Matthew 5:43-45
How is it that two intelligent people can observe the same thing or encounter the same situation and come away from it with very different, sometimes totally opposite views? I am sure that you have observed this.
If we took the book of Ecclesiastes strictly at face value, we could easily become a race of creatures who felt doomed to repeat the same futile exercises day after day. The Preacher observes (1:3-9) that generations come and go, the wind blows, the streams flow, and nothing changes. Even the sun in its rising and setting is seen to hurry to repeat its wearying daily trek across the sky.
Each morning we awaken to the sound of the same alarm, look at the same face in the mirror, take one more shower, gobble another bowl of cereal, drive the same road to work, perform the same tasks, eat another unexciting lunch, travel the same road home, gulp down another supper, listen to another newscast of the same dreary happenings and flop into bed - only to do it all again the next day. Truly, such a life lived “under the sun” is dismal and pointless.
But Someone else taught us a whole new way of looking at life. Life is a blessing from God, and as such it holds great meaning, hope and opportunities. Jesus looked at the sun making its daily journey and said that it was the Father who sent it to bless both the evil and the good. His Father (and ours) sends the rain as a blessing for all people. The sun, the rain, the wind, the streams all fulfill the purposes of God in blessing the earth, and thus men. And if our Father sees fit to continue to bless His whole creation, then we need to refocus our minds and hearts to look at His marvelous works for what they truly are - gifts from the open hand of God.
How reassuring to know that God values His creation so much that He interacts with it continually. How comforting it is to live life with that knowledge indelibly etched in our minds! How thrilling to know that God is “not far from each one of us” (Acts 17:27).