Psalm 90

Traveling through Time

Posted on by Betsy

I love a good book or movie that shows a character who is given a chance to go back in time. Movies like It’s A Wonderful Life, Groundhog Day and even silly shows like Hot Tub Time Machine can be parables that teach us the value of taking advantage of the do-overs that God offers us on a daily basis.

In the case of Hot Tub Time Machine, a character named Lou decides not to return to the present after he and his buddies are transported through time to a night that happened twenty years earlier. (This apparently is what happens when you pour an energy drink on the controls of a ski resort hot tub.) After reenacting the evening as their younger selves, the fellows eventually realize that they can return to the present by pouring another energy drink on the hot tub of their past. But Lou, now that he has had a chance to reflect on the last 20 years of his life, decides to remain in 1986 and try life again. He confesses that the carbon monoxide poisoning that landed him in the hospital in the beginning of the movie was actually a suicide attempt. When the others return, they live into an altered present that was changed by their going back in time. Many of their issues are resolved, and Lou took advantage of knowing what the “future” held by developing a company called Lougle, making him a millionaire.

What would you change if you could go back in time and do something over? What choices would you make the second time around?

One of the lessons here is to live well enough in the present so that you don’t need to go back and redo your actions. God is always using time to our advantage and offers an immediate reset anytime we confess and repent of our actions. As Moses wrote in Psalm 90, God has always been our help from forever in the past to forever in the future:

Psalm 90 (Common English Bible)

Lord, you have been our help,
    generation after generation.
2 Before the mountains were born,
    before you birthed the earth and the inhabited world—
    from forever in the past
    to forever in the future, you are God.

3 You return people to dust,
    saying, “Go back, humans,”
4     because in your perspective a thousand years
    are like yesterday past,
    like a short period during the night watch.
.
12 Teach us to number our days
    so we can have a wise heart.

So the better question is, what change can you make today that would be a better choice than what you chose yesterday? What could you redo right now that will make tomorrow an improvement for you and those around you?

God is able to help you grow a wise heart today if you’ll just let him.

Night Watch by Vic Woodall

Dwelling Place

Posted on by Betsy

Do you have a comfy spot in your home where you go to relax and de-stress? Is there one specific dwelling place that you look forward to as you are driving home from work, a loud sports activities with your kids, or a long trip away? I have a comfy chair on the second floor of my house that I sit in to do all my writing. The view of the harbor, boats, flags, and clubhouse from my windows is like a tranquilizer. The minute I sink into the chair, which once belonged to my mother, I feel safe and at ease.

I hope you have a dwelling place like that as well.

Today we read a psalm of Moses where he refers to God as our dwelling place. This is the only psalm that Moses wrote, but you can find other examples of his song-writing in Exodus 15 and Deuteronomy 32 and 33.

Scholars believe that Moses wrote this during the time described in Numbers 20. This was after the death of his sister Miriam, after being barred from entering the Promised Land due to his disobedience of striking the rock in the wilderness, and after his brother Aaron died. We can certainly see why his attention was now focused on God being his only dwelling place.

Such a lovely image! Moses reminds us that God has been a source of comfort and peace since the beginning of time. People come and go, armchairs and ottomans eventually make their way to the landfill, but God has always been and will always be there for us as a safe and easy place to dwell.

Psalm 90 (Common English Bible)

1 Lord, you have been our dwelling place
    in all generations.
2 Before the mountains were brought forth
    or ever you had formed the earth and the world,
    from everlasting to everlasting you are God.

3 You turn us back to dust
    and say, “Turn back, you mortals.”
4 For a thousand years in your sight
    are like yesterday when it is past
    or like a watch in the night.

5 You sweep them away; they are like a dream,
    like grass that is renewed in the morning;
6 in the morning it flourishes and is renewed;
    in the evening it fades and withers.

You can almost hear his loneliness for his siblings in this last part. People fade and wither and God turns us back to dust in his timing. But what will always remain is that he is God, from everlasting to everlasting.

Spend some time in your dwelling place today and meditate on that. When losses come in your life, and they will come, God will be your dwelling place in all generations.

My Dwelling Place

Three Things about Loss

Posted on by Betsy

So many people I know are dealing with loss right now; a dear friend lost her mother a few weeks ago, another is in the final death moments of a long and happy marriage, a third is grieving her daughter moving out of state, and yet another was just laid off from a job he loved for many years. What is God’s perspective of these things? How can we negotiate losing people and situations that we think we can’t live without? How can we manage our grief?

