PSALMS LESSON 90
 
     We will begin this lesson by giving the 90th Psalm in metre.

                   THE PSALMS OF DAVID IN METRE

                             Chapter 90

Verse 1  "Lord, thou hast been our dwelling place From age to age,
         from race to race. Before the mountains were brought forth,
         Or ever thou hadst formed the earth. From years which no
         beginning had to years unending, thou art God."
Verse 2  "Thou turnest man to dust again, And sayst, Return, ;ye sons
         of men. As yesterday, when past appears, So in thy sight a
         thousand; years, They like a day are in thy sight, Yea, like
         a passing watch by night. "
Verse 3  "As with a flood thou mak'st them pass; They like a sleep
         are, like the grass, That in the morning may be seen To grow
         and flourish, fresh and green; At evening by the hand of
         death, It is cut down, and withereth.
Verse 4  "For in thine anger we're consumed, And by thy wrath to
         trouble doomed; Thou in thy sight our sins dost place, Our
         secret sins before thy face. For in thy wrath our days we
         spend, Our years like tales which quickly end. "
Verse 5  "Our days are threescore years and ten, And if, through
         strength, fourscore, Yet then'tis labor, sorrow and decay;
         'tis soon cut off;-we fly away. Who knows the pow'r thine
         anger hath?  As is thy fear so is thy wrath. "
Verse 6  "O teach thou us to count our days, And set our hearts on
         wisdom's ways. Return, O Lord, at length relent, And for thy
         servants'sake repent. How long-how long-thus shall it be?
         Return, that we may joy in thee. "
Verse 7  "O do thy mercy soon impart To satisfy our longing heart, So
         we rejoice shall all our days, And happy be in thee always.
         For days of grief that we have had, And years of evil, make
         us glad. "
Verse 8  "Thy work unto thy servants show, Thy glory let their
         children know, And let there be on us bestowed The beauty of
         the Lord our God: The work accomplished by our hand Let it by
         thee established stand.

     We will now begin the verse by verse study of the 90th chapter of
Psalms. Psalms 90:1 "{A Prayer of Moses the man of God.} LORD, thou
hast been our dwelling place in all generations."

     Now we see a totally different penman and a totally different
time. We clearly see the children of Israel on the way to the promised
land in this chapter. Moses was God's anointed leader to take them out
of Egypt {world} to the promised land. We see him spoken of as the man
of God, in the verse above. All men and women of God depend heavily
upon prayer. Moses was known to be very meek. He depended entirely
upon God. They may be in the wilderness when Moses wrote this, but for
a fact they were securely in the LORD's hands every step of the way.
As we go through our wilderness on the way to our promised land, we
had better be dwelling in the hands of the Lord, if we plan to make
heaven. Just as the LORD provided all of their needs in their journey,
He will provide our needs, if we are stayed in Him. He truly was
Jehovah Jirah, their provider. We must learn a lesson from this. God
is our shelter from the storm, He is our protector, He is our comfort,
He loves us as no other one ever has. He loves us like He loved these
Israelites, in spite of our faults. He loved us so much, that He sent
us our Saviour.

     Psalms 90:2 "Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever
thou hadst formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to
everlasting, thou [art] God."

     In the beginning, God, says it all. Even the word, in, means
surrounded by the beginning God. There was not anything, or any one,
when God existed in the beginning. The first few chapters in Genesis
tell us that He existed before anything else. In John Chapter 1, we
read about this, also. Let me give one or two verses, but you read it
all. John 1:1 "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with
God, and the Word was God." John 1:2 "The same was in the beginning
with God."  John 1:3 "All things were made by him; and without him was
not any thing made that was made."  Now, let us look at who we are
talking about. I John 5:7 "For there are three that bear record in
heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are
one." You see God made it all. He is Alpha and Omega, the Beginning
and the End, the Everlasting One.

     Psalms 90:3 "Thou turnest man to destruction; and sayest, Return,
ye children of men."

     From dust thou art, and to dust thou shalt return. Man was but a
clump of clay, until God breathed the breath of life in him, and he
became a living soul. Man, without God, is but dust. We can see from
the next Scripture that our eternal life came from Jesus {the second
Adam}. I Corinthians 15:45 "And so it is written, The first man Adam
was made a living soul; the last Adam [was made] a quickening spirit."
Without God we are as the first Adam, flesh that will return to dust.

