IS THE TIME OF YOUR DEATH PREDESTINED BY GOD? - We are like the grass in the field - so we should learn to number our days - that is we should make every day count. God knows all about the days of our life and all of the affairs and schemes of men - we cannot change what God has sovereignly ordained ahead of time. Every one of our days have already been determined and even more amazing, they have been numbered before we were even born. We cannot go one day beyond the day he has appointed for us to live. We have limits to our life. Even though our days are appointed for how long we will live on this earth God tells us “if you walk in obedience to me and keep my decrees and commands as David your father did, I will give you a long life.” We do know that we’ve only got one life and only a short amount of time to get right with God because “Just as people are destined to die once, and after that to face judgment.” God gives us all a choice… either believe in Christ and inherit eternal life or reject Christ and have His wrath abiding on us for all time. You have a choice to make. Repent and trust in Christ or face God’s wrath with no end in sight. Tomorrow may be too late. - Predestination means that something has been predetermined… or been determined ahead of time. This doesn’t mean we don’t have free will and that we won’t be responsible for our actions and that we won’t reap what we sow. We suffer the consequences or reap the blessings according to our actions.

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Is The Time Of Your Death  Predestined By God?

We do know that we’ve only got one life and only a short amount of time to get right with God because “Just as people are destined to die once, and after that to face judgment.” 

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We are like the grass in the field - so we should learn to number our days - that is we should make every day count. God knows all about the days of our life and all of the affairs and schemes of men -  we cannot change what God has sovereignly ordained ahead of time. 

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Every one of our days have already been determined and even more amazing, they have been numbered before we were even born. We cannot go one day beyond the day he has appointed for us to live. We have limits to our life. Even though our days are appointed for how long we will live on this earth God tells us “if you walk in obedience to me and keep my decrees and commands as David your father did, I will give you a long life.” 

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God gives us all a choice… either believe in Christ and inherit eternal life or reject Christ and have His wrath abiding on us for all time. You have a choice to make. Repent and trust in Christ or face God’s wrath with no end in sight. Tomorrow may be too late.

by JACK WELLMAN

 

Has the day of our death been predetermined? 

Are we powerless to change it? 

Has God specified a time for our death and the number of our days?

Predestination is…

You can read about predestination, like in Ephesians 1, and all it means is that something has been predetermined… or been determined ahead of time. 

This doesn’t mean we don’t have free will and that we won’t be responsible for our actions and that we won’t reap what we sow. 

No, we suffer the consequences or reap the blessings according to our actions. 

I cannot hope to fully explain the tension that exists between free will (John 3:16) and predestination (Ephesians 1).

I only know that both are true but I don’t know how they are both true at exactly the same time.

That should not surprise anyone because who can fully know the mind of God since His ways are beyond finding out. 

Here are a few reasons I can say that with biblical authority:

Job 11:7 - “Can you find out the deep things of God? Can you find out the limit of the Almighty?”

Job 36:26a - “Behold, God is great, and we know him not.”

Ecclesiastes 3:11 - “He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also, he has put eternity into man’s heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.”

Romans 11:33 - “Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!”

I could have added dozens more but I think you get the idea. The way God thinks is nothing close to the way we think. 

When we can’t fully explain the ways of God we must accept it anyway. 

Just because I can’t explain how gravity works doesn’t mean it isn’t so and just because I can’t understand something doesn’t mean it’s not true but what about the day of our death? 

Is the day of our death predetermined? 

Is it down even to the hour and the second?

Are all of our days established before we are even born? 

These are all great questions and the answers can be found in the Scriptures but the explanations; that I can’t help you with. 

That’s why He is God and we are not!

Number Our Days

Biblical wisdom has always been that we are like the grass in the field and so we should learn to number our days; that is we should make every day count.

Maybe that’s what the Psalmist meant when he wrote “teach us to number our days, that we may present to You a heart of wisdom” (Psalm 90:12). 

He actually asked “Show me, LORD, my life’s end and the number of my days; let me know how fleeting my life is” (Psalm 39:4) so God “teach us to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom.”

When the religious leaders tried to take Jesus by force to have Him arrested He said “My time has not yet come, but your time is always here” (John 7:6).

So God knows all about the days of our life and all of the affairs and schemes of men and we cannot change what God has sovereignly ordained ahead of time.

Our Days Determined

Every one of our days, believe it or not, have already been determined and even more amazing, they have been numbered before we were even born. 

