One thing we don’t understand is that there are times and seasons and contexts.  We want every time to be the peaceful and happy time.  But that isn’t reality.  Solomon says there is a time for everything.  It’s important we know the times.

God says he has put eternity in their hearts (v. 11).  Everyone is a spiritual being.  Everyone has seasons where they ask the deeper questions and seasons where life is suffocated by “busy.”  But eternity is in the hearts of all.

And then Solomon observes something that sounds strange.

“I also observed under teh sun:  there is wickedness at the place of judgment and there is wickedness at the place of righteousness” (v. 16).

It may seem a strange saying, but he is saying what is so often true.  In the places where judgment and righteousness should prevail, such as in a courtroom, wickedness if found in the hearts of men.  But Solomon points out something important.  God will be the ultimate judge (v. 17).

Then Solomon ponders a mystery.  He says that man and beast have the same fate–return to the dust.  And then a question of what happens after we die.

“Who knows if the spirit of people rises upward and the spirit of animals goes down to the earth?  I have seen that there is nothing better than for a person to enjoy his activities because that is his reward.  For who can enable him to see what will happen after he dies?” (v. 21-22).