The LCA provides this sermon edited for lay-reading, with thanks to the original author.
Psalm 90
In case you haven’t been inside a shop recently, there are only a few more weeks and we will celebrate
Christmas! How time flies! It seems to go faster the older we get. For a child going to Primary School a
term seems so long that it’s impossible to see the end. They just have to live one day at a time.
Conversely, for those of a senior age, a year flies by faster than a month did when they were younger.
What does this mean for us as Christians?
The Psalmist looks at the speed of time for us who live on this earth. He begins with God. A good starting
point in the study of life and its problems is to begin with God. The deepest knowledge about ourselves
comes from the holy Scriptures. So the Writer of God’s Word begins:
“Lord, through all the generations you have been our home!
Before the mountains were created, before you made the earth and the world, you are God,
without beginning and end.”
We immediately see the great contrast between God and ourselves. We humans move along quickly from
one generation to the next. Just look at the younger generation these days: they are so different in the
way they think, and live their lives. Our grandparents probably thought the same about us! The Church
changes too! Think how much has changed since those first migrants came to Australia from overseas.
Then think back further to the Reformation, to Jesus, to the Psalmist, and even further back still. The
generations come and go like waves on the sea.
Above all these waves of countless generations there stands God. He stands above time. As the Psalmist
writes in verse two,
“Before the mountains were created, before you made the earth and the world, You are God,
without beginning or end.”
The contrast with us earthly people is made another way in verse four:
“For you, a thousand years are as yesterday!”
Human beings appear and disappear in wave after wave. Death takes them. And God is like a huge
mountain jutting way up above the waves, not touched by death. God is even older than the mountains!
We human beings weren’t created to disappear in death. The plan was for God’s people to live with him
in a wonderful fellowship briefly summed up in the word ‘love’. The people would love God completely.
Jesus describes their love for God would be “with all their heart, and all their soul, and all their minds.
They would love their neighbour as themselves.” God and people would share in total love. Does that
picture match up with our reality?
It comes as a shock to hear that we, who had been created as completely loving and caring people chose
the way into death. We, who were created for eternal life, now move away into death. The Psalmist
makes this point in verse three:
“You turn people back to dust, saying, “Return to dust!”
For you, a thousand years are as yesterday! They are like a few hours.”
What did you do yesterday? With God, a thousand years seems like yesterday morning. We can scarcely
imagine a thousand years going past so quickly. We people tend to cling to this life as though it is eternity.
We tend to plan and organise our lives as though we will live forever. Yet one long life is only a tiny point
in time. For God, a person celebrating a hundredth birthday today it is as though they were only born an
hour ago!
The Psalmist uses some vivid pictures to give us a glimpse of the brevity of our lives:
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1. Like a dream!
“You sweep people away like dreams that disappear.”
A normal human life is like waking up and no longer remembering a brief dream in the night. It is so quick
and short it disappears before it has started.
2. Like grass.
In our society we could compare death to a lawn mower that runs over generation after generation,
leaving nothing behind, not even a tiny flower! The mower is driven by God’s anger! The reason for God’s
anger is given in verse eight,
“You spread out our sins before you – our secret sins – and you see them all.”
When God looks into our hearts and minds and souls for the beautiful love that should flower – for him
and for all other people – he sees the opposite. He sees ugly weeds like selfishness, and pride, and hatred,
and greed spreading through our lives. When God looks it is like a powerful searchlight and nothing can
be hidden. Not even our most secret thought and desires.
If God didn’t turn the searchlight on us, we would be unaware that anything is wrong. We might suspect
there are some deep problems with some of the other folk we know, but we don’t see anything wrong in
ourselves. God’s Word announces the truth about our inner selves! The sin he sees is not a pretty picture.
God’s searching judgement might lead us to despair of ourselves. But the Good News is that God doesn’t
come to destroy, but he comes like a caring doctor. He scans us and gives us the verdict – a cancer called
sin that will destroy us if not removed!
In loving concern Jesus comes and takes the sin on himself. Jesus is led by the love of God. He is different
from us on the inside – with love for God and love for you and me. He doesn’t live as though this life is all
there is. He is barely 33 years old – not even half way to the average life expectancy we can look forward
to – when he takes on God’s judgement of you and me. Jesus goes into death. He takes all the anger of
God at our sin. In verse 11 the psalmist asks,
”Who can comprehend the power of your anger?
Jesus knows the power of God’s anger at sin. He copped the lot. The love of Jesus is so deep for us we
cannot begin to comprehend the depth of his suffering. Each day we can say to the Jesus who loves us,
“Satisfy us … with your unfailing love, so we may sing for joy to the end of our lives.
Give us gladness in proportion to our former misery!
Replace the evil years with good.
Let us see your miracles again; let your children see your glory at work.”
Jesus is God at work to win us with his love. We are loved by God.
It is we who grow old and die, but not God. When Jesus is offered up as the sacrifice for our sin, God is
offering up the best. The Passover lamb that the Israelites sacrificed each year had to be one year old,
without spot or blemish. Australian sheep farmers know that a one year old lamb is fully grown, and in its
prime. It is the best. It fetches the highest prices. They could not take some old broken-mouthed sheep on
its last legs. The sacrifice God offers is young, and in his prime, without spot or blemish.
Now we can live like God’s children – one day at a time. Eternity is like the end of a school term for a
child. We can’t see that far ahead. But in God’s time we will get there. Jesus will even carry us all the way,
like a good shepherd carrying a lamb. Jesus went ahead when he was only 33 years old so when our time
runs out we can join him. Then we shall be at home with God. That was God’s original plan! Then we shall
rest in God’s love, into eternity. God’s love is infinite and does not change with the passing of time. God’s
love conquers everything. It offers up the best for you and me.
Amen.
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