A Time for Everything

3 Everything that happens in this world happens at the time God chooses.

⁹ What do we gain from all our work? ¹⁰ I know the heavy burdens that God has laid on us. ¹¹ He has set the right time for everything. He has given us a desire to know the future, but never gives us the satisfaction of fully understanding what he does. ¹² So I realized that all we can do is be happy and do the best we can while we are still alive. ¹³ All of us should eat and drink and enjoy what we have worked for. It is God's gift.

¹⁴ I know that everything God does will last forever. You can't add anything to it or take anything away from it. And one thing God does is to make us stand in awe of him. ¹⁵ Whatever happens or can happen has already happened before. God makes the same thing happen again and again.

Injustice in the World

¹⁶ In addition, I have also noticed that in this world you find wickedness where justice and right ought to be. ¹⁷ I told myself, “God is going to judge the righteous and the evil alike, because every thing, every action, will happen at its own set time.”^{[a] 18} I decided that God is testing us, to show us that we are no better than animals. ¹⁹ After all, the same fate awaits human beings and animals alike. One dies just like the other. They are the same kind of creature. A human being is no better off than an animal, because life has no meaning for either. ²⁰ They are both going to the same place—the dust. They both came from it; they will both go back to it. ²¹ How can anyone be sure that the human spirit goes upward while an animal's spirit goes down into the ground? ²² So I realized then that the best thing we can do is enjoy what we have worked for. There is nothing else we can do.^[b] There is no way for us to know what will happen after we die.