“Show me, O Lord, my life’s end and the number of my days; let me know how fleeting is my life.” (Psalm 39:4 NIV)

David is wrestling with anger and frustration and in the height of his fury he prays what we might consider to be an odd request. “Show me how short life is.”

When David’s judgement is off-kilter, he prays for perspective. His request demonstrates wisdom. When we can remember that life is short, we can choose what we want to spend our time on. David didn’t want to waste his breath. Hopefully, neither do we.

When we learn to number out days, we learn to pick our battles. We understand that all our time is passing quickly and our people are more precious than pesky. We start to see time as currency and our hours and minutes as investments. How will we spend what we have?

I’m learning. With the still-smarting loss of all my parents and grandparents and whole history pages in my head left mostly blank, I’m finally figuring it out. People and their stories are important. Satan is the one who convinces us that they are inconvenient or infuriating. News flash; he’s a liar.

“You have made my days a mere handbreadth: the span of my years is nothing before You. Each man’s life is but a breath.” (Psalm 39:5)

If I’m a breath, I can spend this breath on God. Aren’t we all borrowed breath, really? Didn’t the Almighty bend down and breathe on dust and make us? The best expenditure of our existence is to give it back to Him.

“Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.” (Psalm 90:12 NIV)