Please turn in your Bibles this morning to Psalm 90 as we look at the issue of learning to number our days. As you are turning there, consider this, what would you do if you had to buy time:
Consider this: “If we had to buy time, would there be any difference in how we would spend it? Would the days of our lives be used more wisely?” That’s what time management consultant Antonio Herrera asked the participants in a seminar he conducted on the subject. Then Dr. Herrera became more specific. He asked, “What if you had to pay in advance $100 an hour for the time allotted to you? Would you waste it?” The answer should be obvious.
Of course, we can’t put a price tag on the minutes and hours we possess. They are given to us freely. But that doesn’t excuse us from using them conscientiously, carefully, and wisely. The giver of time is God Himself, and that places a far greater value upon it than any monetary figure could suggest. We must therefore use our time intelligently, taking advantage of opportunities it provides for us to serve the Lord and to do His will. – R. W. D.
- Our Daily Bread, July 26
As the New Year is just a few days old now, many New Year’s resolutions have been made and many have been broken already. Now I am not big on New Year’s resolutions, maybe because I fail at fulfilling many of them, but there is one New Year’s resolution that I believe is important for us to keep, it is vital for us to follow through and that is this: that this year we will grow closer to the Lord than we were last year! You see, it speaks of our Christian walk and if there has been no change in our relationship with the Lord then we are stagnant, we aren’t moving. If our relationship with the Lord is less than the year before, then we are backsliding, and again, that is not good, that is not what the Lord desires for us!
And so this morning I would like to encourage you to move forward, to draw closer to the Lord, that you would allow the Lord to teach you to number your days and then to walk down that path that He has set for you! With that said, let’s begin reading in Psalm 90 and we are going to look at verse 12 and let’s see what the Lord has for us this morning.
This Psalm was born out of a prayer of Moses regarding the Jewish people, their wandering for forty years in the wilderness because of unbelief. And Moses’ prayer is for the children of Israel to be revived, to use the days that God has given to them for His glory, that the works of their hands would be of God and not of their own selfish motives or unbelief. It is a prayer to have a God-centered life that overflows into their actions!
Before we examine these verses closer and see how they apply to our lives, let me share with you a serious problem in the lives of many Christians across America – they are not growing in the Lord, they are stagnant and happy to be there! George Barna looked back at the year 2003 and as he surveyed people regarding their faith, this is what his research showed:
Citing the findings from a just-completed national survey of 2033 adults that showed only 4% of adults have a biblical worldview as the basis of their decision-making, researcher George Barna described the outcome. “If Jesus Christ came to this planet as a model of how we ought to live, then our goal should be to act like Jesus. Sadly, few people consistently demonstrate the love, obedience and priorities of Jesus. The primary reason that people do not act like Jesus is because they do not think like Jesus. Behavior stems from what we think – our attitudes, beliefs, values and opinions. Although most people own a Bible and know some of its content, our research found that most Americans have little idea how to integrate core biblical principles to form a unified and meaningful response to the challenges and opportunities of life. We’re often more concerned with survival amidst chaos than with experiencing truth and significance.”
The research indicated that everyone has a worldview, but relatively few people have a biblical worldview – even among devoutly religious people. The survey discovered that only 9% of born again Christians have such a perspective on life. The numbers were even lower among other religious classifications: Protestants (7%), adults who attend mainline Protestant churches (2%) and Catholics (less than one-half of 1%). The denominations that produced the highest proportions of adults with a biblical worldview were non-denominational Protestant churches (13%), Pentecostal churches (10%) and Baptist churches (8%).
For the purposes of the research, a biblical worldview was defined as believing that absolute moral truths exist; that such truth is defined by the Bible; and firm belief in six specific religious views. Those views were that Jesus Christ lived a sinless life; God is the all-powerful and all-knowing Creator of the universe and He still rules it today; salvation is a gift from God and cannot be earned; Satan is real; a Christian has a responsibility to share their faith in Christ with other people; and the Bible is accurate in all of its teachings.
- George Barna, A Biblical Worldview Has a Radical Effect on a Person’s Life, December 1, 2003
Now in saying that, it doesn’t sound too good if only 9% of born again Christians have a biblical worldview and yet, the church today feels it is strong, it is moving in the right direction, it is moving forward – not exactly when you look at the data! Again, George Barna said this regarding a survey he took:
. . . While people are clearly spending less time involved in religious practices such as Bible reading, prayer, and participating in church activities, 70% claim that their own religious faith is consistently growing deeper.