Here are three things to consider if you are grieving today:

One: this time of painful separation is only temporary. While the rest of your earthly life will be spent without the one or that thing that you love, the rest of your life is but a blink of an eye in the scope of eternity. These events are hardly a blip in the scope of an eternal lifetime. 

The problem with grieving is that it slooowwws down time. We become suspended in an artificial reality that is all too real. Days are long and nights are longer because we are stuck in the moment of our crisis like a fly caught in tree sap. Grief can make us feel as though we are swimming in tar, trying to reach a distant shore that keeps moving farther away and the swim is taking forever. Embracing God’s perspective that death and mourning are only temporary states can begin to help us shake off our sluggishness and get on with what is the rest of our short existence here.

Hear these words of Psalm 90 that offer us a perspective of how God measures time: 

A thousand years in your sight are like a day that has just gone by, or like a watch in the night. (Psalm 90:4, NIV 1984) 

In God’s perspective of time, a thousand years are like a day; so, 70-80+ years of an average life span are just a blink of an eye in the scope of our eternal life span.  In our eternal state, this very real grief will become a distant memory.

Two: loss and death aren’t the end. What joy can fill our hearts to know that! If we take on God’s perspective that death isn’t final, then we can begin to process our loss as more of a kind of misplacement rather than a permanent loss. Sometimes in life, we lose things that we know will never be found again. When you lose one earring after a night out, you can look for months and know you will never find it again; it is gone forever. But other times we simply misplace things, like car keys and sunglasses. We are sure they are somewhere in the house, in a purse, or in a pocket, but we have to look in a couple of places before we find them. Understanding death from God’s perspective is more like that; our loved one is not lost forever, just in another place, waiting to be reclaimed when we die and join them in eternity. 

And comfort comes from knowing that they are never, ever misplaced from God, for he is present in life, in death, and in eternity.

Three: when we lose someone or something, we are never alone. Even though we might feel alone, abandoned, and forsaken, there is never a moment when the God who was present before time is not present with us in our anguish. Even Jesus felt abandoned, but he was not. Upon his death, he experienced the power of resurrection and was reunited with the Father. Sin is the only thing that can ever separate us from the Father, but death never can, and so we can find comfort in knowing that in the depth of our loneliness, God is near. 

Jesus came in the flesh to embody the love of the Father for the world. He is the incarnate Lord, the walking-divine who instructs us about the intentions and perspectives of our eternal God. He experienced earthly life, earthly death, and heavenly resurrection. He appeared to His disciples just before his final ascension into heaven. Hear what Jesus had to say about abandonment: 

And surely, I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” (Matthew 28:18-20, NIV 1984) 

This is Jesus’ reminder to you today that he is with you in your grief walk. He will never abandon or forsake you. There is no deep, dark place of sorrow that you can go without him. There is no level of anger that he cannot withstand from you; there is no place of hopelessness that he will not traverse by your side; there is no place of loneliness that he does not occupy. 

You are not alone. Thanks be to God.    

In our end is our beginning
In our time, infinity
In our doubt, there is believing
In our life, eternity
In our death, a resurrection
At the last, a victory

Unrevealed until its season
Something God alone can see. (Hymn of Promise, Natalie Sleeth, United Methodist Hymnal #707)

Unrevealed Until Its Season by Michelle Robertson

Life’s Too Short

Posted on by Betsy

 Life’s too short. 

How many times have you heard that or said that? 

Life’s too short, so eat dessert first. 

Life’s too short to stay angry at your spouse. 

Life’s too short, so spend the money now for that trip you’ve always wanted to take.

Life’s too short to be miserable all the time, so change your situation.

In this Psalm written by Moses, we see this theme in a different context. In his view, life’s too short and then you die. In the meantime, we experience God’s wrath and anger. Now that’s a sobering and discouraging thought! According to this Psalm, we toil and trouble all of our lives and in the end, we just fly away. Yikes!

Psalm 90 (Common English Bible)

Lord, you have been our help,
    generation after generation.
2 Before the mountains were born,
    before you birthed the earth and the inhabited world—
    from forever in the past
    to forever in the future, you are God.

3 You return people to dust,
    saying, “Go back, humans,”
4     because in your perspective a thousand years
    are like yesterday past,
    like a short period during the night watch.
5 You sweep humans away like a dream,
    like grass that is renewed in the morning.
6 True, in the morning it thrives, renewed,
    but come evening it withers, all dried up.
7 Yes, we are wasting away because of your wrath;
    we are paralyzed with fear on account of your rage.
8 You put our sins right in front of you,
    set our hidden faults in the light from your face.
9 Yes, all our days slip away because of your fury;
    we finish up our years with a whimper.
10 We live at best to be seventy years old,
    maybe eighty, if we’re strong.
But their duration brings hard work and trouble
    because they go by so quickly.
    And then we fly off.
11 Who can comprehend the power of your anger?
    The honor that is due you corresponds to your wrath.
12 Teach us to number our days
    so we can have a wise heart.

