Psalm 90: Comfort When You Think About Your Own Death

"Lord, you have been our dwelling place for all generations. Before the mountains were brought forth, before you had formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, you are God." (Psalm 90:1-2, WEB)

This morning, here's a small exercise, a very particular one. An exercise that shifts everything else into place. Imagine that today is the last day of your life. Or better still: imagine that Jesus returns today, while you're still alive. How would you react? Maybe you'd be afraid, or sad. Or maybe you'd be glad, ready to go into the presence of the Lord, with only one longing: that this day would come.

And then the real question, the one that sorts everything out: on that last day, what would your priorities be? Your schedule? It would probably be trying, in a few hours, to tell as many loved ones as possible that you love them. To share the gospel once more with those who don't know God. But the truth is, we don't always get that chance. Death can catch you by surprise. A father who dies of a heart attack overnight, when the day before you were chatting with him about nothing in particular on the phone. A singer who had everything planned out for the year ahead and died in a helicopter crash in January of that very year, saying himself, months before his death, that we should "do things while we still want to do them, because afterward it might be too late." He didn't know how right he was.

The prospect of your death doesn't have to depress you. It makes you reconsider your priorities in light of what really matters. So the question becomes: what comfort do you find in the face of death, the very thing that will launch you into eternity? Psalm 90 answers that. It's the only psalm written by Moses in the whole Psalter, and it hasn't aged a day.

1. A stable refuge in a world that passes away

This psalm is a prayer. Moses addresses God in it, not only on his own behalf, but on behalf of all the people of Israel. Many commentators think it was written after a terrible sentence: the Lord had just told the Israelites over twenty years old, who had rebelled in the wilderness, that they would not enter the promised land but would die in the desert. Moses pleads. He intercedes. And he opens with a note of hope that frames the whole psalm:

"Lord, you have been our dwelling place for all generations." (Psalm 90:1, WEB)

He calls him Lord. From the very first word, he underlines that the almighty God transcends your small, mortal existence. Whether you like it or not, you're entirely subject to him. You didn't create yourself. You didn't choose the day you were born, the country, the family, or the color of your skin. The book of Acts even says it's the Lord who determines the appointed times and the boundaries of where you live (Acts 17:26). Jeremiah adds: "I know, Yahweh, that the way of man is not in himself. It is not in man who walks to direct his steps." (Jeremiah 10:23, WEB)

But this almighty God wants to be your refuge, literally, in Hebrew, a dwelling place. For a nomadic people with no home of their own, that meant a great deal. And it means a great deal for you too. God wants to be your home. Jesus promised it: if anyone loves him and keeps his word, he and his Father will come and make their home with that person (John 14:23). And if you're going through hardship right now, keep this verse close to your heart: "God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble." (Psalm 46:1, WEB)

So ask yourself: where have you placed your refuge? In your spouse, your family, your friends, your money, your house? Sooner or later, you'll have to leave everything behind on this earth. Naked you came into the world, and naked you'll leave it. You're only passing through. God alone is the one stable, solid support. The only one who will remain with you from generation to generation.

2. An eternal God facing fleeting lives

Moses continues, telling God:

"Before the mountains were brought forth, before you had formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, you are God." (Psalm 90:2, WEB)

For people of his time, the stillness of the mountains made them seem eternal. Moses says: there's something more eternal than the mountains, and that's the Eternal One himself. Before the discovery of the Big Bang, atheist scientists found the Bible's opening verse laughable, a beginning, really, the universe had always existed. In 1925, it was discovered that there had indeed been a beginning. The universe is said to be 13.8 billion years old, the earth 4.54 billion years old. And God already existed before all of that.

God's relationship to time isn't like yours. The psalmist reminds you:

"For a thousand years in your sight are just like yesterday when it is past, like a watch in the night." (Psalm 90:4, WEB)

Peter would echo this in his second letter to encourage you to be patient until Jesus returns (2 Peter 3:8). To you, 2,000 years since Christ's first coming feels like a very long time. In God's eyes, it's like two days. Another translation of verse 2 reads: "From everlasting to everlasting, you are God." In other words, God can never stop being God, not for a single day. Even Jesus, when he took on human nature, never once stopped being God. Isaiah reminds us: "Before me there was no God formed, neither will there be after me. I myself am Yahweh, and besides me there is no savior." (Isaiah 43:10-11, WEB)

No one can dethrone God. Not Satan, who tried and lost everything. Not transhumanism. Not artificial intelligence. Not any human being, not any angel. Before God, all the nations put together are but a drop in a bucket (Isaiah 40:15). He's the one who created billions of stars, trillions of galaxies. He holds the whole world in his hands, and your very breath of life. Every breath you take, you owe to him. What else can you do but bow before him?

