Ecclesiastes Helps Us Find Happiness in Different Seasons of Life

Memento Mori Remembering the seasonality of life can really help us enjoy God’s world. When everything feels low, dark, and gloomy, it is naturally comforting to remember that there is a time for everything and that like all seasons, this too shall pass (which presumably explains why so many people have that phrase beautifully calligraphed on their bodies or in their hallways). But the reverse is true too. Seasons of sunshine, sweetness, and light will also fade in due time, so it is important not to take them for granted but to enjoy them and actively celebrate them while they are here—as forty-somethings are forever telling twenty-somethings, as parents of twenty-eight-year-olds are forever telling parents of eight-year-olds, and as poets are forever telling everybody.1 In his commentary on Ecclesiastes, Christopher Wright calls it “Christian opportunism.”2 The writer of Ecclesiastes, Qoholet, (which means “the Collector” or perhaps “the Preacher” (Ecc. 1:2)) makes the obvious application: “In the day of prosperity be joyful, and in the day of adversity consider: God has made the one as well as the other, so that man may not find out anything that will be after him” (Eccl. 7:14)....