Ecclesiastes 7:8
In his book, Searching for Heaven On Earth, David Jeremiah tells the story of how during World War II, a man in Sussex, England, sent some money to the Scripture Gift Mission. He enclosed a letter saying that he longed to give more, but the harvest on his farm had been very disappointing because of a lack of water. He was also fearful because German bombs were being dropped in the area, and his family and farm were at risk. He asked the workers of Scripture Gift Mission to pray that no bombs would fall on his land. Mr. Ashley Baker wrote back from the mission and said that while he didn’t feel led to pray that exact prayer, he had prayed that God’s will for their lives would prevail. Shortly after, a huge German missile crashed down on the farm. None of the man’s family or livestock were harmed, but the bombshell went so far into the ground that it liberated a submerged stream. The stream yielded enough water to irrigate the man’s farm as well as neighboring farms. The next year, due to a bountiful harvest, the man was able to send a large offering to the mission.
In the providential wisdom of God, the end of a thing is better than its beginning. In Ecclesiastes 7, you will notice that a key word in these verses is the word ‘better’ which is used seven times through verse 10. Solomon is writing in a proverbial style where he gives brief, simple statements that offer insightful principles for handling life. I think what he is saying here in verses 7-8 is that you and I can expect adversity in this life. Without wisdom’s proper perspective, we can give in to despair. However, he says the end of a thing is always better than the beginning. When a bomb goes off in my life, I have a hard time seeing how it could ever be a good thing. I have to trust God with the end result.
The end of a thing is better than the beginning, and there are times when even bombs turn out to be blessings. Once we reach the end, we know the whole story, and that is always better than the beginning of a matter when we don’t yet have all the facts. The gospel provides us with this kind of clarity. Though we may not be able to immediately see it, we know that all things work together for the good of those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose. God has promised!
For more, read Romans 8:18-30
