Every once in a while I’ll be reading and come across a saying and reflect to myself, “Oh, that’s where that comes from!”

Psalm 31:5 says, “Into your hands I commit my spirit…” And, of course, Jesus quotes this phrase on the cross in Luke 22:46. It never occurred to me that this came from a psalm. Many of the Jews who heard Christ’s words or read them later knew immediately where the words came from.

This psalm makes another reference to the brevity of life sometimes mentioned at funerals. Verse 15 starts out by saying, “My times are in your hands…”

Soon we will be up to Psalm 39 which includes a huge component focusing on the shortness of life. David starts in 39:4, “Show me, O LORD, my life’s end and the number of my days; let me know how fleeting is my life.”

I have a hard time expressing that desire. Actually, I don’t think I want to know. It is a gracious God who doesn’t let most of us know our end — either how long we’ll live or how we’ll die. Of course David’s real desire is not so much how long he’ll live or how he will die, but a deep desire to make the days count.

Just minutes ago I learned that a dear friend’s daughter and son-in-law have a newborn girl with unbelievable complications that may result in her death unless God miraculously intervenes. “Into your hands I commit my spirit…”

A few weeks ago, I spent a week with my son Kyle in a program called “Christ in the Tetons.” It was a wonderful manhood adventure being outdoors together, but also in building into each other. It’s wonderful to have a son old enough and mature enough to build into me, too. The timing was bad — the trip coming just as we completed moving our household from Arizona to Austin — but it was a wise investment of time. “My times are in your hands…”

I’m fifty. This year, more than ever, I’ve thought, “I wonder how many more productive years I have left.” I’m not asking in a morbid way but because I want to make those years count.

I’m looking for God to direct our paths toward major investments (even though they may appear little from the world’s perspective) to fill the hours, days, months, or years God gives me.

In you, O LORD, I have taken refuge; let me never be put to shame; deliver me in your righteousness. Turn your ear to me, come quickly to my rescue; be my rock of refuge, a strong fortress to save me. Since you are my rock and my fortress, for the sake of your name lead and guide me. Free me from the trap that is set for me, for you are my refuge. Into your hands I commit my spirit; redeem me, O LORD, the God of truth. I hate those who cling to worthless idols; I trust in the LORD. I will be glad and rejoice in your love, for you saw my affliction and knew the anguish of my soul. You have not handed me over to the enemy but have set my feet in a spacious place. Be merciful to me, O LORD, for I am in distress; my eyes grow weak with sorrow, my soul and my body with grief. My life is consumed by anguish and my years by groaning; my strength fails because of my affliction, and my bones grow weak. Because of all my enemies, I am the utter contempt of my neighbors; I am a dread to my friends— those who see me on the street flee from me. I am forgotten by them as though I were dead; I have become like broken pottery. For I hear the slander of many; there is terror on every side; they conspire against me and plot to take my life. But I trust in you, O LORD; I say, “You are my God.” My times are in your hands; deliver me from my enemies and from those who pursue me. Let your face shine on your servant; save me in your unfailing love. Let me not be put to shame, O LORD, for I have cried out to you; but let the wicked be put to shame and lie silent in the grave. Let their lying lips be silenced, for with pride and contempt they speak arrogantly against the righteous. How great is your goodness, which you have stored up for those who fear you, which you bestow in the sight of men on those who take refuge in you. In the shelter of your presence you hide them from the intrigues of men; in your dwelling you keep them safe from accusing tongues. Praise be to the LORD, for he showed his wonderful love to me when I was in a besieged city. In my alarm I said, “I am cut off from your sight!” Yet you heard my cry for mercy when I called to you for help. Love the LORD, all his saints! The LORD preserves the faithful, but the proud he pays back in full. Be strong and take heart, all you who hope in the LORD.
— Psalm 31