Last week we began, but we did not finish, nor did we expect to finish, the consideration that we had concerning the eleventh chapter of Genesis. You remember in that chapter we were reading last week about the rapid cutting down of length of man's days upon the earth. But no longer did he live for nine centuries. No longer was his life measured in centuries, but rather in decades or single years. In the course of one chapter of man's history after the Flood, we get down to more or less the age which men have commonly lived to in our day and all days subsequent to those early times. We read in the 90th Psalm, in verse 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. I suppose this is one of the best-known verses in the Bible, even by ungodly people who don't even know that it is in the Bible. But nevertheless, they all seem to know now that seventy years is the normal limit of man's life. Anything beyond that we call borrowed time. Some of us here this morning may be living on it, even though while we speak. Others, like the man in the pulpit, have a narrowing prospect. of arriving at that all important boundary of life. Others in the heyday of their lives here this morning who sorrowfully enough may never reach it. For seventy years it's not a guarantee either of life or of death. It is just a kind of a guidepost in our thought. We may come, by reason of strength granted to us, to forescore years and even beyond that. But the words say, yet is there strength, labour and sorrow, for it is soon cut off and we fly away. That doesn't mean to say it's more sorrowful to live after 70 or after 80 than it is after 20 or 30. It means that all our days, when we view them, and all the many changes, disappointments, unfulfilled tasks, ambitions, expectations, all our days are increasing in days of labour and sorrow. But nor does that mean that we are a sorrowful people. We never smile or be glad. I suppose that as much laughter as tears in the world could possibly be measured, certainly in your life and mine, so much to rejoice over, as well as that over which we weep. But by and large, the Prophet said that he is now a continued strength in this world, and brings with it labour and sorrow, burden and trial. This is human life, and we are bidden to consider the life that we live, in all its meaning, if you like, in all its vanity, that we might apply our hearts unto wisdom. Even as we are told in this self-same psalm, so teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom. And that too is a well-known verse. Not so well-known as the one which goes before it, but well-known nevertheless. That we ought to be taught to apply our hearts to wisdom, so to number our days. I doubt that that's We pay but scant attention at times to this verse. We don't number our days. We may live our lives in wisdom, not in the variations of folly and vanity. How much waste time there is in your life and mine. How many things we could have fulfilled which we haven't. I look back upon many years during which I could have read more books to more prophets than I have done. Periods of one's life when perhaps we were not as diligent as we might be. How many people say, well if I had my time over again, what we would do? We can't have our time over again. We've just got to number our days. We've got to perceive that beyond a certain point it is exceedingly unlikely that we'll survive. We're always rapidly approaching and we must say farewell to this world and open our eyes upon the world that is to come. Far better is it not to live in wisdom than to live in folly, to live in view of a certainty, than to delude our minds with an uncertainty. Far more important is rational men apart from being Christians, and we should number our And so apply our hearts unto wisdom. Learn to apportion out our time. When Dr. Chalmers entered the last decade of his life, that is when he passed his 60th birthday, he made up his mind, as he had done in advance, to dedicate the last decade of his life, if he ever left it, if he ever reached it, preparation, special preparation for the world to come. So being a man of very methodical, as well as a very pious mind, he set about upon that task. As well that he did, at the time that he did, because he never lived out that decade. He was cut down suddenly one morning. He was found in his chair. As though he were meditating as he often did, but his spirit had gone. Only his body was there in his easy chair. They found him in his chair. They laid his body to rest almost with the honours of a king, as the whole city of Edinburgh turned out. He was only a Presbyterian minister, but he might have been the reigning monarch. It was only his body and his spirit that returned to God and gave him. So we may never fulfill our choice's task, our most pious longings. the most desirable things we set before us in a spiritual sense. So teach us to number our days, we may apply our hearts unto wisdom. This isn't morbid, of course it isn't, morbidity is. It's plain Christian common sense. It's true religion. It's what we were converted for. It's what we are living for. what we hope to dine for. If this world is only the preparation, and its afflictions are only the discipline, a world to come where we shall see the end of that which was only begun here. Who will accuse the Apostle Paul of morbidity when he said, as we have read, in our passage this morning, that our light affliction, which is but for a moment worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory, that enlightened man saw clearly and plainly that there was a connection between our sorrows here and our joys there. It's not just that we exchange our affliction for the gloriousness of today. There's a strong connection between the two, says Paul. Our light affliction now, worker for us, a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory. You see there's a very powerful connecting link between our patience down here below and our realisation of yonder. If we understood this as perfectly as we should, I'm sure we wouldn't complain as much as we do. You say, well I don't complain. Very good, I'm pleased to hear it. I wish I could conform entirely to your pattern at times. We know it's wrong to complain, but we do, don't we? Some of us more than others, some of us less. But if we saw that between our patient endurance of the lot which God has laid upon us, and