Numbering Time

Teach us to number our days, that we might get a heart of wisdom. – Psalm 90:12

This Psalm–a prayer of Moses, the man of God–speaks of time, something that many of us might acknowledge its presence when we feel it strained. We may also find ourselves pushed and pulled by time–read "our schedules,"–not being so much mindfully engaged, but simply following the course carved out for us. With respect to time and God, we hear in this psalm: "from everlasting to everlasting, you are God; a thousand years in your sight are but as yesterday when it is past." That is not our experience as humans. Seventy years, maybe a decade or two more, is the max for us.

If we are to number our days, it at least means that we are mindful of them and the inevitable day when we will return to the dust. Why then do we pray that the Lord would teach us to number our days? It is so we might know what life is for and so pursue it; "to get a heart of wisdom." As we are made for the Lord–in him we live, and move, and have our being,– to number our days is to reckon with our allotted time: how we might use it; how we might "spend" it. For what we spend it on is clearly of value to us. By spending time on something, we proclaim it is of value, for we spend the one thing which we can never acquire more of it.

So if i were to number my days, reckon with how much time I have, where should I allocate it? What responsibilities are rightfully mine that I should spend my time there? What habits or practices need to diminish–I must diminish those things; they do not magically disappear–to make room for more life-giving uses of time?

Reckoning with the relatively short amount of time I have, should also lead us more deeply into the Christian virtues of humility and faith. The time that the Lord has given us is enough.

O Lord, teach us to number our days, that we might get a heart of wisdom.