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He Sets Eternity In Our Hearts

It is an often quoted line and for lots of good reasons.  Among other things, it wonderfully exudes hope!  Just let the words fall on you like gentle rain:  “He has made everything beautiful in its time.”

This line in Ecclesiastes 3:11 points to God’s orchestration of human events in their most appropriate time and place.  In the book of Acts, we find additional descriptions of how He orchestrates human events:  “From one man He made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and He marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands.”  (Acts 17:26)

Going back to Ecclesiastes, there is a crucial thought in the remainder of the verse that is often glossed over:  “He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end.”

And going back to Acts, we get an additional look at God’s purpose in orchestrating human events:  “God did this so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find Him, though He is not far from any one of us.  ‘For in Him we live and move and have our being. As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are His offspring’” (Acts 17:27-28).

In setting eternity in our hearts and orchestrating things, God is working to get us to seek Him.  In fact, in another passage, He declares this great promise:  “You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.”  (Jer 29:13).

We may not be able to fathom everything that God has done from beginning to end but we can know that He purposefully set eternity in our hearts and orchestrates human events that we might seek Him and reach out for Him and find Him. 

And when we find Him, we also find the source of our very being.

 

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