the cross which we carry in this world, that there's a connection between that and the glory that shall be revealed, might enable us to with the more cheerfulness and fortitude that which befalls us. This is a subject in itself. It opens up a wide field which few of us are qualified to speak upon. I'd like a good deal more information and experience of it myself before I venture very far into that field. But it is there, just the same, that the Apostle Paul was convinced of it. Our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceedingly eternal weight of glory, as we look not at the things which are seen, but the things which are not seen. The things which are seen are temporal. The things which are not seen are eternal. we might say is Paul's inspired commentary on the 90th Psalm. We perceive what Moses has written in that psalm, because Moses was the author of it. It's entitled A Prayer of Moses, the man of God. And Paul perceives by true inspiration and enlightenment from the Holy Spirit What it was that Moses meant when he said, so teach us to number our days, we may apply our hearts unto wisdom. But every day that passes, in every hour of every day, has its bearing for you and for me, upon our eternity. You may say, well I thought all that was taken care of by Christ and his sacrifice. Not a bit of it. That's a great mistake. What was taken care of by Christ and His sacrifice was our sin, guilt, condemnation, pardon, forgiveness, renewal of life, the regenerating power of the Holy Spirit, and the certainty of the Christian's hope in the glory that is to come. He didn't relieve us, He was never intended to relieve us, of affliction and trial, and of our patient endurance, of affliction and of the bearing of the cross, which worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory. At any rate, I think that we shouldn't take too much for granted along these lines. It would impose upon us, perhaps, a greater regulation of our own lives, of our time, of our thoughts, if we perceive that of every idle word that we shall speak, we shall give an account in that day. And that the patience and hope which here we practice shall in no while lose its reward mysteriously in the ages of eternity. and turn to our chapter again in the eleventh of Genesis, to see something else. And that is that in the providence of God, the age of man was rapidly cut down to its present restrictive dimension. for a specific purpose, and that was to limit the evil of sin in the world. Some people, when they see the problem of evil all round about them, they say, what is God doing about it? It looks as if he's idle, he's not doing anything about the evil that is in the world. Whereas, of course, he's doing everything about it. There are many answers to that, as to what God is doing. One of them at least is this, that he is limiting the age of man. What kind of a world do you think it would have been, it would be, if men like Napoleon Bonaparte, or Kaiser Wilhelm, or Adolf Hitler, or Benito Mussolini, or Mr. Stalin, or maybe another we could mention, were to go on living for another nine centuries. Some of us might be very thankful that some men, even in our time, have been cut down before they've lived half their day. Others again, in the totality of God's providence, have been permitted to live a full span of life but in the end they've been cut down and the span of life is brief and short and they're soon forgotten. The evils with which we are confronted in this world are already very restricted and restrained on account of the narrow span of human life compared with what it used to be. There are two great limiting factors in God's providential realm. And that is one of them, the brevity of human life. And the other, as we have seen in that chapter, was the confusion of tongues. the curse which rests upon human language, so that the earth is kept divided. And a divided earth, contrary to the foolish philosophy and wisdom of advanced politicians of our time, who had always dreamed of being united. And if we can only be united, wars will be abolished and they forget that a monopolistic would mean the establishment of a universal tyranny. And all history points to that. That's one of the reasons why I'm afraid of Britain going into the common market. My objections are not merely economic, or political, or national, although one could make a good case out for all these things. But my principal objection is this. that is against all the verdict of history, the larger the units, the greater the evil, the more absolute the tyranny. Hence, in the Middle Ages, the fatal tyranny which covered the whole of Europe was a dead weight upon the minds of men, and the evils which flowed from it were greater than anything else that human history has record of. God set limits to it by dividing the world again in the 16th century, the Reformation. The Reformation is gone in our time and the world is coming together again, but not for good, but for total evil. They say, well, if the providence of God failed, if he intended by the confusion of tongues to keep men apart and to scatter them upon the face of the earth, to prevent them from making a universal empire, where it looks as though God's purpose had been overcome, oh no. For the evil that is in men's hearts when they reject his word, close their ears against the truth and their eyes against the light. It is one of the dispensations and methods of the divine government to give men what they desire. It's like a certain man who used to pray two or three hundred years ago. He's gone down in history and making it his daily prayer, Oh Lord, give me a hatred of He didn't say of heresy, but of the heretics. They were all heretics who didn't conform to his ideas. Oh Lord, give me a hatred of the heretics. And someone said, God punished him by answering his prayer. And so God gives to men, eventually, the evil that they desire, and punishes the world for their iniquity. by giving them over to their iniquity. That's what's happening in our own land, the other land. What God will do for the remedy of this, I don't know. He can do one of two things, in my humble opinion. He can either breathe upon all the present works and intentions of men, and bring their combinations and their intentions to ruin, or he can bring the world to judgment. And of the two, it is my expectation that he will do the latter. But a world