I was encouraged by Ecclesiastes 11 and Nehemiah 9 this morning after church when I spent some quiet time in prayer and meditation.
Ecclesiastes 11:5-8 says, “As you do not know the way the spirit comes to the bones in the womb of a woman with child, so you do not know the work of God who makes everything. In the morning sow your seed, and at evening withhold not your hand, for you do not know which will prosper, this or that, or whether both alike will be good. Light is sweet, and it is pleasant for the eyes to see the sun. So if a person lives many years, let him rejoice in them all; but let him remember that the days of darkness will be many.”
God’s growing of babies in a mother’s womb is an amazing thing—in the same way, His work in our lives is amazing, even if we do not see or understand it. Our job is to continue working faithfully to the Lord—He is the one who blesses us with the fruit of our labor. And in rejoicing, we must remember that our joy in earthly things is temporal. The only lasting joy is in Christ. I kinda want to study Ecclesiastes and Philippians together…because Ecclesiastes talks about how to have a right perspective about life on earth and that earthly pleasures are temporal, and Philippians talks about the lasting joy we find in Christ.
Nehemiah 9 is an amazing prayer (that Jed encouraged me to read :). Today I noticed something new when I read it. Verse 5 (the first verse of the prayer) says, “Stand up and bless the LORD your God from everlasting to everlasting. Blessed be Your glorious name, which is exalted above all blessing and praise.”
God blesses us SO abundantly, and when you begin to see all the ways you are blessed, it can be overwhelming. But exalted above ALL blessings is the Lord Himself. Sometimes it is so easy to get distracted by the blessings—even when we are acknowledging that they are from the Lord—and we forget to worship the one and only God, Jehovah Jireh, who satisfies every longing of our hearts.