Ecclesiastes 3:10-20

10 I have seen the burden God has laid on the human race.
11 He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet[a] no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end.
12 I know that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to do good while they live.
13 That each of them may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all their toil—this is the gift of God.
14 I know that everything God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it. God does it so that people will fear him.
15 Whatever is has already been, and what will be has been before; and God will call the past to account.[b]
16 And I saw something else under the sun: In the place of judgment—wickedness was there, in the place of justice—wickedness was there.
17 I said to myself, “God will bring into judgment both the righteous and the wicked, for there will be a time for every activity, a time to judge every deed.”
18 I also said to myself, “As for humans, God tests them so that they may see that they are like the animals.
19 Surely the fate of human beings is like that of the animals; the same fate awaits them both: As one dies, so dies the other. All have the same breath[c] ; humans have no advantage over animals. Everything is meaningless.
20 All go to the same place; all come from dust, and to dust all return.

Images for Ecclesiastes 3:10-20

Cross References 15

  • 1. S Ecclesiastes 1:13
  • 2. S ver 1
  • 3. S Job 11:7; Ecclesiastes 8:17
  • 4. S Job 28:23; Romans 11:33
  • 5. Ecclesiastes 2:3
  • 6. Psalms 34:12
  • 7. S Deuteronomy 12:7,18; S Ecclesiastes 2:24; Ecclesiastes 5:19
  • 8. S Job 23:15; Ecclesiastes 5:7; Ecclesiastes 7:18; Ecclesiastes 8:12-13; James 1:17
  • 9. Ecclesiastes 6:10
  • 10. S Ecclesiastes 1:9
  • 11. S Job 19:29; Ecclesiastes 11:9; Ecclesiastes 12:14; Matthew 16:27; Romans 2:6-8; 2 Thessalonians 1:6-7
  • 12. ver 1
  • 13. S Psalms 73:22
  • 14. S Ecclesiastes 2:14
  • 15. S Genesis 2:7; Genesis 3:19; S Job 34:15

Footnotes 3

  • [a]. Or "also placed ignorance in the human heart, so that"
  • [b]. Or "God calls back the past"
  • [c]. Or "spirit"
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