CONDUCT YOURSELVES WITH WISDOM: en sophia peripateite (2PPAM): (Col 3:16; Ps 90:12; Matt 10:16; Ro 16:19; 1Cor 14:19-25; Eph 5:15-17; Ja 1:5; 3:13,17)

Conduct (4043) (peripateo) (Click for an in depth word study of peripateo from peri = about, around + pateo = walk, tread) (Used 4x Colossians) means literally to go here and there in walking, to tread all around and most commonly in the NT is used figuratively meaning to conduct one's life ("the Christian walk"), to order one's behavior, to behave,  to make one's way, to make due use of opportunities, to live or pass one’s life (with a connotation of spending some time in a place). In (Col 1:10) Paul had prayed that the saints at Colossae would

"walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, to please Him in all respects, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God." (notes on Col 1:10)

Note the benefits of a worthy walk (of wise conduct) - pleasing to God, fruitful for God and growth in the knowledge of God.

Conduct is in the present tense (continual action) and imperative mood (command not a suggestion) which calls for believers to continually walk with wisdom. This is to be the habit of our new life in Christ and His life in us making it possible for us to "strive according to His power which mightily works within" us. In other words, Paul is not commanding us to do anything that God's power has not provided the potential for us to obey. Our part is to continually work out this salvation truth in fear and trembling.

Paul is writing here about the practical aspect of how we walk the talk. He explains how we are to "walk" before others. How we conduct ourselves.

S Lewis Johnson comments that

It is said that Lord Melbourne once remarked in Parliament, after divine principles were injected into the midst of a lively debate, “Things have come to a pretty pass when religion has to affect our daily lives.” I fear that this absurd attitude is more prevalent in the genuine Christian community than we realize or care to admit. We are quite often pious and reverent on the Lord’s Day, but what a different person we become on Monday morning—especially behind the wheel of our automobiles when we are just a little late for work and the traffic is heavy and slow-moving! It is remarkable how often the Word of God stresses the fact that there should be daily exercise in spiritual things on the part of the Christian...The Christian’s week, in a sense, ought to be a week of Sundays, because all of the days are His days." (Bibliotheca Sacra : A quarterly published by Dallas Theological Seminary. Dallas TX: Dallas Theological Seminary.

J Vernon McGee adds the practical comment that

Walking is not a balloon ascension. A great many people think the Christian life is some great, overwhelming experience and you take off like a rocket going out into space. That’s not where you live the Christian life. Rather, it is in your home, in your office, in the schoolroom, on the street. The way you get around in this life is to walk. You are to walk in Christ. God grant that you and I might be joined to Him in our daily walk.  (McGee, J V: Thru the Bible Commentary:  Thomas Nelson or Logos)

Ray Stedman writes...

I like that figure because a walk, of course, merely consists of two simple steps, repeated over and over again. It is not a complicated thing. In the same way, the Christian life is a matter of taking two steps, one step after another. Then you are beginning to walk. Those two steps follow in this passage. Paul describes them as, "Put off the old man" (see Col 3:5-10) and "put on the new." (see specific attitudes and actions in Col 3:12-4:6) Then repeat them. That is all. Keep walking through every day like that. That is how Scripture exhorts us to live."

Wisdom (4678) (sophia) (for an in depth analysis of sophia) (Click for the 6 uses in Colossians) is mental excellence in its highest and fullest sense and includes the ability to judge correctly and to follow the best course of action, based on knowledge and understanding. In simple terms Biblical wisdom can be defined as skill for living.

Sophia is the ability to properly apply the knowledge (which God has already revealed to their heart in answer to Paul's prayer in Col 1:9 note) to each given situation. Biblical wisdom does not allow for separation between learning and living. The wisdom which Paul speaks of is not simply a head knowledge of deep spiritual truths. True spiritual wisdom must affect our daily life. Biblical wisdom is practical, not theoretical.

Wisdom is being able to take what God has revealed to your heart and applying it in given situations in a practical way.