3. Your life: a dream and a flower that fade

And this is where Moses sets God's eternity in stark contrast with the fragility of your existence:

"You turn man to destruction, saying, 'Return, you children of men.'" (Psalm 90:3, WEB)

Literally in Hebrew, God crumbles people back into dust. Was death ever part of God's original plan for you? Of course not. We often hear that "death is part of life." Some societies even glorify death, seeing it as an escape. But from a biblical standpoint, death is a scandal. It's not your friend. Scripture calls it the king of terrors, your enemy. You yourself live in denial. Your brain is naturally in denial about its own mortality. An article from a French science magazine put it this way not long ago: "Our brain denies our own mortality but fully accepts that of others."

It's no accident that Moses mentions Adam near the start of the psalm. It's because you're a child of Adam that you die. Adam represented the whole human race, much like a head of state whose bad decisions affect an entire nation. He disobeyed God, and he dragged you into the catastrophe along with him. Ever since, you've lived in a world where death reigns. Since the beginning of humanity, an estimated 108 billion people have died. Every second, one or two people die somewhere in the world. 150,000 a day. 59 million a year. And Moses knew exactly what he was talking about: he had watched 24,000 Israelites die in a single day because of their disobedience (Numbers 25:9).

The New Testament says it's the devil who holds the power of death (Hebrews 2:14). But God remains sovereign. He alone decides the moment. It takes only a word from God for a baby to be conceived. It takes only a word for a human being to return to dust. As Ecclesiastes puts it: "There is no man who has power over the spirit to contain the spirit; neither does he have power over the day of death." (Ecclesiastes 8:8, WEB)

Moses then offers you two images to describe your life:

"You carry them away as with a flood. They are like a sleep, like grass that grows up in the morning. In the morning it sprouts and springs up. By evening, it is withered and dry." (Psalm 90:5-6, WEB)

A dream lasts one night. Another psalmist will say it this way: man is only a passing shadow that fades away into the night. And a flower, take a poppy, for example. It's among the most beautiful of flowers, and yet its lifespan is estimated at a single day. Every time you look at a flower, it should make you reflect on yourself. But because you live in a developed country, with the advances of modern medicine, it's easier to lull yourself into forgetting just how fleeting your life really is. For many, death is unthinkable, a taboo.

4. The just anger of a holy God, and your true condition

Now comes a side of the Lord we don't much like to hear about:

"For we are consumed in your anger. We are troubled in your wrath. You have set our iniquities before you, our secret sins in the light of your presence." (Psalm 90:7-8, WEB)

This is far from the greeting-card image of a "gentle God" or a "sweet little Jesus." The Lord is no pushover. He must be taken seriously. He can grow angry because of sin. Be careful here: this anger isn't fickle, it isn't arbitrary the way yours can be. It's a just, holy anger against evil. God's eyes are too pure to look on evil (Habakkuk 1:13). Moses knew this well: he had watched, in the wilderness, the snakes sent against the rebels, and he himself had trembled on Mount Sinai, terrified by the fury of God.

So you, as a Christian, might tell yourself: God's anger has no reason to terrify me. And that's true, because Jesus took that anger upon himself on the cross. Jesus is your lightning rod. By grace, you're saved. But don't mistake God for someone you can toy with. Even under the new covenant, the Lord carried out judgments, think of Ananias and Sapphira (Acts 5). God is slow to anger, compassionate above all, merciful above all. But his anger against sin is very real.

And the psalmist warns: the Lord's light exposes your secret sins. You can't hide anything from God. You can lie to others. You can even lie to yourself. Luther said that, like God's anger, sin is an unfathomable depth. That's why David, in Psalm 19, asks the Lord to forgive him for faults he isn't even aware of. And in Psalm 139, he asks God to search out his deepest motives. God knows you better than you know yourself. He scans the depths of your heart like an X-ray. A recent high-profile scandal is a stark example of this: years of secrets, one day dragged into the light. As Jesus said: "For there is nothing hidden, except that it should be made known." (Mark 4:22, WEB)

The good news is that the letter to the Hebrews says God no longer remembers the sins of those who repent and believe in Jesus (Hebrews 8:12; 10:17). It's far better to say to the Lord, as David did: "Show me my sins now. Forgive me now." Because later, it will be too late. Jesus himself said: "I didn't come to judge the world, but to save the world." (John 12:47, WEB) If you don't receive Jesus here on earth as your Savior, you'll meet him on the other side as your Judge.

