When Life Doesn’t Work the Way It Should

Funeral Reflections, Time and Chance and Ecclesiastics

Funerals remind us that life does not always work the way we think it should. Our lives are fragile and unpredictable.

These words from the writer of Ecclesiastes haunt me. I think about them almost every day.

I again saw under the sun that the race is not to the swift and the battle is not to the warriors, and neither is bread to the wise nor wealth to the discerning nor favor to men of ability; for time and chance overtake them all. (Ecc. 9:11)

The irony in the author’s reflection is this:

• the swift should always win the race

• the strong should always win the battle

• the wise should always enjoy the fruit of their wise decisions

• the discerning should always be the most wealthy

• the most skilled should always be shown favor

But Ecclesiastics resists the logic of our our world, and things do not always happen the way they should, for “time and chance overtake them all.”

In other words, you can do everything “right” and the outcome of life will not be as you anticipate.

You can have the healthiest habits, and sometimes be diagnosed with cancer. You can fall in love so genuinely, yet experience hurt so deeply from the same person. You can standout at your job and be let go unexpectedly. You can drive so carefully, yet find yourself on the other side of a tragic accident. Time and chance happen to us all.

Time and chance disrupt the logic we expect in life.

Often, we do not know why things happen, the way they happen, when they happen.

When life does not work the way it should, remember: Jesus’s resurrection assures us that death no longer works the way that it should.

While death takes loved ones from us, God delivers our loved ones from death. Death, now, is but a doorway to eternal life with God. Even still, God invites our questions, grief and pain—He can handle them.

Even when life feels like it’s falling apart, God will hold you, and He will keep you from falling apart.

SH

---

What am I watching?

• Forever (Netflix) — Brilliant, beautiful show

What am I reading?

• The Challenge of Joseph H. Jackson: How America's Most Powerful Black Preacher Became a Forgotten Man by Jared E. Alcántara

• Making the Second Ghetto: Race and Housing in Chicago, 1940-1960 by Arnold R. Hirsch