Note that "with wisdom" ("en sophia" is literally "in wisdom") is placed first in the Greek sentence for emphasis. Literally "in wisdom conduct yourselves".

The aspect of wisdom in view is that which buys up every opportunity to lead a lost soul to the Lord. Thus the Colossian's walk in wisdom is to have in view their Christian witness.

S. Lewis Johnson quipped that

"Often the only version of the Bible the world reads is that of the believer's life, and, if that is true, in the light of the weakness of the church's testimony today surely the world could use a revised version!"

Warren Wiersbe reminds us that

Practical obedience means pleasing God, serving Him, and getting to know Him better. Any doctrine that isolates the believer from the needs of the world around him is not spiritual doctrine. Evangelist D. L. Moody often said, “Every Bible should be bound in shoe-leather." (Wiersbe, W: Bible Exposition Commentary. 1989. Victor or Logos)

Eadie writes that Colossians 4:5-6...

refer to the outer aspects of Christian conduct or such aspects of it as present themselves to the world. While they were to set their affections on things above, and mortify their “members which are upon the earth;” while they were to put off certain vices, and assume certain virtues, culminating in love; while they were to be exemplary in every social relation—as husbands and wives, parents and children, masters and servants; and while they were to be instant in prayer for themselves and for the apostle, all this ethical code referred to personal and mutual spiritual duties within the church. They must, however, in ordinary circumstances, come in contact with unbelieving heathenism around them. If they shrank entirely from such company, the inference of the apostle would be realized—“for then must ye needs go out of the world.” But they were not to go out of the world because it was bad, they were to remain in it for the purpose of making it better. And that their conduct might exercise such a beneficial influence they were thus enjoined" to conduct themselves in truth and communicate the truth to a world steeped in lies and bound tight in sin.

TOWARD OUTSIDERS: pros tous exô: (1Co 5:12,13; 1Th 4:12; 1Ti 3:7; 1Pet 3:1)

Toward (4314) (pros from pro = in front of) can express motion or direction and thus "to" or "toward".  Pros can convey the idea of nearness, of being or remaining near by or at.  Pros can refer to a position near another location or object, often with the implication of facing toward the object. It is as if our lives are place toward or before the lost, that they might observe and examine and determine whether there is a difference in the way we conduct ourselves.

APPLICATION: If you were put on trial for being a Christian, would there be enough "evidence" to convict you?

Outsiders (exo) means literally out (as being outside a door and so out of doors). Figuratively as in this verse, exo speaks of those not belonging to one's society and specifically non-believers or non-Christians. Literally Paul says "those outside" (tous exo) an expression which is equivalent to the rabbinical term denoting those who belong to another religious group and in the present context refers to those outside the church, those who are not regenerate or born again. The unsaved are outside the family of God, and God has assigned us the privilege to be His ambassadors to proclaim the gospel of the kingdom to them. Effective witness involves walking wisely, being alert to every opportunity, and being careful in what we say and how we say it (1Pe 3:15 note).

Paul uses the same phrase toward outsiders (pros tous exo - literally toward those outside") in his letter to the Thessalonians writing that the believers should...

make it your ambition to lead a quiet life and attend to your own business and work with your hands, just as we commanded you; so that you may behave properly toward outsiders and not be in any need. (See notes 1Thessalonians 4:11; 4:12)

What a sad thing to be those outside, those who are “without”...without Christ, without hope, without peace, without forgiveness! (cp notes Ephesians 2:12) It is important that believers live wisely among the lost, for unsaved people are looking at our lives and trying to find things to criticize.

We are to first speak the gospel clearly with our lives, which may open a door for us to speak the gospel with our lips.

This story has often been told about Dr. Will H. Houghton, who pastored the Calvary Baptist Church in New York City and later served as president of Chicago’s Moody Bible Institute till his death in 1946. When Dr. Houghton became pastor of the Baptist Tabernacle in Atlanta, a man in that city hired a private detective to follow Dr. Houghton and report on his conduct. After a few weeks, the detective was able to report to the man that Dr. Houghton’s life matched his preaching. As a result, that man became a Christian.