Job knew this when he said “Man who is born of a woman is few of days and full of trouble. He comes out like a flower and withers; he flees like a shadow and continues not. And do you open your eyes on such a one and bring me into judgment with you? Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean? There is not one. Since his days are determined, and the number of his months is with you, and you have appointed his limits that he cannot pass” (Job 14:1-6). 

Imagine that! 

We cannot go one day beyond the day he has appointed for us to live. 

We have limits to our life.  We cannot even “go one day beyond” them. 

The fact is that God’s “eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them” (Psalm 139:16). 

Not only are the very days of our life established “even the hairs of your head are all numbered” (Matthew 10:30).

God’s Sovereignty and Our Days

Even though our days are appointed for how long we will live on this earth God tells us “if you walk in obedience to me and keep my decrees and commands as David your father did, I will give you a long life” (1 Kings 3:14). 

This is why obedience is so important and we are commanded to “Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you” (Exodus 20:12). 

We do know that we’ve only got one life and only a short amount of time to get right with God because “Just as people are destined to die once, and after that to face judgment” (Hebrews 9:27).

God gives us all a choice… either believe in Christ and inherit eternal life (John 3:16) or reject Christ and have His wrath abiding on us for all time (John 3:36b). 

He tells us to make a choice today:

“See, I set before you today life and prosperity, death and destruction. For I command you today to love the Lord your God, to walk in obedience to him, and to keep his commands, decrees and laws; then you will live and increase, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land you are entering to possess.  But if your heart turns away and you are not obedient, and if you are drawn away to bow down to other gods and worship them, I declare to you this day that you will certainly be destroyed. You will not live long in the land you are crossing the Jordan to enter and possess. This day I call the heavens and the earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live” (Deuteronomy 30:15-19).

Conclusion

You have a choice to make. Repent and trust in Christ or face God’s wrath with no end in sight (Revelation 20:11-15).

He tells us “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts” (Hebrews 3:7) and “In the time of my favor I heard you, and in the day of salvation I helped you. I tell you, now is the time of God’s favor, now is the day of salvation” (2 Corinthians 6:2).

Tomorrow may be too late for if Christ returns and you are not saved, you are condemned for all time but if you repent and trust in the Savior, you will be saved. 

Let me close with the way Daniel the Prophet puts it:  “at that time your people — everyone whose name is found written in the book—will be delivered. Multitudes who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake: some to everlasting life, others to shame and everlasting contempt. Those who are wise will shine like the brightness of the heavens, and those who lead many to righteousness, like the stars for ever and ever” (Daniel 12:1a-3). 

You are free to choose but choose you must, for no choice is a no-choice because Christ said “He who is not with me is against me and he that is not against us is for us” (Matthew 12:30).

 

Jack Wellman is a father and grandfather and a Christian author and pastor of Heritage Evangelical Free Church in Udall, KS & also a Prison Minister. He did his graduate work at Moody Theological Seminary. His books are include: “Teaching Children The Gospel/How to Raise Godly Children,“ “Do Babies Go To Heaven?/Why Does God Allow Suffering?,“ "The Great Omission; Reaching the Lost for Christ," and “Blind Chance or Intelligent Design?, Empirical Methodologies & the Bible."

https://www.whatchristianswanttoknow.com/is-the-time-of-your-death-predestined-by-god/

 

 

TEACH US TO NUMBER OUR DAYS - Time does not have the same meaning for God that it has for us. For us, a thousand years is a time so long that we cannot really imagine experiencing it. For God, it is no different from a very short period of time - He is eternal, above the time that He created. This eternal God directs the course of history by His infinite power. “Teach us to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom.” This verse is often treated as if it were a proverb that means, “Life is short, so live wisely.” But in the context of the whole psalm, it means much more than that. It is a key part of a meditation on God and on living as the people of God. In Hebrew, verse 12 begins with the words “to number our days.” This phrase picks up the theme of time that is so pervasive in this psalm. A reflection on time leads us to see how weak we are and how short our lives are. Such realism about our weakness is the necessary foundation of any true wisdom. The shortness and weakness of human life are the fruit of sin and judgment in the world. It is surely frightening to think that God’s wrath will equal all the obedience that is due to Him. Although life is short and the wrath of God terrifying, the mercy and protection of God for His people are great. Through all the generations of His people’s existence, reaching back all the way to creation, God has always preserved and protected His people. God remains the home of His people because He is the redeeming God. Moses reminds us that while the life of man is frail and short, God is eternal.