must be summoned to judgments sooner or later. In our day it will probably be sooner than later. I could be mistaken, but at the worst stage of human history Christ will return. We somehow seem to be approaching a time like that which may so be described. These are the two great factors, limiting factors, to man's sin history. And God has other means besides these. As for Osenstein, raising up a new life, pouring out of his grace upon the nations, this has been done again and again. But there will be a last time. when this will be done. And it could be, of course, in our day. We return now to the 90th Psalm, to say a few words which we may carry away with us concerning this wonderful prayer of Moses, the man of God. title is important. Moses only wrote one psalm and this is it, right in the middle of the book of Psalms. Read it and study it. This great psalm stands out in its unique assessment of man's place in the universe and the trials and afflictions by which man must travel on to his destiny. It shows us God over all. Watching over the human race. Limiting our evils but all the time by His Spirit. Saying, return ye children of men. What a verse that is, verse 3. Thou turnest man to destruction and sayeth, return ye children of men. Wonderful indeed and mysterious are the ways of God. He turned man to destruction in the Garden of Eden when the race was cast out because of sin, and we with our first parents reaping to this day the consequences of that great apostasy, bearing within our breasts a legacy of human depravity, of darkness and ignorance, of disposition to evil, which is common to the human race. The human race turned to destruction. The sentence of death passed upon all men because that all have sinned, not only in Adam but in themselves. The sentence of death passed and executed upon the human race. The great evil, dear friends, for you and for me is this, that unless the Lord comes first, Our end will be not translation, but death. And I don't like death. I don't know whether you do, but I don't. I would rather not die. I'm not afraid of death, I hope. But I don't like it. It's an enemy. It's not a friend. Except in so far. by divine wisdom and providence. It is the friend in that mysterious way that the death of Christ brings with it all glory and life everlasting. Man is turned to destruction, his days are limited. Some of us ought to be thinking even now, what exactly will happen on that last day of my life. I'll be stepping out where I've never stepped before. Either suddenly or gradually. Thou hast written the page already in bygone ages of my last hours. It's all in thy divine decrees. It is thou who turnest man to destruction and hast written that he must die and he must die because of sin. sin in himself, sin in the right, the sentence passed upon it, but you have said return ye children of men. In that word return, oh Lord, if it means anything at all to me it means this, be restored, live again, look to me and be saved, all the ends of the earth. He that believeth in me as the scripture has said, shall never die, even although his body is laid in the dust. The man in Christ overcomes death and arrives at the eternal throng and enters through the gates of the eternal glory, not by his own prowess, not by his own strength, Not by his own right and merit, only one did that and that was Christ, the Son of God. God a man who went down to the grave and came up again. If one died for all, then were all dead. And he died for all that they which live in him might live not unto themselves but unto him who died for them and rose again. No, no man lives again. by faith, not by strength, not by merit, but by faith, in that word of God which says, return ye children of men. Oh Lord, if there is a word true in this divine book, it is that that thou art full of compassion and says to the whole of the human race, return ye children of men. He doesn't say return ye elect section of the children of men. Let us make that mistake. He says to all men, return. Even if they don't return, he bids them return. Death overcomes them at the last. I mean eternal death. Because they don't return. But he says, return ye children of men, without exception. Paul puts it in another way. Now God commanded all men, everywhere, to repent. But there is a door that is open wide. There is a Saviour who has died and lives again. There was one who in himself has borne all affliction. Paul speaks about our light affliction, but it was his heavy load. Lord, Father, is it be possible that this cup pass from me? Nevertheless, not my will, but thy will be done. A human nature bowed down in agonies and blood in the garden unto the immense weight of this world's sorrows and sins. Our light affliction is great and heavy and sore burden. The cross opens for us that eternal city. of glory, grace and power. We by faith approach that boundary. When your time comes and when my time comes, I trust that our absorbing thought will be Christ, the empty tomb, the glory in which He sits crowned, and we shall triumph over death. in that solemn and momentous moment, as we look to Him who overcame death, and by His almighty power, His eternal merits, His all-sufficient grace, will take us by the hand from that day, and leaving the poor shell behind. in which we tabernacle in this world, will take our spirits with Him to glory, there to remain in Paradise with Him, in that eternal presence of His joy, until the solemn moment again when soul and body will be reunited in that triumphant resurrection morning, when the graves shall be opened All shall stand before His throne, and those who by faith in Him, and by eternal hope looked to Him, and by the divine call were added to Him, who know what it means, this word, return, ye children of men. They shall be found standing by His side. For to those who overcome by faith, This Word is spoken. I will make Him to sit down with me in my throne, even as I also overcame and am sat down with my Father in His throne. That's the destiny of the human race. Let the grave open His mouth to devour. It cannot touch my soul. It cannot touch your soul if you are hurt. You shall triumph over it. Believe. Believe. And we sing for His name's sake. Let us sing number ten. Praise the Lord, ye heavens adore Him. Praise Him, angels in the heights, sun and moon, rejoice before Him. Praise Him, all ye stars and light. Number 10.