MAKING THE MOST OF THE OPPORTUNITY: ton kairon exagorazomenoi (PMPMPN):

Making the most (1805) (exagorazo from   ek = out or from. If something is in something else, then ek describes separating it in respect to place, time, source or origin + agorázo = buy, acquire possessions or services in exchange for money with the result that whatever has been bought is the buyer's by  right of possession <> from agora = market place where things were exposed for sale,  a forum, a place in which the people assemble and where public trials were held)  means literally to buy out of (the preposition "ek" = out of) the market place. It means to completely redeem.

Exagorazo is used 4 times in the NT (Gal 2x; Eph; Col) and is translated: making the most, 2; redeem, 1; redeemed

There are two basic uses of exagorazo in the NT, the first speaking of the believer's redemption from slavery to sin.

Paul uses exagorazo twice in Galatians with this meaning, writing that "Christ redeemed us (bought us out and out or fully from) from (ek = out of) the curse of the Law (which is death, the penalty for breaking the Law), having become a curse for (on behalf of ~ substitution) us-- for it is written, "CURSED IS EVERYONE WHO HANGS ON A TREE" (Gal 3:13)

The Welsh translation of this verse says that “Christ hath wholly purchased us from the curse of the law.” The Galatians imagined that Christ only half purchased them, and that they had to purchase the rest by their submission to circumcision and other Jewish rites and ceremonies. Hence their readiness to be led away by false teachers and to mix up Christianity and Judaism. Paul says in essence "No, you have been "wholly purchased from the curse"".

In the second similar use in of exagorazo in Galatians Paul explains that

"when the fulness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the Law, in order that He might redeem (exagorazo) those who were under the Law, that we might receive the adoption as sons." (Gal 4:4-5)

Those who believe in Christ are bought out from their slavery to Sin, the payment price He paid being the only one high enough to redeem all of mankind, the

“precious blood, as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ” (1Peter 1:19 notes).

Since Christ has purchased men out of the slave market of sin (sin caused us to be under the curse of the Law) by His own blood, believers now are His bondslaves and He has the right of possession. Paul using the root verb (agorazo) writes that believers "have been bought with a price (agorazo - a past completed transaction never to be repeated).

Therefore glorify God in your body." (1Cor 6:20)

Stated another way, the redeemed are never again to be put up for sale in the slave market.

The root verb from which exagorazo is derived (agorazo) is used frequently in the Septuagint (LXX,, Greek of the Hebrew OT) with the idea that such deliverance involves cost of some kind, effort, suffering, or loss to the one who effects the deliverance.

The second meaning of exagorazo is to "buy up" and is the meaning here in Colossians and the parallel passage in Ephesians. It means to to gain something, especially an advantage or opportunity. To make the most of.

Exagorazo is used to translate the Aramaic in Daniel 2:8  where Nebuchadnezzar saw through his seers trickery (to entice him to tell them the dream, upon which they would tell him the interpretation) and answered

“I know for certain that you are bargaining for time, inasmuch as you have seen that the command from me is firm." (Daniel 2:8)

The phrase "bargaining for time" is translated in the Greek with exagorazo and kairos (see below) just as in Colossians and Ephesians.

BDAG notes that

"the king’s oneiromancers (interpreters of dreams) face an hour of peril in which there are no options except to deliver what the monarch requests. The middle voice (ton kairon exagorazomenoi) in Col 4:5; Eph 5:16 appropriately expresses choice in perilous times" (Arndt, W., Danker, F. W., & Bauer, W. A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature)

Making the most of the opportunity means to take advantage of any opportunity that comes your way, and in the context of this section in Colossians refers to an opportunity to speak the gospel.

