I’ve been reading Don Richardson’s book, Eternity in Their Hearts: Startling Evidence of Belief in the One True God in Hundreds of Cultures throughout the World, and finding it interesting. The title comes from Ecclesiastes 3:11.

I’ve always liked the book of Ecclesiastes. Maybe because I initially approached life with that same assumption that this life is all there is and found the same futility and incredulity. I knew, somewhere in me, that I couldn’t die forever and that there was Someone beyond myself in ultimate control and authority.

Ecclesiastes 3:9-14 (which follows the famous v. 1-8) -  What gain has the worker from his toil? 10 I have seen the business that God has given to the children of man to be busy with. 11 He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also, he has put eternity into man’s heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end. 12 I perceived that there is nothing better for them than to be joyful and to do good as long as they live; 13 also that everyone should eat and drink and take pleasure in all his toil—this is God’s gift to man. 14 I perceived that whatever God does endures forever; nothing can be added to it, nor anything taken from it. God has done it, so that people fear before him.

So it’s not the end of the story with the whole “there is a time for everything,” and that we are going to be busy with the busy-ness of life doing nothing new under the sun. In every one of us God Himself has put the concept of eternity. If we are honest with ourselves, we know this life is not all there is. We know we are eternal beings. What we do lasts only temporarily. What God does lasts forever (v. 14), and God has made us to last forever. Just another reminder to live for eternity and do what counts for eternity now.