5. Seventy, eighty years: then flying away

Moses continues:

"For all our days have passed away in your wrath. We bring our years to an end, as a sigh. The days of our years are seventy, or even by reason of strength eighty years; yet their pride is but labor and sorrow, for it passes quickly, and we fly away." (Psalm 90:9-10, WEB)

Solomon is a striking example of this. He was the wisest of men. And yet his life was shortened because of his failures: he died at 60, when he could have lived much longer had he obeyed. One well-known secular songwriter once wrote about death: "Time is the monstrous ticking of the clock. Death is the infinite in its eternity. But what becomes of those who come to meet it? Just as we earn our living, must we earn our death?" Psalm 90 answers: yes, because of sin, you have earned death. A famous French actress once said in a recent interview that she thought about death every day, that there was nothing more horrible, and that "death is the punishment we all share." She wasn't wrong on that point.

Moses himself didn't die at 70 but at 120. And he was called by God at 80, as if to remind you that it isn't by your own strength that you fulfill your calling, but by the Lord's strength working in you. The numbers 70 and 80 in the psalm probably refer to the Israelites in the wilderness, struck down by early death. But curiously, the average life expectancy worldwide today is around 71 years for men and 75 for women. Right in that same range.

Old age, for many, is nothing but labor and sorrow. Jacob, at 130, looking back on his life, called it "few and hard" (Genesis 47:9). One famous French statesman, who died at 79, said that "old age is a shipwreck." Yes, old age without God is a shipwreck. But with God, there's a promise. Keep this verse close to your heart: "Even to old age I am he, and even to gray hairs I will carry you. I have made, and I will bear. Yes, I will carry, and will deliver." (Isaiah 46:4, WEB)

6. Your comfort: the one who conquered death

The psalmist closes this first part by saying, "It passes quickly, and we fly away." Fly away to what? Everything depends on your answer to God's call on your life.

Here is your comfort. Here is the promise of Jesus Christ for all who believe in him:

"I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will still live, even if he dies. Whoever lives and believes in me will never die." (John 11:25-26, WEB)

For the Christian, you don't really experience death at all. It becomes a passage into eternity with God. Your life is brief. Your body will return to dust. But if Jesus is your refuge, then the word of God, which stands forever, unlike the grass that withers, promises you this: death will not hold you. It is crossed over. It is passed through. Prepare to meet your God (Amos 4:12). Sooner or later, it will happen. Today, you can say to your Savior: "So teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom." (Psalm 90:12, WEB)

Key takeaways

Psalm 90 is the only psalm written by Moses. It invites you to look your death in the face so you can rediscover what truly matters.
God is eternal: "from everlasting to everlasting, you are God." Your life, on the other hand, is brief: a dream, a flower that fades.
Death is not your friend. It's the fruit of sin that entered the world through Adam.
God has a just anger against sin, but Jesus took that anger on himself at the cross for all who believe in him.
Your comfort in the face of death is Jesus himself: "He who believes in me will still live, even if he dies."

Personal application

If today were your last day, who would you need to tell "I love you"? Who would you need to share the gospel with again? What are you waiting for?
Where have you really placed your refuge right now: in God, or in something that will pass away along with you?
What priorities would you change in your life if you numbered your days in light of eternity?
Is there a hidden sin you'd rather not name? Can you, like David, ask the Lord to show it to you now, so he can forgive you now?
Have you already placed your death in the hands of Jesus, the one who conquered death?

Verses cited

Frequently asked questions

Why meditate on death when the Bible speaks of eternal life?
Because facing your own death reframes everything: your priorities, your relationships, how you share the gospel. Moses himself puts it this way: "Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom" (Psalm 90:12). Looking your death in the face in light of Christ doesn't crush you, it sets you free.

How can I understand the "wrath of God" without being afraid of it?
God's anger isn't fickle. It's a just and holy anger against evil. For the believer, that anger was absorbed by Jesus at the cross, he is your lightning rod. So you can speak of it with reverence and respect, but without terror: if you believe in Jesus, God no longer remembers your sins (Hebrews 10:17).

What difference does it actually make to know that death is "a passage"?
It changes how you live today. You can serve God, love those around you, share the gospel, and face illness or grief with a peace the world cannot give. Jesus says: "Whoever lives and believes in me will never die" (John 11:26). Physical death will still come, but it won't stop you.

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