In Ephesians Paul exhorts the saints to

Therefore be careful how you walk, not as unwise men, but as wise, making the most of  (exagorazo - buying up each opportunity) your time (kairos) because the days are evil. So then do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is." (see notes Ephesians 5:15; 5:16; 5:17)

MacArthur commenting on this verse writes that exagorazo

"has the basic meaning of buying, especially of buying back or buying out. It was used of buying a slave in order to set him free; thus the idea of redemption is implied in this verse. We are to redeem, buy up, all the time that we have and devote it to the Lord. The Greek is in the middle voice, indicating that we are to buy the time up for ourselves—for our own use but in the Lord’s service. (MacArthur, J: Ephesians. Chicago: Moody Press or Logos)

Hodge adds that (Eph 5:16) can be translated

"availing yourselves of the occasion,” i.e. improving every opportunity for good." (Hodge, C. Commentary on Ephesians)

In both (Eph 5:16) and here in (Col 4:5) Paul uses the middle voice which conveys a "reflexive" sense to the verb - the idea then is of buying up for oneself, of buying up the opportunity, the season, the space of time in which something is seasonable, and of turning each opportunity to the best advantage for oneself.

Thayer says that exagorazo as used in (Eph 5:16) and (Col 4:5) means to

"Buy up, buy up or out of for one's self and so to make wise and sacred use of every opportunity for doing good, so that zeal and well doing are as it were the purchase money by which we make the time our own."

The UBS Handbook Series adds that

"The readers are being told to seize and use every opportunity to carry on their Christian witness, because these are evil days, In some languages it is necessary to specify what is involved in every opportunity. Accordingly, it may be necessary to translate make good use of every opportunity you have as “every time you can do something good you should” or “you should use every chance to do good”. (The United Bible Societies' New Testament Handbook Series or Logos)

The idea then is turning each season (kairos) to the best advantage since none can be recalled if missed. 

“Every time you can do something good you should”.

Kenneth Wuest translates (Col 4:5)

"buying up for yourselves the strategic, opportune time."

He translates (Eph 5:16) similarly as

buying up for yourselves the opportune time, because the days are pernicious.

The idea is to be habitually, continually ''buying up'' all that is anywhere to be bought and not allowing the moment (THE KAIROS) to pass by unheeded or unused but to make it one’s own. 

Ironside said...

"Time is given us to use in view of eternity."

As someone else has said

"Beware of wasting the present. Instead of killing time, redeem your spare moments today. Wasting the gift of time insults the Giver of time."

Redeem the time! God only knows
How soon our little life may close,
With all its pleasures and its woes,
Redeem the time!         — Anonymous

God set a goal, yet gave the choice
To mortals how time may be spent,
Admonishing that worth, not length,
Values time's accomplishment.
                            — Mortenson

The idea is not to make best use of time as such (although that is certainly advisable), which is what we should do in the sense of not wasting it, but of taking advantage of the opportunities that present themselves.

THE OPPORTUNITY ("the opportune season"): ton kairon:  

Opportunity (2540) (Kairos) (Click for an in depth word study of kairos) refers to a strategic point of time.

Kairos is distinct from the Greek chronos, which refers to time in general. Kairos on the other hand refers to a specific period of opportunity which when it passes by is irretrievable. Our English word opportunity comes from the Latin and means “toward the port.” It suggests a ship taking advantage of the wind and tide to arrive safely in the harbor. The brevity of life is a strong argument for making the best use of every opportunity God gives us.

Kairos then does not emphasize a point of time but rather a space of time filled with possibilities and opportunities. Paul tells the saints at Colossae and Ephesus to buy up every one of these opportunities for yourselves and ultimately for God's glory.

All believers are presented with opportunities to redeem. Paul exhorts us to go into the open market and buy up those opportunities by using them rightly. Remember that interruptions can be opportunities to serve.

As someone has accurately stated, the three most difficult things to do are : keep a secret, forget injury, and make good use of your leisure time (it's really not yours anyway but His...He's just "loaning" it to you.)

