Inside: If you’re overwhelmed by overlapping phases of life, thinking differently about Ecclesiastes 3 can help relieve the pressure and reorient your perspective. ~
One thing I appreciate about living in Kansas is the fact that we have four distinct seasons.
Some years, winter ends earlier than others. And it’s possible—probable, even—that we’ll have spring-like weather in January and that summery temperatures will extend well into the fall. Typically, though, the seasons run like clockwork around here—one right after another after another.
But have you ever noticed that the seasons of life don’t necessarily work like this? As I think about my own life, in particular, the familiar passage from Ecclesiastes 3 comes to mind.
A Time for Everything
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,
a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
a time to search and a time to give up,
a time to keep and a time to throw away,
a time to tear and a time to mend,
a time to be silent and a time to speak,
a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace.
One at a Time?
These 14 “time-for” couplets in Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 represent various seasons we may go through in our lives. And for some unknown reason, I used to look at them as separate from each other.
In other words, I thought we experienced these “times” one at a time.
I see now, though, that nothing could be further from the truth. Looking at this list while considering events from one especially difficult year of my life highlights this point rather emphatically.
A Poignant Example
Both of my parents died in the spring of 2019. Losing them resulted in many tears, but also much laughter as we fondly remembered times spent with them over the years. It also required my family to go through all their belongings and decide what to keep and what to throw away.
On a less emotional but more physically taxing note, Randy dug the root ball of a huge old lilac bush out of the ground the summer after my parents died, and we replaced it with a row of junipers. Then we embarked on a home renovation project that included jack hammering a large section of tile flooring and redoing all the surfaces in our kitchen.
Finally, this phase of our daughters’ lives seemed to be one when they needed a lot of hugs from their dad and not nearly much embracing from their mom. And as our older girl looked ahead to high-school graduation and college the following fall, she did a lot of verbal processing, while her parents did a lot of listening.
Do you see them there, the references to tearing down and building, planting and uprooting, weeping and laughing, and so forth?
Multiple Seasons at Once
Perhaps my recollections prompted you to scan your own life for similar correlations to Ecclesiastes 3. I suspect you have at least a few, maybe even more than me.
And we haven’t even touched on events further out from our homes—examples of war and peace, love and hate, or speaking out and being silent that we hear about on the news, see on social media and witness in our communities every day.
The thing is, this is life—especially when you’re smack dab in the middle of the Sandwich Generation. Seasons do come and go, for sure. “This too shall pass” can be a helpful bit of encouragement.
But when we are experiencing several exhausting or overwhelming seasons at once, it’s easy to feel torn and scattered, physically and emotionally. And that doesn’t even factor in the tension we may feel spiritually—to somehow discover what God might be trying to teach us or figure out what we are supposed to take away from the situation so we can grow and move on.
Unnecessary Pressure
Although this kind of introspection can be useful, it also puts a lot of pressure on us, particularly if we start thinking we are solely responsible for everything that happens to us.
We still have to push through hard things, of course. We have to persevere in finding solutions for our problems. But we also have to rely on God’s mercy. To trust that He knows what is going on and why. To accept the fact that things may not turn out the way we want or hope or believe is right.
When we’re in the middle of multiple seasons at once, it’s easy to be whipped about like a fall leaf in a Kansas wind—skittering all over the map and never settling any one place for more than a millisecond. I’m not saying we should to try to “be in the moment” 24 hours a day, as if that were even possible.
But I also don’t think we should put all our eggs in the basket of “when this is all over.” Hard seasons don’t automatically eliminate all the good in our lives, after all. There are still reasons to be joyful, gifts to be thankful for, people to love with all our hearts, minds and souls.
The writer of Ecclesiastes concludes his talk of seasons by telling us that God “has made everything beautiful in its time” (Ecclesiastes 3:11). Even during the less-than-happy times, His blessings are abundant and all around us, if we just make an effort to look.
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An Invitation and a Free Gift
I can hardly believe it, but I’ve been sending out Courage, Dear Heart—my subscriber-only, email newsletter—for half a year! The newsletter replaces my third blog post of each month, and if you haven’t signed up yet, I’d love for you to do so here:
As my way of saying thanks, you’ll receive a free copy of my 7-day devotional, Faith, Fear, and the God Who Goes Before Us.
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♥ Lois
When we’re in the middle of multiple seasons at once, we have to rely on God’s mercy and trust that He knows what is going on and why. Share on X Even in the hardest seasons, there are still reasons to be joyful, gifts to be thankful for and people to love with all our hearts, minds and souls. Share on XP.S. I’m linking up this week with InstaEncouragements, Let’s Have Coffee and Grace & Truth.