Further, at the same time that 84% of adults claim to be Christian, three out of four say they are either absolutely or somewhat committed to Christianity, and three-fifths say they believe the Bible is totally accurate in all that it teaches, the moral foundations are crumbling. This year brought about increases in the proportions of people who contend that cohabitation (60%), adultery (42%), sexual relations between homosexuals (30%), abortion (45%), pornography (38%), the use of profanity (36%) and gambling (61%) are “morally acceptable” behaviors.
Several Barna studies pointed out that most Christian churches evaluate success in terms of program attendance, child satisfaction and parental satisfaction, but do little to examine individual spiritual advancement.
What makes all of these realities so hard to grasp is the substantial level of religious activity in the United States. Although there has been no change in the percentage of adults or teenagers who are born again in many years, the fact that four out of every ten adults attends a church service in a typical week; that a similar proportion read the Bible outside of church services; or that eight out of ten people claim to pray to God during a typical week minimizes people’s sensitivity to other indicators of spiritual decay. Christian ministries will raise nearly $60 billion for domestic ministry in 2003, and there is an estimated $3 billion of new construction work occurring on church properties to facilitate expanded ministry activities. All of these figures lend an air of security and stability to the religious condition of the country.
. . . The fact that there has not been any measurable increase in church involvement or personal spiritual depth in the past decade challenges the widespread notion that the U. S. is as spiritually healthy and focused as ever.
- George Barna, Spiritual Progress Hard to Find in 2003, December 22, 2003
If that is true, if the results that George Barna has put forward are correct, and I believe they are, then how in the world can we change a nation? How in the world can we get people more involved, to turn up the heat regarding our spiritual lives? How do we get the spiritual condition of this nation moving again, moving in the right direction? Very simply, one heart at a time and it begins with our heart and it will spread from there, touching the lives of others. If Jesus has impacted your life, it will overflow and touch others, it is catchy! Remember what the Lord told Solomon in II Chronicles 7:13-14 when the people turn from God and God’s judgment comes upon them, “When I shut up heaven and there is no rain, or command the locusts to devour the land, or send pestilence among My people, if My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land.”
Obviously this can be spoken of in regards to a nation or an individual. You see, when the spiritual condition of the nation or the person becomes dry, becomes lifeless; when things are eating away at the foundations of this nation; of what you believe, when the disease of sin is consuming a nation, a person; then pray to the Lord, seek Him, and it is the Lord who will bring healing to this land and to the individual. But don’t miss the point, the Lord is calling for His people to get on their knees and pray, to get serious regarding their relationship with Him. That means it begins with us and if our walk with the Lord is stagnant or moving backwards, we will not impact this nation or any individual for our own lives are not even impacted by God!
Again, let’s read through Psalm 90 verse 12 once again. We are told, “So teach us to number our days, That we may gain a heart of wisdom.” Or as The Living Bible puts this verse, “Teach us to number our days and recognize how few they are; help us to spend them as we should.” The word “teach” in Hebrew is YADHA and it speaks of understanding, acquiring knowledge, seeking it out. It also speaks of knowing a woman intimately! What does that have to do with this verse? Very simply, we are to know God’s Word intimately. You see, you grow by knowing more about the Lord, reading His Word, learning from Him, being taught by the Holy Spirit!
Here at Calvary Chapel we are in our ninth year reading through the Bible, from Genesis through Revelation. Each Sunday in our bulletin is a reading schedule for the week for you to follow. It amounts to reading about 2 to 3 chapters in the Old Testament and about 1 chapter in the New Testament each day, or about 15 minutes a day! And think about it, at the end of the year you will have read all of God’s Word, all that He has for you. If you haven’t started yet, you are only 3 days behind. Thus, just get started now, and you can easily make up those chapters you are behind. You don’t have to do it in a day, but over a week, a month, and you will be caught up with us. You need to make it part of your daily activity, make it a habit, for it is a great one and once you do, you will not go a day without being in the Word of God.
