Psalm 39 & Psalm 103:13-16
July 3, 2016
preached by Doug Cooper
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Time of Reflection Quotations

“We had entered an era of limitlessness, or the illusion thereof, and this in itself is a sort of wonder. My grandfather lived a life of limits, both suffered and strictly observed, in a world of limits. I learned much of that world from him and others, and then I changed; I entered the world of labor-saving machines and of limitless cheap fossil fuel. It would take me years of reading, thought, and experience to learn again that in this world limits are not only inescapable but indispensable.”

~ Wendell Berry (1934-present), American novelist, poet, and farmer

“You act like mortals in all that you fear, and like immortals in all that you desire.”

“You live as if you were destined to live forever, no thought of your frailty ever enters your head, of how much time has already gone by you take no heed. You squander time as if you drew from a full and abundant supply, though all the while that day which you bestow on some person or thing is perhaps your last.”

“What are you looking at? To what goal are you straining? The whole future lies in uncertainty: live immediately.”

~ Lucius Annaeus Seneca (4 BC-AD 65), Roman philosopher, statesman, dramatist

“God has made us so that we must be mutually dependent. We may ignore our own dependence, or refuse to acknowledge that others depend upon us in more respects than the payment of weekly wages; but the thing must be, nevertheless. Neither you nor any other master can help yourselves. The most proudly independent man depends on those around him for their insensible influence on his character– his life.”

~ Elizabeth Gaskell (1810-1865), English novelist, “North and South”

“Money and machines anesthetize neediness. They put us in charge, in control.  As long as the money holds out and the machines are in good repair, we don’t need to pray.”

~ Eugene H. Peterson (1932-present), American clergyman and author

“Bound on a voyage of awful length
And dangers little known,
A stranger to superior strength,
Man vainly trusts his own.

But oars alone can ne’er prevail
To reach the distant coast;
The breath of Heaven must swell the sail,
Or all the toil is lost.”

~ William Cowper (1731-1800), English poet and hymnodist, Human Frailty

Sermon Passages

Psalm 39 (NASB)

¹ I said, “I will guard my ways
That I may not sin with my tongue;
I will guard my mouth as with a muzzle
While the wicked are in my presence.”
² I was mute and silent,
I refrained even from good,
And my sorrow grew worse.
³ My heart was hot within me,
While I was musing the fire burned;
Then I spoke with my tongue:
⁴ “Lord, make me to know my end
And what is the extent of my days;
Let me know how transient I am.
⁵ “Behold, You have made my days as handbreadths,
And my lifetime as nothing in Your sight;
Surely every man at his best is a mere breath. Selah.
⁶ “Surely every man walks about as a phantom;
Surely they make an uproar for nothing;
He amasses riches and does not know who will gather them.

Psalm 103:13-16 (NASB)