What will 2024 hold?

2023 certainly held surprises for us – some good, others devastating. Some made little difference to us, while others rocked the very foundation of our lives. It never crossed my mind that I would bury my wife of over 47 years in 2023. My world was shaken and will never be the same. Indeed, 2023 held some unpleasant and troubling events. But what will 2024 hold for each of us?

One thing for certain is that I will be closer to death than I have ever been. I must face the reality that I have a terminal, fatal, incurable, disease and so do you. It is called being human. I must face the reality that I am closer to death than I have ever been before. We are at best on borrowed time. As you and I prepare for our encroaching death, what do we need to know and take seriously?

Moses, in Psalm 90:12, warns each of us, “So, teach us to number our days so that we may get a heart of wisdom.”

This life is my school, my training ground, the scene of my education for eternity. What a fool I would be to waste and squander such a little season! The only season I have. Am I foolishly throwing away this opportunity which has been given to me in this school of life to prepare for the real life which awaits us when this is over?

Isaiah wrote, “My dwelling is plucked up and removed from me like a shepherd’s tent; like a weaver I have rolled up my life; he cuts me off from the loom; from day to night, you bring me to an end (Isaiah 38:12).

As suddenly as the tent of a shepherd is taken down, folded up, and transferred to another place. There is doubtless the idea here that he would continue to exist, but in another place, as the shepherd would pitch his tent or dwell in another place. He was to be cut off from the earth, but he expected to dwell among the dead. The whole passage conveys the idea that he expected to dwell in another state – as the shepherd dwells in another place when he strikes his tent and it is removed. “He cuts me off from the loom” – This is another image designed to express substantially the same idea. The sense is, as a weaver takes his web from the loom by cutting the warp, or the threads which bind it to the beam, and thus loosens it and takes it away, so his life was to be cut off.

How does the right numbering of our days lead to the applying of our hearts to know wisdom?

In this Psalm 90, it seems Moses is reflecting upon those dropping dead daily in the wilderness. That path of wandering strewn with carcasses – how Israel must have been impressed with the certainty of death and the shortness of life. In verse 4 when Moses compared the longevity of God to that of man, the fleeting nature of man’s was even more clearly seen: “For a thousand years in your sight are but as yesterday when it is past, or as a watch in the night.” The numbering of my days help bring wisdom because it makes me realize how transitory our life is.

Life’s riches and glory are so meaningless, worthless, vain. In a very little time I will truly know the vanity of earthly treasure (see the Foolish Farmer, Luke 12:20). What is man profited by earthly treasure? Matthew 6:19-20 discussed the contrasts between earthly and heavenly treasures: “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in or steal.” It is terrible to waste this short life in pursuit of things that will not last beyond this fleeting moment.            And so, too, of this world’s sorrows. Should I be so moved by them if I know how little time they lasted? Paul says, “Our light afflictions which are but for a moment.” (2 Cor. 4:17) Hence he who rightly numbers his days lives above the world, is independent of it, is free from its terrible down drag and tyranny.

What will tomorrow bring? I have my hopes and my plans, but I have no idea what will occur. Work left undone today may remain undone; the kind word not said today may remain silent; a sin unrepented of may remain on our account tomorrow and cost us our all; the soul unsaved today may remain unsaved and condemned to a devil’s hell. So, what will 2024 hold? I don’t know and I don’t necessarily want to know. But, whatever it holds I pray God will give the strength to rise above it and keep my focus on heaven.

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