In his book, Being the Best (Thomas Nelson Publishers), Denis Waitley has some interesting observations about procrastination. He tells us:
When you stop to think about it there is no such thing as a future decision. You face only present decisions that will affect what will happen in the future. Procrastinators wait for just the right moment to decide. If you wait for the perfect moment, you become a security seeker who is running in place, going through the motions, and getting deeper in a rut.
If I wait for every objection to be overcome, I will attempt nothing. My personal motto is, Stop Stewing and Start Doing. I can’t be depressed and active at the same time. I like changing the word motivation slightly to reflect a personal commitment to take charge of today and make it the best day I can – motive plus action equals motive-action.
Everybody is looking for new ways to get motivated. Companies and corporations pay sizable fees to consultants who try to make their personnel more productive and fire up their salespeople. A motivated person thinks, I’m going to try it. But motivation must turn into motive-action, or nothing will happen.
That is the quandary of the unknown poet who wrote:
I spent a fortune
On a trampoline,
And a rowing machine
Complete with gadgets
To read my pulse,
And gadgets to prove
My progress results,
And others to show
The miles I’ve charted –
But they left off the gadget
To get me started!
The gadget that can get you started is motive-action. Try it and see!”
- Bits & Pieces, June 22, 1995, pp. 6-7
How many Bibles do you own? I bet that most of you have at least 2, maybe more. The thing is, not how many Bibles do you have, but how often do your read the Bible you do have? You see, the Word of God is our daily spiritual food and thus, if we don’t partake of it, we will be starving ourselves spiritually speaking. Peter put it this way in I Peter 2:1-3, “Therefore, laying aside all malice, all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and all evil speaking, as newborn babes, desire the pure milk of the word, that you may grow thereby, if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is gracious.” I like the way The Amplified Bible puts it, “SO BE done with every trace of wickedness (depravity, malignity) and all deceit and insincerity (pretense, hypocrisy) and grudges (envy, jealousy) and slander and evil speaking of every kind. Like newborn babies you should crave (thirst for, earnestly desire) the pure (unadulterated) spiritual milk, that by it you may be nurtured and grow unto [completed] salvation, Since you have [already] tasted the goodness and kindness of the Lord. [Ps 34:8.]”
I know that we are all very busy, but how many times do you not eat all day, miss all your meals because you are so busy? I bet not too often if at all because you need to eat to keep your physical body healthy and strong. Thus, take 15 minutes a day to read the Word of God and keep your spirit healthy and strong! Turn off the television which doesn’t build you up for the most part, there are some good things on there, but you need to be fed, you need the nourishment of God’s Word. The Lord said in Amos 8:11-12, “‘Behold, the days are coming,’ says the Lord GOD, ‘That I will send a famine on the land, Not a famine of bread, Nor a thirst for water, But of hearing the words of the LORD. They shall wander from sea to sea, And from north to east; They shall run to and fro, seeking the word of the LORD, But shall not find it.’”
Also, I would encourage you this year to do some Bible memory verses. Just pick a couple of verses each week, write them down on some paper, and go over them each day and if you do that over the entire year, only 2 per week, you will have memorized 104 verses in just 1 year. And I will tell you this from my own personal experience. It is not easy for me to do, I have to work at it, but it is amazing how those come to mind as you are going through situations, as you are sharing your faith. Not only read God’s Word this year, but also memorize it, Navigators has a good program of Bible memorization that I used when I first got saved or you can just make your own, a Scripture that God is speaking to you about, maybe from your daily reading, and write it down and go over it and over it and make it part of your life!
You see, God’s Word is so important because it is living and powerful in our lives if we would allow it to be. Paul tells us, “For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are naked and open to the eyes of Him to whom we must give account.” The Living Bible puts these verses this way, “For whatever God says to us is full of living power: it is sharper than the sharpest dagger, cutting swift and deep into our innermost thoughts and desires with all their parts, exposing us for what we really are. He knows about everyone, everywhere. Everything about us is bare and wide open to the all-seeing eyes of our living God; nothing can be hidden from him to whom we must explain all that we have done.” And The Amplified Bible puts these verses this way, “For the Word that God speaks is alive and full of power [making it active, operative, energizing, and effective]; it is sharper than any two-edged sword, penetrating to the dividing line of the breath of life (soul) and [the immortal] spirit, and of joints and marrow [of the deepest parts of our nature], exposing and sifting and analyzing and judging the very thoughts and purposes of the heart. And not a creature exists that is concealed from His sight, but all things are open and exposed, naked and defenseless to the eyes of Him with Whom we have to do.” Hebrews 4:12-13. As it has been said, 7 days not reading your Bible makes one weak! Let us not neglect our spiritual food, THE WORD OF GOD!
