.3:1-15.

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Events controlled by God’s fixed order (Ec 3:1-15)

In Ec 1:1-11 the author considered the ceaseless toil and repetition in the natural world and decided that life was useless.

Now (ignoring for the moment the conclusions he has just outlined in Ec 2:24-26) he considers the fixed order of events in the world.

It appears to him that everything happens at the time God has decided it will happen. In view of this, all human effort to improve life is useless. People can change nothing (Ec 3:1-9).

Human beings may have a desire to know God and the realities of the unseen eternal world, but they still cannot understand God’s ways. The writer is confident that God does everything perfectly according to his plan, but he is also frustrated because he does not know what that plan is.

People can only accept whatever God sends them and find pleasure in it (Ec 3:10-13).

They can change nothing; events will go on repeating themselves according to God’s fixed purposes. Their realization of this keeps them in a state of fear before God (Ec 3:14-15).