We each have our share of bad luck or misfortune. None of us know when we might fall victim to a sudden disaster and find ourselves like fish in a net or birds in a trap.
Yet I see all this as wisdom and it impressed me.” Solomon uses the term “ under the sun” twenty-eight times in his book of Ecclesiastes. I wonder how many times he would have used it if he had lived in Alaska during the summer.
On a trip to Alaska, the plaguing question was “When do these people sleep?” It does not get dark within the span of a 24-hour day, which really throws off the sleep habits of visitors. As we were busy doing the tourist thing, we thought it might be time to get a bite to eat. The sun looked like it was about 4:30 in the afternoon, so I asked Lynnette what time it was, and to our astonishment it was after 9:30 in the evening,
I think Solomon’s point about being “under the sun” was not about the daylight of each day, but was to teach us about the events and situations that occur around us every day in which we have no control. While living in Florida the first warning signs that a hurricane was heading directly through Ocala, had me getting up at 5:00 a.m. and moving everything inside and tying down everything else that could possibly move. I am sure many other people throughout the state prepared the same way but as the time approached and the storm veered off to the east there was a sigh and prayer of relief from everyone in our area. When I heard of the destruction and death that took place within the impact area east of us, my mind went to today’s verse.
Even with all the preparations, no one knows when we might fall victim to a disaster. On the television I listened to a man in the hospital crying because he went to move his elderly parents from their home but the home was blown 150 feet in the air by the hurricane winds. His parents died in the storm and he kept crying, “Why couldn’t I have gotten there earlier and saved them?”
It does not matter who we are or how good we might be, we all encounter problems. Does the Lord love us any less? Did we do something wrong for God to show his wrath on us? Was it something our family did? I emphatically say, "NO".
Every day we encounter events that may drive us to feel that God is out to get us. Yet, as we continue to study the Bible, we see that the Lord will never give us more that we can handle.
Try reading the book of Job this week. Then you can see who the author of all disasters is and who the Comforter is. Maybe our wisdom from hurricanes is to thank the Creator of this world for His love for us.
Ecclesiastes 9: 11-13 “Here is something else I have learned under the sun: The fastest runners and the greatest heroes don’t always win races and battles. Wisdom, intelligence, and skill don’t always make you healthy, rich or popular