Not only are we to acquire knowledge by reading the Bible and memorizing Scripture but we also need to number our days in regards to the knowledge we have acquired from God. You see, we all have a set time to live and I believe God is telling us to use them fully, don’t waste the days that He has given to us! There is a space of time that God has given to us to work and thus, if we don’t use that time wisely, it will be wasted. This is not to lay on you some big guilt trip but I believe we need to be aware that our time is short, that we are here for a reason. In verse 10 of Psalm 90 we are told, “The days of our lives are seventy years; And if by reason of strength they are eighty years . . .” Thus, let us not waste the time that God has given to us!
Paul, in Ephesians 5:15-21 tells us, “See then that you walk circumspectly, not as fools but as wise, 16 redeeming the time, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be unwise, but understand what the will of the Lord is. And do not be drunk with wine, in which is dissipation; but be filled with the Spirit, speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord, giving thanks always for all things to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, submitting to one another in the fear of God.”
And The Amplified Bible puts these verses this way, “Look carefully then how you walk! Live purposefully and worthily and accurately, not as the unwise and witless, but as wise (sensible, intelligent people), Making the very most of the time [buying up each opportunity], because the days are evil. Therefore do not be vague and thoughtless and foolish, but understanding and firmly grasping what the will of the Lord is. And do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery; but ever be filled and stimulated with the [Holy] Spirit. [Prov 23:20.] Speak out to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, offering praise with voices [and instruments] and making melody with all your heart to the Lord, At all times and for everything giving thanks in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ to God the Father. Be subject to one another out of reverence for Christ (the Messiah, the Anointed One).”
Notice, Paul tells us to walk carefully because the days are evil, pay attention but keep walking, know what God’s will is for you, what you are to do and the way that is done is by submitting to the Holy Spirit, moment by moment, day by day, week by week, month by month, year by year and-so-on. And as you do your life will overflow with the things of God as you are using your time wisely for the Lord, to bring Him glory!
Lastly, we are told that as we read God’s Word, as we learn to use the days that God has given to us wisely, we will gain a heart of wisdom and true wisdom leads to a reverence of the Lord, that is where it begins and it ends! It is as Job 28:28 says, “And to man He said, ‘Behold, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom, And to depart from evil is understanding.’” Also, in Proverbs 2: 2, 6 we are told, “So that you incline your ear to wisdom, And apply your heart to understanding . . . For the LORD gives wisdom; From His mouth come knowledge and understanding.” Wisdom is the application of knowledge, the things that God has taught us we need to apply to our lives; we need to walk in them! You see, if you just have information, knowledge, it becomes useless unless you apply it to your life!
Listen to this poem that puts things into perspective for us. It goes like this:
This is the beginning of a New Day.
God has given me this day to use as I will.
I can waste it or grow in its light
And be of service to others.
But what I do with this day is important because . . .
I have exchanged a day of my life for it.
When tomorrow comes,
Today will be gone forever.
I hope I will not regret the price I paid for it.
- Author Unknown
The Year 2003 is over, there is nothing we can change about it, we can’t do anything about what we did in it or what we didn’t do in it. The thing is, we truly can start a fresh this year and make it a year we grow in the Lord. That we learn how to number our days, we learn what God desires for us in this year and we gain His heart of wisdom as we walk with Him, moving forward in the Lord! Read His Word daily. Spend time with Him. Memorize Scripture. Be in fellowship with other believers. Get involved in Bible studies. See how you can minister in the body of Christ that He has placed you in!
As I close this morning, may I encourage you with these words from Peter as he said, “You therefore, beloved, since you know this beforehand, beware lest you also fall from your own steadfastness, being led away with the error of the wicked; but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be the glory both now and forever. Amen.” II Peter 3:17-18. That is my prayer not only for you this year, but also for me, that in the year 2004 we would grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and walk worthy of the high calling by which we have been called! As the Psalmist said, “So teach us to number our days, That we may gain a heart of wisdom.”