What Time Is It? Series

City Slickers is an old movie (1991) that tells the story of three friends having mid-life crises. They escape the city and head west for a two-week cattle run to discover what's important in life.

Before they leave, Mitch (played by Billy Crystal) shares what he does for a living on Dad's Day at his son's school. Instead of talking about his work as a salesman, Mitch bewilders the third graders with a monologue about how bleak their future is. Take a look (show City Slickers, Dad’s Day scene). He says:

Value this time in your life, kids, because this is the time in your life when you still have your choices, and it goes by so quickly. When you're a teenager, you think you can do anything, and you do.

Your 20s are a blur.

Your 30s, you raise your family, you make a little money, and you think to yourself, “What happened to my 30s?”

Your 40s, you grow a little pot belly. You grow another chin. The music starts to get too loud, and one of your old girlfriends from high school becomes a grandmother.

Your 50s, you have a minor surgery. You'll call it a procedure, but it's a surgery.

Your 60s, you have a major surgery; the music is still loud, but it doesn't matter because you can't hear it anyway.

70s, you and the wife retire to Fort Lauderdale. You start eating dinner at 2:00, lunch around 10:00, breakfast the night before. And you spend most of your time wandering around malls looking for the ultimate in soft yogurt and muttering, “How come the kids don't call?”

By your 80s, you've had a major stroke, and you end up babbling to some Jamaican nurse who your wife can't stand but who you call mama.

Any questions? (City Slickers, Columbia Pictures, 1991, written by Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel, directed by Ron Underwood, begins at 00:16:50; www.PreachingToday.com).

What a bleak outlook on life! But that’s the nature of life “under the sun.” That’s the nature of life without God.

Do you want a different kind of a life? Do you want a life full of meaning and purpose? Then I invite you to turn with me in your Bibles to the book of Ecclesiastes, Ecclesiastes 3, Ecclesiastes 3, where the Bible describes how to enjoy a meaningful life when you invite God into your everyday existence.

Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted; a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; a time to seek, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away; a time to tear, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; a time to love, and a time to hate; a time for war, and a time for peace (ESV).

God is absolutely sovereign. That means God has set a time for every matter under heaven, for every event, for every affair. Literally, for every desire.

Now, when Solomon describes these events, he lists 14 pairs of polar opposites (or for you grammar nerds, 14 merisms). It’s a common literary device, which puts two extremes together to include those extremes and everything in between. So God not only determines the time of a person’s birth and death, but also the time of every event of that person’s life in between.

And the fact that Solomon lists two sets of seven merisms is significant, as well, because the number seven suggests completeness. That is to say God is in COMPLETE control of everything that happens. Ephesians 1:11 puts it this way: “[God] works ALL things according to the counsel of his will,” not just SOME things, but ALL things, not just the GOOD things, but the BAD things, as well, not just the PLEASANT things, but the HARD things, too, not just the BEAUTIFUL things, but the UGLY things, as well. God is in complete control of everything that happens.

You can look at this in one of two ways. 1st, you can despair, because God’s control means you have no control; all your efforts are therefore meaningless, because they don’t make one bit of difference in the end. That’s one way to look at God’s complete control of everything.

The other way is to delight in God’s sovereign control, because that means everything you do is part of His sovereign plan, the good things, as well as your mistakes, your successes, as well as your failures. God causes ALL things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose (Romans 8:28, NASB). That means everything you do has meaning and purpose, because it is all a part of God’s sovereign plan.