Hammarskjold wrote in his famous spiritual diary, MARKINGS: For all that has been, thanks. For all that is to come, Yes!. What time is it in your life? AMEN