Many biblical texts stand as warning beacons to those who think they will always have time to do what they should. When Noah and his family entered the ark and shut the door, the opportunity for any other person to be saved from the flood was gone.

Because King Ahab disobeyed God by sparing the life of the wicked Ben–hadad, he was told by a prophet,

“Thus says the Lord, ‘Because you have let go out of your hand the man whom I had devoted to destruction, therefore your life shall go for his life, and your people for his people’ ” (1Ki 20:42).

Peter said,

“If you address as Father the One who impartially judges according to each man’s work, conduct yourselves in fear during the time of your stay upon earth” (1Pe 1:17 note).

In his farewell remarks to the Ephesian elders at Miletus, Paul said,

“I do not consider my life of any account as dear to myself, in order that I may finish my course, and the ministry which I received from the Lord Jesus” (Acts 20:24).

Paul’s course was prescribed by God, and within that course he would minister to the utmost until his last breath. He was determined to run with endurance the race that was set before him (see note Hebrews 12:1 ). At the end of his life he therefore could say,

“I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith” (2Ti 4:7 note).

APPLICATION: Your entire life should be built around looking for opportunities to present Christ, seizing the time and using it wisely. Evaluate all of your activities and determine how they affect your testimony for Christ. Ask yourself --

"Will any particular activity provide an opportunity to present Christ or will it make it more difficult for me to present Him?"

Grant Richison notes by way of application that...

"Time" means opportunity. The Greek word here means a time in which something is seasonable. Evangelism is seasonable! We need to seize on the season! God wants us to take advantage of the opportunity when it comes along. We cannot recall the opportunity if we miss it. Are we making the most of every opportunity? There is a favorable time to preach the gospel. We can mark time, waste time and kill time. Only a Christian who walks in wisdom can redeem time. In sharing our faith, God wants us to "Strike while the iron is hot" or "Make hay while the sun is shining." We squander so many opportunities. God places opportunities at our disposal but we waste the moment." (Notes on Col 4:5)

Ray Stedman adds this interesting thought...

It is interesting how Paul describes the opportunities. They do not just fall into our laps, but we must buy them up. This means we must look for them and use them. We are to make opportunities, humanly speaking. Our opportunities are the result of the Spirit working, but it is the Spirit working as we are willing to be biblical. As we approach our neighbors, friends and people we work with on our jobs, are we looking for opportunities to present Christ to them? Such an approach will affect our conduct. We would not want to say or do anything that would detract from the Gospel of Jesus Christ." (Colossians 4:2-6: Living the Life)

Wayne Barber's comments on Ephesian 5:16 (from his sermon on Eph 5:15-17 "Walking as Light in a World of Darkness") are apropos to Colossians 4:5. He writes that...

"Look at verse 16: "making the most of your time, because the days are evil." Now the word for "time" is an interesting word. It is the word kairos. It means season or opportunity. Now we know something about a season. A season comes in, but we also know something else about a season. A season goes away. There is going to come a summer time. But we are going to move out of that season into a time of barrenness. All of a sudden the leaves fall off the trees and it is just brown and dry. A season begins but a season ends.

Paul is saying, "Make the most of your time. If the season started when we received Christ, it is going to end when He comes for us. We only have one season. We only have one opportunity. You don’t get those choices over again." Many of us have made unwise choices. Many of us have not applied truth in our life. Already we are feeling it because we are getting older. Paul is trying to tell these Ephesians, "You had better wake up and get going, because you may not have that much longer. You only have one shot at it. Learn to make proper, biblically influenced choices in your life so that you can make the most of the time."

Making the most of the time means to redeem the time. To redeem the time means to purchase it. That is one thing that we all have in common. Every one of us has exactly the same amount of time. You’ve got 24 hours, and what you do with it is your business. You’ve got to make choices. But now wait a minute. He says, "Redeem the time." What do you mean, "redeem the time"? Purchase it. To purchase it, I have to have the collateral.