13 Come back to us, Lord!
    Please, quick!
    Have some compassion for your servants!
14 Fill us full every morning with your faithful love
    so we can rejoice and celebrate our whole life long.
15 Make us happy for the same amount of time that you afflicted us—
    for the same number of years that we saw only trouble.
16 Let your acts be seen by your servants;
    let your glory be seen by their children.
17 Let the kindness of the Lord our God be over us.
    Make the work of our hands last.
    Make the work of our hands last!

But take a look again at the first two verses of this Psalm, which describe the image of God as our help in all generations. This indeed is a word of comfort. What does it mean to you to have God as your help? Moses assures us that from forever in the past to forever in the future, God doesn’t change. In the midst of toil and trouble, remembering that God is God (and we are not) helps tremendously. And his final plea for the kindness of the Lord to be over us ends this reading with a note of hope. We indeed want God’s glory to be seen by our children and to know that the labor of our hands and hearts will last. Even while feeling God’s wrath, Moses is aware of God’s mercy.

Moses appropriately calls attention to the “life’s too short” conundrum and brings a certain focus to the situation. It begs the question of what you intend to do with this too-short life. Can you answer that today? Life is too short. How are you going to number your days wisely? What changes should you make today to honor your commitment to the Lord before you go? Notice that Moses points out that God is angry when we sin and are disobedient…

The sobering tone of this Psalm is a call to self-examination and reflection. We are reminded to double check our sins and do some spiritual heart surgery where needed. We need to observe the acts of God and look for God’s glory in the midst of our behaviors. The brevity of our existence on earth need not be marred by God’s anger at our sin, especially when the remedy of repentance and forgiveness is so close at hand through Jesus Christ. Life is too short to carry the burden of unconfessed sin. We join Moses’ prayer that God’s kindness would be over us and allow our works to outlive our lives. We can count on God to be kind, even when we have not been.

So in this too-short life, we need to count our days and use them well. In this too-short life, we should seek wisdom and righteousness. Having acknowledged the anger that follows sin, we should strive every day of this too-short life to walk in holiness. Life’s too short for regrets.

What are you doing with your too-short life? Spend it well.

And eat the dessert first!

Come Back to us, Lord by Michelle Robertson

Separation

Posted on by Betsy

If you live far away from your family, you know the pain that separation can bring. Missing out on daily joys and activities is hard. Thank goodness for technology like FaceTime that allows us to see and hear each other, but nothing can replace a warm hug and the feeling of a three-year-old holding your hand.

One of the things that heaven promises is that when we get there, we will never be separated again:

For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:35-39, NIV 1984) 

God’s perspective of death is that death is not the end. It is not final, nor is it forever. God’s perspective is that by the power of the resurrection there is a death of death, as believers receive eternal life upon their death. And so, the good news is that nothing can separate us permanently from God or our families … not even death.

This means that this time of painful separation is only temporary. While the rest of your life will be spent without the one you love, the rest of your life is but a blink of an eye in the scope of eternity. Just as those highly anticipated moments in our lives seem forever to get here, like kids who wait for Christmas or brides who wait for their wedding day, those events are but a blink of an eye in the scope of an eternal lifetime. If you have older children, think back about their toddler and elementary years. How often do we say, “I can’t believe how fast it went”? And yet each pregnancy was its own lifetime!

The problem with grieving is that it slooowwws down time. We become suspended in an artificial reality that is all too real. Days are long and nights are longer because we are stuck in the moment of our crisis like a fly caught in tree sap. Our movements and our thoughts are sluggish. It takes forever to get simple things done, to make sentences come together, to remember why we have walked into a particular room. It is not uncommon to forget even names of friends and acquaintances after the shock of a death. Grief can make us feel as though we are swimming in tar, trying to reach a distant shore that keeps moving farther away and the swim is taking forever. Embracing God’s perspective that death and mourning are only temporary states can begin to help us shake off our sluggishness and get on with what is the rest of our short existence here. Hear these words of Psalm 90 that offer us a perspective of how God measures time: 

A thousand years in your sight are like a day that has just gone by, or like a watch in the night. (Psalm 90:4, NIV 1984) 

So, if you are grieving right now, take heart. This separation won’t last forever, and you are not alone in your sorrow. Jesus himself walks with you today, and while you can’t feel him holding your hand, you can know for certain that he holds your heart.

