Religion: A Pastor Ponders

The edge of eternity

By Pastor William Jenkins

September 14, 2006

We were sobered recently when we learned of the death of our modern day Tarzan, Steve Irwin. To many people he was entertaining; to all he was daring. He was totally fascinated by the animal habitat and the personalities of the creatures that live there.

If there is any consolation, it is that he died doing what he loved to do.

His death made me think how fragile and uncertain life is. We take for granted the hours we have to work and play and be with our family and friends…to enjoy life. All too suddenly these bright blessings can be gone.

Ecclesiastes 3:1-13 is a favorite passage to many people. It blends together the events of life. Everything has it’s time — everything good and everything bad. It’s time does not last long, however, because the river of life flows on and the things upstream push into the place of the things downstream. One thing is followed by or displaced by another.

There is a rather strange thing I have noticed in these verses. The word “time” is mentioned thirty times, like the ticking of a clock. Dropped at the end of “time” is a single word that stops the ticking of time. It occurs only once, yet is so captivating that it needs no repeating. It is the word “eternity”. Verse 11 says that “God has put eternity in our hearts…”

The Roman statesman Cicero wrote: “There is, I know not how, in the minds of men, a certain pressage (sic) as it were, of a future existence…” Cicero may not have known the origin of this “pressage”, but the sage of Ecclesiastes knew.

There is a sense in which we live on the edge of eternity. We spend our lives skirting its boundary. Between the time to be born and the time to die God has given us the gift of enjoying life. And a good gift it is.

League City United Methodist Church is located at 1411 Main Street (FM 518), one block east of Interstate 45. For information, call the church offices at 281-332-1557 or visit the website at

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