     Psalms 90:4 "For a thousand years in thy sight [are but] as
yesterday when it is past, and [as] a watch in the night."

     With God, time is nothing. It is only in His dealing with men
that He regards time. II Peter 3:8 "But, beloved, be not ignorant of
this one thing, that one day [is] with the Lord as a thousand years,
and a thousand years as one day."  God is not controlled by time, as
we are, but is rather the controller of time. Days and weeks and
months are for this life, not for eternity. In heaven where God
dwells, there is but one eternal day. There is no night at all.

     Psalms 90:5 "Thou carriest them away as with a flood; they are
[as] a sleep: in the morning [they are] like grass [which] groweth
up."

     This is undoubtedly speaking of the life span of a person. It is
in time as a blink of His eye. We do not live very long. We are like
grass that comes up in the spring and is gone in the fall. The wonder
of it all, to me, is that if we are so insignificant, why did He love
us so much that He sent His Son to die on the cross, that we might be
saved to live eternally with Him.

     Psalms 90:6 "In the morning it flourisheth, and groweth up; in
the evening it is cut down, and withereth."

     This is very much like our life. We bloom when we are children
and teenagers, but very soon old age comes, and we are gone. This life
is like a wind that blows and then is gone. The only life worth living
for is that eternal life with our Lord. Let that second Adam {Jesus
Christ} quicken your spirit that you might live forever, with Him.
I love the sound of {forever}.

     Psalms 90:7 "For we are consumed by thine anger, and by thy wrath
are we troubled."

     God never intended for mankind to live so short a time. Sin
brought death. The sad thing is that man knows he is destined to die.
In fact, man begins to die the day he is born. All the smart people in
all the world have not figured out how to live very long. Thank
goodness, God provided a way for us to live for ever; Jesus is the
Way. Now when God looks at us, He is not angry. He sees the beautiful
white linen garment of righteousness that Jesus gave us in exchange
for our sins. He sees His adopted children.

     Psalms 90:8 "Thou hast set our iniquities before thee, our secret
[sins] in the light of thy countenance."

     There is no sin ever committed that God is not aware of. You may
hide them from the world, but God knows them everyone. His Light
searches the heart and soul of man and reads us like a book.

     Psalms 90:9 "For all our days are passed away in thy wrath: we
spend our years as a tale [that is told]."

     When our life is nearing the end, we can look back, and it is
like a short story that has been told. Praise God! believers do not
feel the wrath of God. When a believer dies, it is like stepping out
of one room and going to a beautiful room awaiting for us. Jesus is
the Door we enter by.

     Psalms 90:10 "The days of our years [are] threescore years and
ten; and if by reason of strength [they be] fourscore years, yet [is]
their strength labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly
away."

     Moses is saying that 70 years is the natural life span of a
person on this earth. Some stronger people even live to be 80, but
even at that, it is very short. In our day, a few are living to be 100
years old, but even that, when measured against all of eternity, is
but one tick on God's clock. I love the part that says {we fly away}.
Christians, to be absent from this body, is to present with the Lord.
What a wonderful homecoming we have. This world is not our home. We
are but passing through.

     Psalms 90:11 "Who knoweth the power of thine anger? even
according to thy fear, [so is] thy wrath."

     In Exodus, we saw just a small glimpse of God's wrath, when He
drowned the Egyptians in the sea. We, also, saw just a little of God's
wrath when the children of Israel made the golden calf, and God killed
many. We know, also, that God, at one point, even regretted that He
had made man, and He sent the flood to destroy them. In the flood, God
saved Noah and his family. God never forgets His own. God makes a
separation between His people and those who refuse to follow Him. I
greatly fear the wrath of God for those who refuse to follow Jesus.

     Psalms 90:12 "So teach [us] to number our days, that we may apply
[our] hearts unto wisdom."

     This is saying, to me, that we are to treasure each moment and do
good in that moment. Take stock of how much time you have, and use
that time wisely for the Lord. The beginning of wisdom is the fear of
the Lord. All of us can look back and see time we wasted on foolish
things of the flesh. You can not do anything about that, it is past
and gone. Use the time you have left to do the will of God.

