All the days ordained for me
were written in your book
before one of them came to be.
(Psalm 139:16)
How many days do I have left? I don’t know. No one does, except God. He knows the exact number of years, days, hours and seconds that I will occupy my address on Planet Earth; the exact moment that my death will occur.
Now that may not seem like a cheery thought to you, and in fact, most people would find that sobering, at best, and frightening, at worst. Not me. I find great comfort and security in knowing that God has my life so ordered that I will neither die a day sooner nor live a day longer than what has already been recorded in his book. You see, life and death are far above my pay grade, so I will happily let Father God take care of that department, thank you very much.
So if I truly and correctly understand this profound truth, then I am freed from the fear of death to fully live the life that God has planned for me. I can enjoy an intimate walk with the One who is intimately involved in each minor detail of my day (Psalm 139:1-4), who never lets me out of his sight (Psalm 139:5-8), whose fatherly hand guides my every move (Psalm 139:9-10), and who is never limited or intimidated by my circumstances (Psalm 139:11-12). In fact, God is so involved in my life that he was even there at the moment my mother and father conceived me in love, and while I was in the womb, he superintended even the most infinitesimal details of my physiological and temperamental formation.
God knows me! He knows everything about me. He planned me, built me, watches over me, can steer me back on track when I wander from his purpose (Psalm 139:23-24), can be completely trusted to keep me safe until the Divinely allotted numbers of days ordained have expired and then take me to the next life that he has prepared for me. And he has done such an inexpressibly great job with this life I can’t even begin to imagine what’s on tap for the next!
“Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too great for me to understand” (Psalm 139:6, NLT), but it won’t keep me from enjoying this day and praising the One who is in charge of it!
“Thou hast made us for thyself, O Lord, and our hearts
are restless till they their rest in thee.”