Psalms 90

This is the only psalm credited to Moses. It sets the eternal God beside frail, dying people, and admits that sin and God’s anger are part of why life is short. It ends with a prayer that God would return, satisfy His people with His love, and give lasting worth to their work.

Psalms 90:1

Moses begins with what has never changed. Long before Israel had a land, God was their home. In the wilderness, tents and wandering were all they had, yet they could say that God Himself was where they lived, safe, from one generation to the next.

BSA: dwelling place (“habitation, refuge, home”): God is not only a shelter to run to but the place where His people actually live.

See also: Deuteronomy 33:27; Psalm 91:1.

Psalms 90:2

Mountains seem to be the oldest things we know, yet God was before them. The earth is pictured as being born. God was never born; He simply is. His life has no beginning and no end, which makes Him a sure foundation for short-lived people.

BSA: everlasting (“eternity past”): God’s existence reaches back beyond all beginnings and forward beyond all endings.

See also: Genesis 1:1; Psalm 102:25-27.

Psalms 90:3

God sends people back to the dust they were made from, as He said after Adam sinned. Death is not an accident. It happens at God’s word. The psalm is plain about it, and that honesty is where its wisdom begins.

BSA: mortals (“men, the man, adam”): The word echoes Adam, so our return to dust recalls the first man’s fall.

See also: Genesis 3:19; Ecclesiastes 12:7.

Psalms 90:4

God does not experience time as we do. A thousand years is to Him like yesterday, or like a few hours on night watch, which passed quickly. His patience and His timing are not measured by our short lives.

BSA: watch (“night guard, period of vigil”): A watch was a few hours of a sentry’s duty, a short stretch that is soon over.

See also: 2 Peter 3:8.

Psalms 90:5-6

Human life is compared to grass. It sprouts fresh at dawn and is dried up by evening. God sweeps people away like a flood, as if in sleep. Life is lovely but very brief, and it is not ours to keep.

BSA: whisk (“sweep away, carry off”): Death comes like a current carrying us off, beyond our control.

See also: Isaiah 40:6-8; James 1:10-11.

Psalms 90:7

Moses links our short, troubled lives to God’s anger at sin. Death and fear are not just natural. They are tied to a moral problem between us and a holy God. The psalm speaks for the whole people, saying we are consumed.

BSA: consumed (“burned up, used up”): God’s anger is felt as something that wears life away.

Psalms 90:8

Nothing is hidden from God. Even sins we kept secret are laid out in the full light of His face. This is sobering, but it is also honest. Only when sin is seen as it is can it be confessed and forgiven.

BSA: secret (“hidden, concealed”): Sins we hide from others and from ourselves are fully exposed to God.

See also: Psalm 139:11-12; Hebrews 4:13.

Psalms 90:9

Life under God’s displeasure seems to melt away. Our days decline, and we end our years with a sigh, a faint breath of weariness. The verse is not cold but truthful, and it shows how short and heavy human life can feel.

BSA: sigh (“a moan, a deep breath, a lamentation”): Life ends like a breath let out, quiet and soon gone.

Psalms 90:10

Seventy or eighty years is the usual span. Even the strong years are mostly toil and trouble, and then they are gone as if we flew away. Moses is not mocking life but showing how little time we have to use well.

BSA: labor (“amal, trouble or toil”): The word means hard, wearying work, the kind that leaves a person worn out. sorrow (“aven, wickedness or pain”): It carries the sense of trouble that comes with a fallen world.

See also: Job 14:1-2.

Psalms 90:11

Hardly anyone grasps how serious God’s anger is. If we did, we would fear Him as He deserves. Moses wants his people to take God’s holiness as seriously as He means it, not to treat sin lightly.

BSA: fear (“reverence, respect”): The right response is awe and reverence, not mere terror.

See also: Proverbs 9:10.

Psalms 90:12

This is the heart of the psalm. Since life is short, we ask God to teach us to count our days, to see how few they are and how precious. The result is a wise heart, one that lives for what matters to God.

BSA: number (“count, weigh the value of”): It is not only counting days but weighing what each one is worth. wisdom (“prudence, good judgment”): Wisdom here is practical skill in living before God.

See also: Psalm 39:4; Ephesians 5:15-16.

Psalms 90:13

The mood turns to prayer. Moses asks the covenant God to come back to His people and to show pity. His cry, how long, is the honest cry of those who have waited under hardship and want to know God is near again.

BSA: LORD (“Yehovah, the covenant God”): He appeals to God by His personal covenant name, the name of promise to Israel. compassion (“be sorry, show pity”): He asks God to relent and treat His servants tenderly.

See also: Exodus 32:12-14.

Psalms 90:14

After a long night of sorrow, Moses asks for a morning of God’s faithful love. Only that can really satisfy. Joy that rests on His steady love is not a passing mood but can fill all our days.

BSA: loving devotion (“kindness, mercy, faithful love”): This is God’s covenant love, which stays loyal to His people. Satisfy (“fill to the full, meet our deepest needs”): God’s love fills the soul as food fills the hungry.

See also: Psalm 30:5; Lamentations 3:22-23.

Psalms 90:15

Moses asks that joy be as large as the sorrow was long. He trusts that God can match years of affliction with years of gladness. Behind the request is the belief that the hard seasons are not the last word.

BSA: afflicted (“humbled, oppressed”): The hardships were a humbling, and He asks for relief in equal measure.

See also: Isaiah 61:7; Romans 8:18.

Psalms 90:16

He asks that God’s work be seen in his own day, and that the next generation also see His glory. We pass away, but God’s work goes on. He wants his children to witness what God does, not only hear about it.

BSA: splendor (“glory, majesty, beauty”): It points to the visible beauty and majesty of God’s own presence.

See also: Psalm 145:4.

Psalms 90:17

The psalm ends asking for God’s favor and for lasting value in what we do. Our work is short-lived on its own, but God can make it count. The repeated request shows how deeply Moses longs for it.

BSA: favor (“pleasantness, kindness, beauty”): God’s favor brings a sweetness and beauty to life and work. establish (“set up, appoint, make firm”): He asks God to make the work stand firm and last.

See also: 1 Corinthians 15:58; Psalm 127:1.