Our Everlasting God
Notes
Transcript
Observations
Observations
When I was in undergrad I had a professor start a lecture by saying “You are going to die… and when you die no one will care.” Now he was an Old Testament professor so it’s very likely he spent a little too much time reading book three of the psalms that morning…
However, his point wasn’t just to make a bunch of 20 somethings sad. He later went on to state that the sooner you come to grips with the reality that you are going to die the sooner you can learn to not stress about your life.
I may have told part of this story before… but in my early 20s this caught me off guard - my generation has been referred to as a snowflake generation. We were given participation trophies and told we could be anything we set our minds to… So for once it felt like people weren’t lying to me anymore - because I knew he was right - one day I will indeed die.
He was currently in the process of mourning the death of his dad, and I certainly think that was part of his motivation. But during this conversation he also asked the question “How many of you know your grandparents parents names?” A few raised their hands - And then he went back another generation until no one raised their hands.
And thus he added on “You are going to die… and in 100 years no one will know your name.” And this he connected back to his dad - and how even though his Dad’s funeral was well attended none of the close to 200 students in that classroom.
Yet the whole point of his statement was quick similar to what Moses teaches us here in this Psalm. Learn two things: God eternal, you are not - your days are numbered, and when you realize that seek for the eternal one to give you wisdom that you may live wisely.
Moses writes this Psalm. While we see other songs from Moses in the OT, such as Exodus 15 and Deuteronomy 32 you might be surprised to hear this is the only Psalm written by Moses. If we remember that the Psalter is telling a story then we see Psalm 90 as a (somewhat) hopeful response to book 3.
Like many of the Psalms of David - this Psalm seems to be born out of the experience of Moses and the Israelites in the wilderness. This Psalm speaks of God’s eternality and man’s mortality. God is from everlasting and man get 70-80 years if he’s lucky. And consider how that message would sound to a group of men who are banished from the land that their fathers was promised for 40 years so that those who were disobedient would die out before the next generation enters into the land.
From Everlasting, From Dust, To Tomorrow
From Everlasting
From Everlasting
The Psalm opens with a remarkable statement about God’s care for his people.
1 Lord, you have been our dwelling place in all generations.
While we have become very familiar with concept of God making his dwelling with his people in the garden, the temple, the tabernacle, the person of Jesus who dwelt among us, and the Holy Spirit who dwells in the followers of Jesus. The manner in which Moses uses the language here is a little different - rather God has been a dwelling for the the people of God. God has been a shelter for the people of God. Consider the significance of this to a people who are currently homeless. At the time that Moses wrote this they have left slavery in Egypt and they are wandering in the wilderness. They do not currently have a home - they live in tents - but God is their shelter.
2 Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever you had formed the earth and the world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God.
God is everlasting. He was there before the foundations of the earth, and before time itself.
This placed further emphasis on God as a shelter to his people in all generations. Because he has no beginning or end he can be a shelter to his people from all generations.
God has always been God. “From everlasting to everlasting you are God.”
From everlasting to everlasting is very clear that it wasn’t just a super long time ago - but that there was never a time when he was not.
(This verse significantly separates us from Mormons, we’ll discuss that in sunday school in a few weeks.)
God has always been. God has always been God. God was never anything other than God.
And this statement is significant for the rest of the text as God’s immortality is set against our mortality…
God is eternal. We are finite. You came into existence when you were conceived in your mother’s womb. God did not - he has no beginning. And God has no end.
As a reminder, you are going to die. One day your heart will stop beating, your brain will stop working, your lungs will stop breathing.
And this statement of God’s eternality in verse 2 feeds into verse 3.
From the Dust
From the Dust
3 You return man to dust and say, “Return, O children of man!”
The eternal one is the one who returns you back to the dust. The Lord is the one who states that it is time for you to die.
Psalm 139 states something similar. The same text that states that God formed your inward parts, and knitted you together in your mothers womb in verse 13 also states that God numbered your days before you were born.
16 Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them.
Yet Moses is also picking up no the language of Genesis 3:19, where in the curse the Lord tells Adam from dust you came to dust you shall return.
And in James 4:14 we see a similar statement.
14 yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes.
But as we see in verse 4, God is not like that
4 For a thousand years in your sight are but as yesterday when it is past, or as a watch in the night.
And this is a somewhat familiar verse as we see it referenced in 2 Peter 3:8
8 But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.
But consider how seldom we actually consider the weight of that. 1000 years ago there were no baptist nor presbyterian churches, - there was no division between the eastern and western churches there was no Roman Catholic or Eastern Orthodox. Do you know the name of anyone in your family line that lived 1000 years ago? I assume not. And yet the text here tells us that it like a day to the Lord - or like a few hours in the night.
And verses 5-6 continue the idea of the man’s transience - stating that God sweeps us away as with a flood - that our days are like a passing thought, or a dream - you wake up and it’s gone… and after a few minutes you’ve forgotten the dream altogether. We are like glass - green in the morning and dead and withered it the evening. Moses is stacking these pictures to make clear that we as the band Kansas sang… are dust in the wind.
7 For we are brought to an end by your anger; by your wrath we are dismayed.
Now this might sound like Moses is writing that we die because God gets angry with us - and that’s not exactly what he means here. Remember that Psalms 86 and 89 teach us that God is slow to anger, he is abounding in steadfast love and mercy. God is not some spiteful child with a magnifying glass burning ants.
But when Moses speaks of the Lord bringing us to an end by his anger, and that we are dismayed by his wrath - we ought to remember that our sins are heinous - and a righteous God must respond to our sins with wrath. And this is further stated by verse 8…
8 You have set our iniquities before you, our secret sins in the light of your presence.
We have no secret sins. Even your darkest thoughts God knows them. The sins that you have so carefully hidden from your family, or the sins that you prevent anyone from church from knowing about. You might fool me, and hide your sins on Sunday morning as you put on your Sunday’s best - but there are no sins so secret that God does know about them. And frankly hiding your addictions, thoughts, habits, temptations, and depravity from me, or the rest of the church doesn’t protect you from wrath - it just protects your ego. Your ego wont spare you from the wrath of God.
