"It is better to go to a house of mourning than to go to a house of feasting, because that is the end of every man, and the living takes it to heart." (Eccles. 7:2) Much thought has been given to this lately, and the backdrops have been Psalms 90 & 19. Naturally we chase delight, ease, and amusement to pacify our souls, hardly recognizing the unrelenting tug of our hearts and the satiation that never seems quite to come. We look to another man's life and see their scenario which seems to disclose perfect joy, and we squirm. I squirm. "For who knows what is good for a man during his lifetime, during the few years of his futile life? He will spend them like a shadow." (Ecc. 6:12). I look on at feasts everyday, and view them from afar with jaded eyes. My mind forgets that perma-smiles and glittery jewels come with a price tag I am not willing to pay. The excess fuels a lust and God is forgotten in the enjoyment of His gifts. I wish it be not so, but abundance and activity naturally defer contemplation and true understanding. To not enjoy God is a travesty, as well as enjoying the gifts more than the Giver.
The other morning I opened to Psalm 19 and was swept completely away in the glory of my Maker. "The heavens are telling of the glory of God; and their expanse is declaring the work of His hands." I closed my eyes, (as I recommend you do yours,) and I listened for the hearkening of the heavens to my opened heart. I stood up to get something, and the horizon had begun its fill of coral and cobalt hues, and with piercing wisps the trees were illumined. Oh yes, the heavens are declaring, and how seldom do we listen! "Day to day pours forth speech, and night to night reveals knowledge." Hope, light and faithfulness rise with the sun, as truth, beauty, and order fill the evening sky. Each day these silent evangelists declare the majesty of God, and set up for us soul pegs on which we might hang our hearts.
This renewal of my mind began a fury at beholding any and all futility allowed to exist in my life, and the Lord lead me on to Psalm 90. (Spend time in these, people; labor over them!)
I'd been thinking much of mountains, and repeating to myself all the reasons why they've captured my affections. I'd also been thinking much of my beloved Montana, and came to be surprised at the first line of Psalm 90. He writes, "Lord you have been our dwelling place in all generations. Before the mountains were born or you gave birth to the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, You are God."
Spurgeon writes of this, "before those elder giants had struggled forth from nature's womb as her dread firstborn, the Lord was glorious and self-sufficient. Mountains to Him, though hoar with the snow of ages, are of an hour." Wow. Indeed, if He is from everlasting--of no beginning or end, certainly then, all things of this earth are hardly even marked with time. Also, the mountains were not called home, or the dwelling place of a people, but God is the very dwelling place--refuge--home, for the believer. His haven is also unlike anything of this earth for its foundation transcends time and it is not built with human hands. (Heb. 11:3, 11:16). Great consolation comes to the heart whose surety is secured in an unshakable and unchangeable God.
Moses wrote this after something like 38 years of wandering in the wilderness, and having been fed purely on the goodness and faithfulness of God. He'd seen a generation come and go in his sojournings, and had certainly had ample time for contemplation. He compares our lives to a watch (3 hours) in the night, or that a thousand years are as yesterday in the Lord's recollection. He compares man to the grass, which grows vigorous in the day, and withers at the night. He does not even liken man to the oak, but to simple, plentiful, perishing grass. Huh.
As Psalm 19 speaks of the sun and its circuit that is from one end of the heavens to the other exposing the day, Psalm 90 expands of the light of the Son that exposes the secret sins of man in the light of His awesome presence. You can hear his exhalation as he states that we "have finished our years like a sigh "[or a tale that is told]. And you can feel his exasperation as we consider, "what then? what to do?"
He implores, "So teach us to number our days, that we may present to You a heart of wisdom." Yes, Lord, teach us.