The Reality of Life’s Brevity – Psalm 90:4-6
4 For a thousand years in your sight
are like a day that has just gone by,
or like a watch in the night.
5 You sweep men away in the sleep of death;
they are like the new grass of the morning —
6 though in the morning it springs up new,
by evening it is dry and withered.
All of us have experienced the focusing effect of an imminent deadline – the term paper that is due, the business presentation to be given the next day. Moses’ intent is to help us see that life may seem long to us, but that it is in fact very, very brief. To communicate this he gives two formulas for calculating the brevity of life.
Formula #1: A thousand years = 1 day.
God is not time-bound. To God, a thousand years is the same as one day. But to turn this around and apply it to humans, let’s take the ratio and break it down. 1,000 years = 1 day or 24 hours, and to simplify the math, let’s assume that a human lifespan is 100 years. Then, a 100-year life is roughly 2 ½ hours long or 150 minutes.
Consider the following table:
| If you are: | Then you’ve lived: |
|---|---|
| 20 years old | 30 minutes of your 2 ½ hours |
| 30 years old | 45 minutes of your 2 ½ hours |
| 40 years old | 1 hour of your 2 ½ hours |
| 50 years old | 1 ¼ hours of your 2 ½ hours |
| 60 years old | 1 ½ hours of your 2 ½ hours |
Formula #2: The Watch in the Night
The typical security watch for guards was 3 hours or 180 minutes.
In a lifespan of 100 years, that would be equal to 18 minutes.
| If you are: | Then you’ve lived… |
|---|---|
| 20 years old | 3.6 minutes of your 18 minutes |
| 30 years old | 5.4 minutes of your 18 minutes |
| 40 years old | 7.2 minutes of your 18 minutes |
| 50 years old | 9.0 minutes of your 18 minutes |
| 60 years old | 10.8 minutes of your 18 minutes |
As you can sense, the clock is ticking more rapidly than we think. And it’s never certain that we’ll get all those allotted minutes.
The Reality of Our Imperfection and Failings – Psalm 90:7-8
7 We are consumed by your anger
and terrified by your indignation.
8 You have set our iniquities before you,
our secret sins in the light of your presence.
Not only are our lives brief, but they are full of imperfection and failure before God. We may be able to cover up these failings from the eyes of men, but not from the eyes of God. And so there is no room for pride in our hearts. We need to humbly live and work with a due sense of urgency, responsibility and care. This applies not only to the way we use our days but also how we interact with others. Knowing that the lives of others is fragile and fleeting, do we seek the welfare of others? Do we seek to bring blessing and hope to them in the brief moments they share with you at home, at play, at work?
Comments (5)
Moses as a lesson in leadership
Dan,
I think you are raising some very key points in this article.
Recently we watched The Ten Commandments on DVD, the latest version, not the Charleton Heston classic. It is very interesting to observe the character development in Moses versus Pharoah in this film, which is quite a good treatment of the Bible passages it covers. Two leaders with very different outlooks on life.
To me, Moses is a study in STICK-HANDLING OUR FUTURES …
A Canadian comedian nicknamed ‘Red-Green’ always finishes his show with the little maxim, "keep your stick on the ice." A hockey analogy.
Its amazing what a stick in the right hands can do, under the right
conditions! Remember Gretzky?
Recently I was reading in Exodus about Moses at the bitter waters of Marah. He had just lead them from slavery and the clutches of the Egyptian Pharoah … and they were quickly upset with their leader … the people demanded water of Moses …
… he then "cried out to the Lord" .. THEN, the Lord ’showed him a stick’ which he then threw in the water and it all turned sweet, drinkable.
It struck me that ‘the next step’ in our lives often involves surprising, simple things that are sometimes counter-intuitive to ourselves (let alone others).
Poor Moses must have looked like a mess to the people. The Lord used all of this to encourage Moses and the people to keep their walk focused.
Its quite a little passage. (Ex. 15:22-27)
It struck me that his 40 years in the desert before returning to Egypt was not a waste.
It was preparation for ‘more desert’ experience in the Sinai, after the Red Sea deliverance … desert living for which that generation of Israelites was not accustomed. 40 years of preparation
for what could have been an 11 day journey (that stretched into 39 years, but that is another story …)
The key was that Moses ‘cried out to the Lord,’ and then God showed him the stick. My, how I need to learn that lesson. I am learning to ‘call out’ and to ’stick handle’ my days. To be faithful with the small things God puts in front of me.
It may look messy/riduculous or whatever to others, but my little stick is all that I have. In the hands of God it can usher in ‘my next thing’ and ’something of great value for others.’
Moses reminds me that God allows some of his leaders to be turned inside out. Moses’ life had amazing book-ends and every chapter was a story of relationship with God and people … not linear progression just based on principles (i.e. 10 keys to success or whatever.)
Two simple reminders:
Moses "cried out"
God "showed him a stick"
Moses is an amazing figure in Bible history. I need to learn more from his life and work … thank you for bringing him to our attention, Dan.
Leader Development as Linear Progression?
Thanks for your many insightful comments, Ross. One of the points you make (among many good ones!)is this idea of how leaders, and people in general grow and progress. It is very much a myth in my mind, as you have noted, that people make linear progression based on principles, 10 keys, 7 steps, or whatever. Progress ultimately is not self guided but an outworking of a God-facing relationship.
I think the point of the psalm is NOT to seek a purpose driven life, but a God-driven life. In my work in leader development, I see many, many people laying out plans, designing their own purpose or mission, and then setting off to pursue those things…and incidentally asking God to bless these efforts.
It seems that God had to bring Moses to the end of all these things…the idea that he might use his own position and power in Egypt to bring about the deliverance of a people, that he himself might have the ability to do all this by himself, that the people of God might rise up and show themselves to be a godly and God-seeking people.
I feel that it was only after the humbling and emptying process of his first 40 years in the desert…where all pretense and presumption was stripped away, and then in the early stages of the exodus, when things turned terribly bad, that Moses finally, in Exodus 33, cries out "show me Your glory" that Moses is himself finally transformed and becomes able to lead the people on a terribly difficult journey.
Moses indeed provides us with many, many lessons on leadership and the development of a leader.
Progressive vs. Leapfrog growth … God’s way
Your points are so important.
First, I must say that Moses is more a promise-driven leader than a purpose-driven leader. He learned to take God at his word. The design of the exodus was God’s strategy, not man’s. There was a strong vertical tug on Moses mind and heart … he received a sense of what God was promising to do and then he stepped out ‘believing’ and ‘doing.’
Second, the place of discontinuity in the life of a leader is profound. Moses spent 40 years on the backside of a desert. This did not come out of leadership foresight, long-term planning or beginning with the end in mind.
It was a discontinuity in his life and work. A profound season of downward mobility.
Joseph experienced the same thing.
He went from a pit to a palace to a prison and then back to a palace … over a span of many years. Nothing linear there.
The way in which God seemed to use some of his leaders in the Bible record, seemed to involve a crisis of faith, life circumstances or leadership itself. When the leader went into a personal tunnel of chaos, and kept his/her walk with God, it seems that they often come out with ‘leapfrog’ opportunities to honour the name of God and serve other people.
However, those who design ‘leapfrog opportunities’ for themselves end up messing things up.
The Bible calls Moses the meekest man on earth at that time … amazing.
Meekness = power under control. That is true leadership!
Ross
BBL Canada
Unknown
hi all. nice blog. its very ineresting article.
Unknown
hi nice site.