This based on an excerpt from my book, Mourning Break, available at Amazon.

Gone the Sun by Sherri Henderson

Life’s Too Short

Posted on by Betsy

Life’s too short.

How many times have you heard that or said that in a lifetime?

Life’s too short, so eat dessert first.

Life’s too short to stay angry at your spouse.

Life’s too short, so spend the money now for that trip you’ve always wanted to take.

Life’s too short to be miserable all the time, so change your situation.

In a Psalm written by Moses, we see this theme in a different context. In his view, life’s too short and then you die. In the meantime, all we get to do is experience God’s wrath and anger. Now that’s a sobering and discouraging thought! According to this, we toil and trouble all of our lives and in the end, we just fly away. Yikes!

But focus on the first and the last verses of this Psalm:

Psalm 90 (New Revised Standard Version)

Lord, you have been our dwelling place
    in all generations.
2 Before the mountains were brought forth,
    or ever you had formed the earth and the world,
    from everlasting to everlasting you are God.

This is beautiful language. The image of God being our dwelling place in all generations is a word of comfort. From everlasting to everlasting, God is God and we are his! In the midst of toil and trouble, remembering that God is GOD (and we are not) helps tremendously.

3 You turn us back to dust,
    and say, “Turn back, you mortals.”
4 For a thousand years in your sight
    are like yesterday when it is past,
    or like a watch in the night.

9 For all our days pass away under your wrath;
    our years come to an end like a sigh.
10 The days of our life are seventy years,
    or perhaps eighty, if we are strong;
even then their span is only toil and trouble;
    they are soon gone, and we fly away.

Moses appropriately calls attention to the “life’s too short” conundrum and brings a certain focus to the situation. It begs the question of what you intend to do with this too-short life. Can you answer that today? Life IS too short. How are you going to number your days wisely? What changes should you make?

Moses reminds us that God is angry when we sin and are disobedient.

11 Who considers the power of your anger?
    Your wrath is as great as the fear that is due you.

So in this too-short life, we need to count our days and use them well. In this too-short life, we should seek wisdom and righteousness. Having acknowledged the anger that follows sin, we should strive every day of this too-short life to walk in holiness. Life’s too short for regrets.

What are you doing with your too-short life? Spend it well.

12 So teach us to count our days
    that we may gain a wise heart.

Life’s Too Short to Miss a Single Sunset by Joe McGraw

A Thousand Years

Posted on by Betsy

Time. We never seem to have enough of it, are always running out of it, have no control over it, and rule our lives by it. Think about how many times every day you check your watch/phone/Alexa to see what time it is. Nobody likes to be late for an appointment, and time sets the pace for our daily activity.

When someone you love dies, time starts to play tricks on you. Suddenly time stops. You find yourself dwelling on the past, trying to stretch out last moments, and not wanting to move into a future without them. Days and weeks either get stuck in the slow molasses of grief or suddenly accelerate to a holiday you hadn’t anticipated where you get to relive your loss in a new way.

Time in God’s terms, however, is a much altered thing. In Psalm 90 we see a common idea that in God’s perspective, a thousand years is like a day:

Psalm 90 (Common English Bible)

Lord, you have been our help,
    generation after generation.
2 Before the mountains were born,
    before you birthed the earth and the inhabited world—
    from forever in the past
    to forever in the future, you are God.

3 You return people to dust,
    saying, “Go back, humans,”
4     because in your perspective a thousand years
    are like yesterday past,
    like a short period during the night watch.

This is what happens when you apply eternity to time. Suddenly centuries of years become like days. In heaven there are no clocks to measure out 24-hour periods of existence. Time simply IS.

The blessing in that for all of us is that our loved ones who have gone before us will experience our arrival as though it is happening right after theirs. The compression and expansion of eternity mean that for them, time is a seamless flow of entry into heaven. So when my father died in 2009, he turned around and there came my mom in 2014, which in eternity was like a day later. Best of all, their lives now are timeless as they rest in our Father’s arms. So too will yours be when you get there “tomorrow.” From forever in the past to forever in the future, God is with us.

5 You sweep humans away like a dream,
    like grass that is renewed in the morning.
6 True, in the morning it thrives, renewed,
    but come evening it withers, all dried up.

Take some time today to meditate on these things. God has been with you since before he birthed the earth and the inhabited world, and he will be with you forever. Thanks be to God!

Timeless Beauty by Becca Ziegler