3 "For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:
2 a time to be born, and a time to die;
a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;
3 a time to kill, and a time to heal;
a time to break down, and a time to build up;
4 a time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
5 a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
6 a time to seek, and a time to lose;
a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
7 a time to tear, and a time to sew;
a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
8 a time to love, and a time to hate;
a time for war, and a time for peace.
9 What gain has the worker from his toil? 10 I have seen the business that God has given to the children of man to be busy with. 11 He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also, he has put eternity into man's heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.12 I perceived that there is nothing better for them than to be joyful and to do good as long as they live; 13 also that everyone should eat and drink and take pleasure in all his toil—this is God's gift to man.
14 I perceived that whatever God does endures for ever; nothing can be added to it, nor anything taken from it. God has done it, so that people fear before him. 15 That which is, already has been; that which is to be, already has been; and God seeks what has been driven away."
Ecclesiastes 3:1-15
The tension between 'today' and 'forever' in the life of man cannot be fully resolved. Yet man can find 'forever' in 'today' by gratefully accepting the gifts of God, and doing His commandments. The lesson is therefore that of the acceptance of life as it is, be aware the danger of expecting too much from it and of trying to satisfy the longings for eternity with the things of time. There is such a thing as divine discontent, and we must learn to live with it.
We have spoken about God setting eternity in our hearts. The AV translation of 11 obscures this, but the NIV translates correctly when it reads 'He has also set eternity in the hearts of men'. It is this that underlies Augustine's famous words 'Thou hast made us for Thyself, and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in Thee'. But it is a very strange thing, and one of the paradoxes of the gospel, that when men with a hunger in their hearts are drawn thereby to Christ and are saved, they find another, and even more intense, hunger born within them. By saving us, God has, as it were, quickened the 'infinite thing' within us, and made it pulsate and vibrate with living energy, so that as Christians, we yearn and long and hunger after God. There are deeps in the Christian's life that nothing but eternity will satisfy. The Preacher's advice here, then, is to accept the situation as it comes and to make the most of it, recognising the deeper dimension - i.e. God - and that what He does He does forever.