Ecclesiastes 11:1-6

1 Cast your bread upon the waters, for you will find it after many days.

² Give a serving to seven, and also to eight, for you do not know what evil will be on the earth.

³ If the clouds are full of rain, they empty themselves upon the earth; and if a tree falls to the south or the north, in the place where the tree falls, there it shall lie.

⁴ He who observes the wind will not sow, and he who regards the clouds will not reap.

⁵ As you do not know what is the way of the wind, or how the bones grow in the womb of her who is with child, so you do not know the works of God who makes everything.

⁶ In the morning sow your seed, and in the evening do not withhold your hand; for you do not know which will prosper, either this or that, or whether both alike will be good.

Chapters 11-12 close the book with practical exhortation. Though we cannot know what the future holds, we are still to act wisely in view of it. Verse 1 seems to refer to making an investment (“cast your bread”) in merchandising across the seas (“upon the waters”) in expectation that a profit will be realized on it “after many days.” … Verse 1 speaks of the time required to see a return on the investment and verse 2 about the need for diversification. — Grace, page 1180.

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Cast your bread (v.1) — Sow without any hope of a harvest: do good even to them on whom your benefactions seem thrown away. — Treasury, page 427.

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If we wait until conditions are perfect (v.4), we will never do anything. We must act now and trust God for the outcome. — Grace, page 1181.

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We do not need to understand how or why God works to trust in His providential outworking of all things. … While we do not know the results of our efforts, we are to diligently apply ourselves and trust God for the outcome. — Grace, page 1181.

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… Busy oneself in reproductive industry (v.1), such as that of a farmer, and share with the poor the resulting profit (v.2). The clouds and the trees are pointed to (v.3) as illustrations of this life of industry and benevolence. The clouds fill themselves, they empty it out upon the thirsty earth. A tree, whether it happens to be in the cold north or the hot south, gives its fruit and shade to others. The argument of v.2 is that because a famine is possible, therefore surplus wealth should be generously distributed. … The argument of verse 3 is that if the lot of a tree happens to fall in the north or in the south of a land, its function is to grow and bear fruit and afford shade, and so benefit the people. A farmer that declines to work because of the wind or the rain (v.4) will not enjoy the full harvest that will reward the diligence of v.6. … It is as fruitless and as vain to waste time in trying to find out God’s secret purposes in the permission of evil as to try to ascertain how the bones of a child are formed prior to birth. — Williams, pages 447-448.

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Don’t stand gazing idly at the clouds, wondering when and where the rain is going to fall. Don’t allow your actions to be governed by the capricious conditions of life under the sun. Sow because it is the honorable thing to do. True, the value of what you are doing is shrouded in mystery, as is the formation of the child in the womb. Man does not know what God is doing, but that lack of knowledge is never to serve as a cause for inactivity. Man must do his work and enjoy the present life, though it is beyond his powers to determine the future. — KJV Commentary, pages 752-753.

My various commentaries see different shades of meaning in these verses. My take, after reading what they had to say, is this: Life isn’t predictable. We can never know the future. Our role in light of this is to do the next right thing. We should plan for the future while knowing that it will likely not pan out the way we expect it to. We should waste a lot of time trying to make sense of it all because we can’t.