Ecclesiastes 1:9-11; Ecclesiastes 7:10
The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun. Is there any thing whereof it may be said, See, this is new? it hath been already of old time, which was before us. There is no remembrance of former things; neither shall there be any remembrance of things that are to come with those that shall come after.
Say not thou, What is the cause that the former days were better than these? for thou dost not enquire wisely concerning this.
CHARLES SIMEON (1759-1836): In every age, discontented men have been forward to make this inquiry; “What is the cause that the former days were better than these?” They make no endeavour to ascertain the correctness of their sentiments: but, taking for granted that they are right, they demand the reason of so strange a phenomenon.
CHARLES BRIDGES (1794-1869): National changes may bring national declension. Increasing wealth and luxury may relax the tone of public morals. But—it may be asked—Is it not the ordinary habit of the old men of the generation to give undue worth and weight to the records of bygone days?
CHARLES SIMEON: Those who are now advanced in life, can remember, that, in their early days, the very same clamour was made by discontented men as at this hour: and, if we go back to every preceding generation, we shall find the same complaints respecting the deterioration of the times: but we shall never arrive at that time, when the people confessed themselves to be in that exalted state in which our imaginations place them.
JOHN GILL (1697-1771): The same vices and virtues are now as ever, and ever were as they are; men in every age were born in sin, and were transgressors from the womb; from their infancy corrupt, and in all the stages of life; there were the same luxury and intemperance, and unnatural lusts, rapine and violence, in the days of Noah and Lot, as now; in Sodom and Gomorrah, and in the old world, as in the present age; and there were some few then, as now, that were men of sobriety, honesty, truth, and righteousness.
CHARLES SIMEON: What is the inquiry which is here discouraged?
CHARLES BRIDGES: Impatience often produces a querulous spirit—“How much brighter were the days of our fathers! Never shall we see the like again.” Yet be it remembered, we know the former days only by report. Present days are a felt reality. Under their pressure it is natural to believe, that the former days were better than these…The rebuke is evidently directed against that dissatisfied spirit, which puts aside our present blessings, exaggerates our evils, and reflects upon the government of God as full of inequalities, and upon His providence, in having cast us in such evil times…Yet, in a general view, “God has been always good, and men have been always bad,” and “there is nothing new under the sun.”
JOHN TRAPP (1601-1699): Lay aside, therefore, these frivolous inquiries and discontented cryings out against the times, which, in some sense reflect upon God, the Author of times—for “can there be evil in an age, and He hath not done it?” (Amos 3:6); and bless God for our gospel privileges, which indeed should drown all our discontents.
CHARLES BRIDGES: “Murmurers and complainers” belong to every age. Leave God’s work to Him, and let us attend to our own work, which is—not so much to change the world, but to change ourselves—to “serve our own generation by the will of God.”
ALEXANDER MacLAREN (1826-1910): Let us be thankful, too…And let us hold firmly to the far deeper truth that the future will be the same as the past, because God is the same. God’s yesterday is God’s tomorrow—the same love, the same resources, the same wisdom, the same power, the same sustaining Hand, the same encompassing Presence. “A thousand years are as one day, and one day as a thousand years;” and when we say there is no new thing under the sun, let us feel the deepest way of expressing that thought is, “Thou art the same, and Thy steadfast purposes know no alteration.”
MATTHEW HENRY (1662-1714): Now the design of this is also to show the folly of the children of men in affecting things that are new, in imagining that they have discovered such things, and in pleasing and priding themselves in them. We are apt to nauseate old things, and to grow weary of what we have been long used to, as Israel of the manna, and covet, with the Athenians, still to tell and hear of some new thing, and admire this and the other as new, whereas it is all what has been. And to take us off from expecting happiness or satisfaction in the creature. Why should we look for it there, where never any yet have found it?
MATTHEW POOLE (1624-1679): There is nothing in the world but a continued and tiresome repetition of the same things. The nature and course of the beings and affairs of the world, and the tempers of men’s minds, are generally the same that they ever were, and shall ever be; and therefore because no man ever yet received satisfaction from any worldly things, it is a vain and foolish thing for any person hereafter to expect it.
ROBERT HAWKER (1753-1827): But while the fashions of the world, with all its different pursuits, end in vanity; let the subject be considered as it relates to Christ, and here all things become certain, solid, and substantial.
MATTHEW HENRY: If we would be entertained with new things, we must acquaint ourselves with the things of God, and get a new nature; then “old things pass away, and all things become new,” 2 Corinthians 5:17.
JOHN TRAPP: Get into Christ, that thou mayest be “a new creature,” 2 Corinthians 5:17. So shalt thou have a new name upon thee, Isaiah 62:2; a new spirit within thee, Ezekiel 36:27; a new alliance, Ephesians 2:14; new attendants, Psalm 91:11; new wages, and new work, Isaiah 62:11; a new commandment, 1 John 2:8; a new covenant, Jeremiah 31:33; a new way to heaven, Hebrews 10:20; and a new mansion in heaven, John 14:2; 2 Corinthians 5:8.
MATTHEW HENRY: The gospel puts “a new song into our mouths,” Psalm 40:3; Revelation 5:9. In heaven all is new—all new at first, wholly unlike the present state of things, a new world indeed, Luke 20:35; and all new to eternity, always fresh, always flourishing.
ALEXANDER MacLAREN: And so, while we confront the future, we can feel that God being in us, and Christ being in us, we shall make it a far brighter and fairer thing than the blurred and blotted past which today is buried, and life may go on with grand blessedness and power until we shall hear the great voice from the Throne say, “There shall be no more death, no more sorrow, no more crying, no more pain, for the former things are passed away, Behold! I make all things new,” Revelation 21:4,5.
EDWARD REYNOLDS (1599-1676): Let the badness of the age in which we live make us more wise, more circumspect, more humble.
JEROME (340-420): Thou shouldst so live that thy last days may be thy best days, and the time present better to thee than the past was to those that then lived.
MAXINE COLLINS (1920-1984): I have but today, may I make it tell
Not in history books, but that I used it well
For Jesus.
Just today, yesterday is gone
Tomorrow yet to come;
And between them hung
Is that space, of time and place
That is this day, this hour, this minute
This one breath is all that I can claim
May its aim, be to proclaim:
Jesus.