     Psalms 90:13 "Return, O LORD, how long? and let it repent thee
concerning thy servants."

     When God looked down and saw that the children of Israel had made
the golden calf, God wanted to destroy them all. Moses pled with God
for them, and God repented of His desire to kill them all. Perhaps,
this is what is intended here. The cry of all mankind for ever has
been for mercy. We do serve a merciful God, who loves us. He made a
way for everyone to be saved. I Timothy 4:10 "For therefore we both
labour and suffer reproach, because we trust in the living God, who is
the Saviour of all men, specially of those that believe."

     Psalms 90:14 "O satisfy us early with thy mercy; that we may
rejoice and be glad all our days."

     What a wonderful thing to make your decision to follow Jesus at a
very early age. There is a special peace that the people who know they
are saved have. It makes their life a joy to live, and even death has
lost its sting for them, because they know they are headed for their
heavenly home.

     Psalms 90:15 "Make us glad according to the days [wherein] thou
hast afflicted us, [and] the years [wherein] we have seen evil."

     Even the children of God have tribulation in this life. Sometimes
I believe, the more tribulation you have, the more blessed will the
heavenly reward be. One of the beautiful things, I remember pertaining
to this, is the wonderful welcome that Jesus gave Stephen after he had
been stoned to death. No other place in the Bible do we read of Jesus
standing at the right side of the Father. I believe Jesus stood to
welcome Stephen home.

     Psalms 90:16 "Let thy work appear unto thy servants, and thy
glory unto their children."

     This is not speaking of man's work, but God's work. I believe
this, perhaps, is prophetically speaking of the 6 hours Jesus worked
on the cross for you and me. The glory of God is from generation to
generation. These children of Israel would possess the promised land
from generation to generation. They did nothing to get it. God gave it
to them. We did nothing to receive our home in heaven either. The only
thing required was that we believe, as Abraham had believed God. Our
belief, and his belief, is counted unto us for righteousness.

     Psalms 90:17 "And let the beauty of the LORD our God be upon us:
and establish thou the work of our hands upon us; yea, the work of our
hands establish thou it."

     Galatians 2:20 "I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live;
yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in
the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and
gave himself for me."  The real beauty, that we have, is Christ in us.
I mentioned before, that He has clothed us in beautiful snow white
linen garments of His righteousness. Moses wanted his work to be
pleasing unto God. So do I want my work to be pleasing unto Him.
Moses, along with all of us, wanted to hear the Lord say, well done,
thy good and faithful servant.

























                             Questions 90

1.  Who was the penman of chapter 90 of Psalms?
2.  What is this Psalm?
3.  What is Moses called?
4.  What is this psalm all about?
5.  Even though the children of Israel were in the wilderness, they
    were securely in _____ _______.
6.  If we plan to make heaven, where must we be dwelling?
7.  He was clearly _______ _______ their provider.
8.  Name at least 3 things that the Lord is for us.
9.  From __________ to __________, thou art God.
10. Where are 2 different places we can read that God created all
    things?
11. Quote 1 John chapter 5 verse 7.
12. What are some of the names of God that show His eternity?
13. From ______ thou art, and to ______ thou shalt return.
14. The first Adam was made a ________ ______.
15. The second Adam was made a __________ _______.
16. A thousand years in God's sight is as a watch ___ ___ _____.
17. Quote 2 Peter chapter 3 verse 8?
18. God is not controlled by time, He is the _________ of time.
19. In heaven where God dwells, there is one ________ ___.
20. Verse 5 is speaking of what?
21. We are like ______ that comes up in the spring and dies in the
    fall.
22. What brought death to man?
23. When God looks at a believer in Christ, what does He see?
24. His Light searches the heart and soul of man and reads us like a
    _____.
25. What is it like when a believer dies?
26. How many years does verse 10 say we should live, if we have a
    normal life?
27. What could cause some to live longer?
28. To be absent from the body, is to be present _____ ____ _____.
29. What are some examples of God's wrath?
30. So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts _____
    ______.
31. What was an example of God changing His mind about destroying
    someone?
32. Who is Jesus the Saviour of?
33. Who did Jesus honor by standing to greet him into heaven?
34. What does the author believe verse 16 is speaking of
    prophetically?
35. Quote Galations chapter 2 verse 20.