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Teach Us to Number Our Days

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Time does not have the same meaning for God that it has for us. For us, a thousand years is a time so long that we cannot really imagine experiencing it. For God, it is no different from a very short period of time - He is eternal, above the time that He created - this eternal God directs the course of history by His infinite power

FROM W. Robert Godfrey 

“Teach us to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom.” - (Psalm 90: 12)

This verse is often treated as if it were a proverb that means, “Life is short, so live wisely.”

But in the context of the whole psalm, it means much more than that, as we will see. It is a key part of a meditation on God and on living as the people of God.

In Hebrew, verse 12 begins with the words “to number our days.”

This phrase picks up the theme of time that is so pervasive in this psalm.

A reflection on time leads us to see how weak we are and how short our lives are: “You return man to dust and say, ‘Return, O children of man!’ … You sweep them away as with a flood; they are like a dream, like grass that is renewed in the morning: in the morning it flourishes and is renewed; in the evening it fades and withers… The years of our life are seventy, or even by reason of strength eighty; yet their span is but toil and trouble; they are soon gone, and we fly away” (verses 3, 5–6, 10).

Here, Psalm 90 shows its connection to the concerns of Psalm 89 about man’s frailty: “Remember how short my time is! For what vanity you have created all the children of man! What man can live and never see death? Who can deliver his soul from the power of Sheol?” (Psalm 89:47–48).

Such realism about our weakness is the necessary foundation of any true wisdom.

“O Lord, make me know my end and what is the measure of my days; let me know how fleeting I am” - (Psalm 39:4).

The shortness and weakness of human life are the fruit of sin and judgment in the world.

The psalmist acknowledges that sin frankly, saying, “You have set our iniquities before you, our secret sins in the light of your presence” (Psalm 90:8).

He knows that his holy God visits His judgment on sinners. “For all our days pass away under your wrath; we bring our years to an end like a sigh… Who considers the power of your anger, and your wrath according to the fear of you?” (verses 9, 11).

It is surely frightening to think that God’s wrath will equal all the obedience that is due to Him.

Although life is short and the wrath of God terrifying, the mercy and protection of God for His people are great.

God is the home of His people: “Lord, you have been our dwelling place in all generations” (verse 1).

Through all the generations of His people’s existence, reaching back all the way to creation, God has always preserved and protected His people.

Even in the garden of Eden, He promised that He would redeem His own (Genesis 3:15).

God remains the home of His people because He is the redeeming God.

Moses reminds us that while the life of man is frail and short, God is eternal. “Before the mountains were brought forth or ever you had formed the earth and the world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God” (verse 2).

Moses takes us back before God created the earth to remind us that our God is before and beyond time and this world.

He has always been, and He is sufficient to Himself without us.

Moses makes this point in another way in verse 4: “For a thousand years in your sight are but as yesterday when it is past, or as a watch in the night.”

Time does not have the same meaning for God that it has for us.

For us, a thousand years is a time so long that we cannot really imagine experiencing it.

For God, it is no different from a very short period of time. He is eternal, above the time that He created.

This eternal God directs the course of history by His infinite power.

Moses, who had seen the power of God often displayed in the deliverance of Israel from Egypt, continues to pray that the majesty of God’s works would remain before the eyes of the people: “Let your work be shown to your servants, and your glorious power to their children” (verse 16).

As God had brought suffering by His power, so Moses prays that God will send blessing: “Make us glad for as many days as you have afflicted us, and for as many years as we have seen evil” (verse 15).

If our need is to number our days by contrasting their shortness with the eternal nature of God, then our prayer to God is that He would teach us: “Teach us to number our days.”

We will never learn that lesson in our own strength.

We are not only ignorant if left to ourselves, but we suppress the truth in unrighteousness (Romans 1:18).

We convince ourselves that we have a long time to live, and as long as we are healthy, we really believe that we will live forever in this body.

We need a teacher, and the only teacher who can rescue us from ourselves is God.

This excerpt is adapted from Learning to Love the Psalms by W. Robert Godfrey.

Ligonier Ministries exists to proclaim, teach, and defend the holiness of God in all its fullness to as many people as possible. To that end, Ligonier’s outreach today is manifold and worldwide. Having been founded by Dr. R.C. Sproul in 1971, Ligonier’s teaching fellowship consists of theologians, pastors, and scholars who teach through Renewing Your Mind broadcasts, the Reformation Study Bible, Tabletalk magazine, books through the Reformation Trust Publishing division, and hundreds of teaching series. The ministry also offers an undergraduate degree program through Reformation Bible College.

“My passion has been to awaken people to the holiness of God.” —R.C. Sproul

https://www.ligonier.org/blog/teach-us-number-our-days/

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