“I said to myself concerning the sons of men, “God has surely tested them in order for them to see that they are but beasts.” (Ecclesiastes 3:18)
I stumbled across this verse while reading through Ecclesiastes in my car during a lunch break a few days ago and it caught my eye. I’ve read through Ecclesiastes before, and no doubt I’ve read this verse already, but this time it jumped at me. What an insulting way to be uplifting!
Immediately what came to mind was the study that Ikon Youth Ministries has been going through in Judges. This book is a magnification of what went on throughout Israel’s history. First Israel was one man (Israel, duh!) then a family, then a people, then a nation with a law, then a nation with land, with judges, and with kings. Each level of God’s governance produced the same thing: failure. In the case of the periods of the Judges and Kings: anarchy.
Solomon, during the period of the Kings notes wisely that God’s testing revealed them to be like beasts. So did God’s governance fail?
Hardly.
In 1st Samuel, the people make a request of God through the prophet Samuel:
“…and they said to him, “Behold, you have grown old, and your sons do not walk in your ways. Now appoint a king for us to judge us like all the nations. But the thing was displeasing in the sight of Samuel when they said, “Give us a king to judge us ” And Samuel prayed to the LORD. The LORD said to Samuel, “Listen to the voice of the people in regard to all that they say to you, for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected Me from being king over them.” (1 Sam 8:5-7)
At each stage of Israel’s life God increased their level of earthly government, in this case even taking a request, but note the end of the passage, “but they have rejected Me from being king over them.” God was always their king, their ruler, but they did not live in light of this. In a way, God gave them what they wanted in order that their hearts would be revealed to them.
This is the nature of sin: The depth of depravity of which we will sink should drive us to our knees, begging for mercy. The world as we know it is a cesspool of our own design . Romans1:18-32 highlights this fact. three times this passage says that we are given over to the consequences of our desires, and the result is pure human ugliness.
As a Christian, the cross of Christ has shown me that I am a beast. The desire of my flesh is for my destruction, and not just my destruction but a painful trip. I am lifted up only after first being brought low. Like a weird version of “It’s A Wonderful Life” I can praise God that it is His righteousness, His wisdom, His mercy, and His Son that will forge my way into eternity.
