Is "this too shall pass" found in the Bible?

An Oriental fable has it, that a tyrannical prince once bade one of his wise men to give him a motto which should be equally applicable to everything within his kingdom, under penalty of death. The wise man reflected for a moment and then replied: "You have but to write upon everything, O King, these words, 'And this, too, shall pass away.' "

"The fashion of this world passeth away." — 1 Corinthians 7:31.

In this connection it is well to take heed to the words of the apostle, "But this I say, brethren, the time is short (or more correctly 'straitened'), it remaineth therefore that both they who have wives be as though they had none; and they that weep as though they wept not; and they that rejoice as those that rejoiced not; and they that buy as those that possessed not; and they that use this world as not abusing it; for the fashion of this world passeth away." (1 Cor. 7:29-31.)

The final paragraph of this chapter (verses 25-40) gives the contrasts between those who marry and those who do not. Let us heed these blessed exhortations of such importance to God's people. "I say, brethren the time is short." If that was true then, how much more so is it in the significant days in which our lot is cast. With the ever increasing signs of the ending of the age and the coming of the Lord about us, we know that the time is short. In view of this fact those who have wives are to be as though they had none; they who weep, who pass through suffering, as though they wept not; they that rejoice, as though they rejoiced not; they that buy, as though they possessed not; and they that use the world as not abusing it, for the fashion of this world passeth away. We are to be without carefulness and distraction, so that we can serve the Lord. Much here is the advice of the Apostle concerning yielding to nature, which is perfectly lawful, or not yielding to it as to marriage. It is not the commandment of the Lord. Nevertheless we must remember that if he gives his apostolic advice, it is inspired advice, the advice of the Holy Spirit.

The true course is that which is urged later by the apostle in 1 Cor. 7:29-31: "But this I say, brethren, the time that remaineth is shortened; in order that both they that have wives be as though they had none; and they that weep as weeping not; and they that rejoice as rejoicing not, and they that buy as not possessing; and they that use this world as not using it to the full; for the fashion of this world passeth away." We are but pilgrims and strangers, passing through a world to which we no longer belong; we are of the Father, His gift to Christ, Whose witnesses we are now called to be, as we wait for His coming to be with Him and to share the glorious inheritance along with Him. It is His will to assign us our lot meanwhile; and piety would own with thankfulness His disposal of us, whether as a test of our subjection of heart or as a sphere of serving Him from day to day. For there is nothing right for our souls where He has not His place. It is not enough that there be "contentment." This alone would be but a heathen sentiment; as in fact not a few pagan authors have expressed it prettily, though (it is to be feared) it was rather what they could see to become man than what they really made good in their daily conversation. The Stoics who most affected such language were hard rather than happy men. Even had they succeeded in practice, how far short of Christ was their self-complacent contentment!

Take again indirect allusions to the coming of the Lord. Some brethren were going to law one with another. (1 Cor. 6) What is the weapon of the apostle? Is it merely the unbecoming sight of brother suing brother before a court of law? The apostle urges not the moral propriety which any one ought to feel, but lets in the light of that day upon the litigants. "Do ye not know," he says, "that the saints shall judge the world? and if the world shall be judged by you, are ye unworthy to judge the smallest matters? Know ye not that we shall judge angels?" How could they then go before the world to be judged? He shames them by the incongruity of Christians, the future judges of the world, seeking its judgment upon their matters. May I venture to say, that the incongruity of the Christian going before the world to punish the world was a thought reserved for a day of yet darker confusion? — From the next chapter, again, we learn that there were some who wanted to better their condition then — slaves, who were impatient to be free; men and women, who were in a hurry to change their condition by marrying, etc. What is the language of the apostle? what does the Holy Ghost counsel? "The time is short." The moral was plain to the Christian; the great truth of the Lord's coming underlies it. Be it that trial abounds: if He is at hand, why be anxious? why let your will work? What matter the circumstances of the present time? It is not merely that the Lord can lead the master to give his slave liberty, which he may use, value, and be thankful for. But if not, what then? The Christian slave has already a better emancipation, and soon the scene will be over; "for the fashion of this world passeth away."

Here, in the apostle's exhortation to all, we see its influence so mighty that, without a word of direct reference, it shows the time straitened. Not that it does not reveal a period of true and holy blessedness for the earth afterwards; but there will be a total change, compared with which the greatest of revolutions is as nothing; for the powers of the heavens shall be shaken, not the earth only but also heaven, and the world-kingdom of the Lord and His Christ shall come, not to speak of the still brighter portion of the glorified saints in the Father's house. Thus the scriptural expectation effectually blots out from heart and mind a long future for man's enjoyment as he is. "It remaineth that both they that have wives be as though they had none; and they that weep as though they wept not; and they that buy as though they possessed not; and they that use the world as not abusing* it; for the fashion of this world passeth away" (vers. 29-31). It is not, of course, that Christ ignores relationship, sorrow, joy, business, or position; but He brings in an energy of the Spirit for each, which, while deepening sensibility, and respecting everything which God established in nature and on earth, raises superior to all and attaches to Christ in heaven about to come again. The apostle thus would have the saint true to Christ on the one hand, and on the other to form a just estimate of the world as already condemned, and only awaiting the Lord's coming to have the sentence executed. For not more surely has He been lifted up from the earth and does He draw all to Him, than the judgment of the world is now, though its prince has yet to be actually expelled. The apostle would have us in faith to see the present form passing away.

Maybe it is not obvious why we chose this passage. It deals with what happens on earth (relationships, mourning, joy, buying, possessing and ownership). But the last sentence makes us sit up and take notice: "For the form of this world is passing away". It shows us an "extra-terrestrial" perspective with which earthly things are viewed. It is the perspective from heaven, where the Christ is.

Then there is another exceedingly strong thing connected with it: how long is this going to last? "The Lord is at hand." You have got your joy and strength elsewhere, and "the fashion of this world passeth away." If conscious that my portion is in Christ, the looking for the Lord, who is my portion, makes me to sit loose to everything here. If our expectation, if the feeling of our hearts, is that the Lord is at hand (I do not mean prophecy, but the personal expectation of the saint himself), it must be so. What event is there between you and heaven? The only one is our going up there. If I am looking for Christ to come straight down from heaven and take me up, what event is there between? It is no great wonder if the Christian has power to go through circumstances and master them; he has joy in the Lord that nothing can touch. In waiting for Christ what must be done before He comes? "The day and the hour knoweth no man"; but there is only one thing that must be done, the gathering in of the saints. "The longsuffering of God is salvation." "The Lord is not slack concerning his promise," but He is waiting on poor sinners. Prophecy does not speak to us of heaven; faith looks to heaven, and sees what is there. Prophecy is God's politics, and it saves us from human politics - a great mercy too. Our portion is Christ Himself.

Are we going in for the things of this world? They are perishing. They are not our own, even when we possess them. They are “another man’s” (Luke 16:12), and one of these days you will have to leave them for the other man. The true riches are heavenly, eternal, and our own. The fashion of this world passeth away. Our portion is not here among things visible, and we do not wish it to be. We have something infinitely better.