Ecclesiastes 6

I think Solomon hit on something extremely important in this chapter. It would seem he’s been building up to it for six chapters, running through lists of nearly everything that can be experienced in this life and calling all of it meaningless—wealth, poverty, wisdom, folly, justice, injustice, toil, laziness, and so on.

As I’ve been reading, I’ve thought to myself more than once, How can both opposites be meaningless? How can wisdom and folly be meaningless? Shouldn’t we desire one and not the other? Or desire neither? If they’re both meaningless, what does it matter which one we have?

The key, I believe, is in verse 12 of this chapter: “For who knows what is good for a person in life, during the few and meaningless days they pass through like a shadow? Who can tell them what will happen under the sun after they are gone?” There, Solomon just said it right out in the open: We are not in a position to determine what is “good” or “bad” for us. After all, if a person can have “wealth, possessions and honor, so that they lack nothing their hearts desire” (vs 2) and still not find satisfaction and meaning in life, can we say that wealth, possessions and honor for that person are “good”?

Here’s the truth: It’s time for us to stop deciding what is “good” and “bad” for us and choose to trust that only God is good. And not only is He good, but He always does what He knows is best for us. Now, please listen carefully: Nobody will ever want better things for you and your life than God wants for you. You can trust yourself fully to Him!

So, who knows what is good for you in life? God knows!
Only He is good.