17 For nothing is hidden that will not be made manifest, nor is anything secret that will not be known and come to light.
Secret sins will be brought to light.
11 Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them.
The world around us often equates sin with fun, but the Bible equates sin and death. Sin is what is killing you.
We may seek to hide our sins in darkness, but they will be revealed and judged by the light of God’s presence. And all sins will be judged… they will either be placed on Christ and forgiven, or you will bear the weight of that… and in verse 9 we read that the wrath of God is on all our days. This is because God hates sin.
10 The years of our life are seventy, or even by reason of strength eighty; yet their span is but toil and trouble; they are soon gone, and we fly away.
It is interesting that Moses writes that we might get 70-80 years in verse 10, when Deuteronomy 34:7 tells that Moses lived 120 years. Moses being the exception does not negate his statement though.
Yet Moses does not say all of this to be bleak - we have certainly had a lot of that in the Psalms this summer. But rather in 12-17, Moses turns from his reflection on the eternality of God and the finiteness of man to applying that. But consider how Moses watched an entire generation of Israelites pass away over 40 years in the wilderness.
So Moses isn’t just stating this as a poetic statement - for him it was happening before his very eyes.
So though this reality was around Moses as he is watching this generation die off… things haven’t changes for us today. We still see that people live for the most part 70-80 years and then they die - they are soon gone.
The Moses concludes this section with a rhetorical question….
11 Who considers the power of your anger, and your wrath according to the fear of you?
On the one hand this answer to this is no one. However, that’s because the power of God’s anger is unfathomable to a finite human. However, Jesus on the cross has the fullness of God’s wrath poured out upon him. Those who believe in Jesus are forgiven of their sins, that warrant them death and judgment, and are promised a glorious eternity with the everlasting one.
However, Moses uses this not as a space to mope - but instead he uses this as a guide for how he ought to seek tomorrow. He prays to God to ask him for aid in how to live.
To Tomorrow
To Tomorrow
In light of knowing that your days are numbered - pray that God teaches you to use those days wisely - use that for wisdom. Not misery.
12 So teach us to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom.
verse 12: God is from everlasting. We are not. We will die. So in light of that we pray that God teach us to number our days that we might gain wisdom. There is wisdom in knowing that your days are numbered.
And this actually goes back to the point of what my Old Testament professor was trying to teach us. Which he had an air for making shocking statements - he was teaching us to be comfortable with the idea that we likely wont be famous, and will likely have a limited influence - but we still have responsibility to use our days wisely and to use them to glorify our creator.
And Moses’ prayer continues, he asks that God would have pity on them - and if you remember the book of numbers you can see that God quite regularly had pity on Israel - he was incredibly merciful to them. And frankly each and every one day that we wake up - each morning that the Lord gives us - each morning that he satisfies us with his love is grace. Paul tells us in Romans 6:23 that the wages of sin are death - our sins earn our death.
And as Moses prays in verse 14 - pray each day that God’s love would satisfy you - that God would be enough… and that this would turn your to rejoice always in him. That it would lead you to turn from sin and unrighteousness and instead glory in God. And even that God would lead us to be glad in the midst of affliction. That the Lord might give you joy even when God has brought sorrow upon us as the Psalmist in Psalm 88, or when God in judgment destroys the nation as he did in Psalm 89 - pray that God might still satisfy you in his love. That we like Paul, when he was in prison, might learn to rejoice in the Lord always.
(ADDRESS 15 on Wednesday night)
The Moses closes the psalm in verses 16-17
16 Let your work be shown to your servants, and your glorious power to their children. 17 Let the favor of the Lord our God be upon us, and establish the work of our hands upon us; yes, establish the work of our hands!
By reflecting upon God’s work - that he might show it to his servants. And then asking that God would show them grace and establish the work of their hands.
Application:
God’s eternality is a reason to praise him but it is also a reason to trust him, and a reason to pray - but it is also a reason to glorify him with every fiber of our being. We will fail. Daily we will fail to ascribe God the glory that he deserves - but God is rich in mercy, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.
God is everlasting - he has been king through it all. Through the 500 years of Egyptian slavery, through the collapse of the temple and the fall of the Davidic kingdom, through Assyrian and Babylonian captivities of the OT, through the persecution of the early church in Acts, through the crusades, through the holocaust, through the cold war, through today Jesus is king - and no presidential election, no recession, no nuclear war, nor anything else will threaten his throne. Jesus is eternally reigning as King.
And as Psalm 2 reads - kiss the son, lest he be angry. You will either fall on the rock of ages and be broken, or the rock of ages will fall on you and and be crushed. You will either come to Christ and find yourself forgiven and free in him - or you will face him at judgment.
The Scriptures tell us that in Hebrews 9:27-28
27 And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment,
The book of Hebrews also tell us in Heb 10:31
31 It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.
I quoted half of Romans 6:23 earlier…
23 For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
There is a free gift of grace to be had for those who believe in Christ Jesus.
GOSPEL…
Christ is the everlasting one who took on flesh so that he might die so we can have eternal life with him.
Confess your sins to God… bring the darkness into the light…
You are going to die one day - so with the time that you have pray that the Lord establishes the work of your hands. Pray that the Lord uses your hands, your talents, your skills for his glory - and do not allow them to be squandered so that you might build up wrath.
(Pray: Eternal God… you are from everlasting to everlasting… you have formed the earth and everything around us. Verse 12.