Not only do you have to have the collateral, you have to have the right kind of collateral if you are going purchase anything. So what is the collateral to purchase time? It is my choices. We have to understand this. Life is filled with one choice after another choice after another choice. It is not putting the garment on in the morning and thinking it is going to stay on you all day. You have to continue all day long to make those choices. What are those choices motivated by? They are motivated by what the Word of God has taught us. They are motivated by our respect of who God is. Now to be the right choice it has to be a choice that honors Christ and what His Word has to say. That is the way I purchase time. I have only got one time around, and I have to learn to make proper choices. How many choices did you make yesterday?

We have to learn that time is short. We only have one season. We only go around one time. Make those choices. Why? Because every time you choose, you are going to do something. That is called a deed and one day we will answer for those deeds at the Bema Seat of Christ. Are they wood, hay and stubble? What is wood, hay and stubble? They are stupid, fleshly, religious choices. Sometimes they are not even religious. What are precious stones? They are choices that were made based on God’s Word and my willingness to do what He tells me to do. We are making those choices, moment by moment by moment.

Kefa Sempangi (whose story is told in the book A Distant Grief, Regal Books) was a national pastor in Africa and barely escaped with his family from brutal oppression and terror in his home country of Uganda. They made their way to Philadelphia, where a group of Christians began caring for them. One day his wife said, “Tomorrow I am going to go and buy some clothes for the children,” and immediately she and her husband broke into tears. Because of the constant threat of death under which they had so long lived, that was the first time in many years they had dared even speak the word tomorrow. Their terrifying experiences forced them to realize what is true of every person: there is no assurance of tomorrow. The only time we can be sure of having is what we have at the moment. To the self–satisfied farmer who had grandiose plans to build bigger and better barns to store his crops, the Lord said, “You fool! This very night your soul is required of you” (Lu 12:20). He had already lived his last tomorrow.

There is a tide in the affairs of men,
Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;
Omitted, all the voyage of their life
Is bound in shallows and in miseries.
             Julius Caesar, 4.3.217 --Shakespeare

Napoleon illustrates the idea inherent in "kairos" (opportunity) noting that

"There is in the midst of every great battle a ten to fifteen minute (this would equate with the idea inherent in the Greek word kairos) that is the crucial point. Take that period and you win the battle; lose it and you will be defeated."

Charles E. Hummel said...

Our greatest danger in life is in permitting the urgent things to crowd out the important.

The writer of Hebrews called these "urgent things" "encumbrances" or "weights" the Christian runner needs to cast aside, in order to be able to pursue the best.

The 16th-century reformer Philip Melanchthon kept a record of every wasted moment and took his list to God in confession at the end of each day. It is small wonder that God used him in such great ways.

An ancient Greek statue depicted a man with wings on his feet, a large lock of hair on the front of his head, and no hair at all on the back. Beneath was the inscription:

"Who made thee? Lysippus made me. What is thy name? My name is OPPORTUNITY. Why hast thou wings on thy feet? That I may fly away swiftly. Why hast thou a great forelock? That men may seize me when I come. Why art thou bald in back? That when I am gone by, none can lay hold of me."

We need to live in such a way that we get the most for our time. We are to live as if every minute counts— because it does. We can always make more money, but we cannot make more time. Once it is gone, it is gone forever. And when our time on this earth is over, we will give an account to the One who gave us our allotment of this precious commodity. The Lord Jesus was sensitive about time. He began His ministry at age thirty and ended it a mere three years later. His life was jammed with people with immediate needs. Sick. Dead. Scared. People pushed through crowds to touch Him. In Mark 1:35–37, before sunrise, Christ spent time with the Father. Peter and his friends “searched for Him. When they found Him, they said to Him, ‘Everyone is looking for You.’ ”In Matthew 14:23, He spent time with the Father in the evening. In Luke 6:12–13, He spent the night in prayer. And in Luke 5:15–16, we see that He slipped away into the wilderness to spend time with the Father. He had three short years to teach, preach, heal, and lead. But the most important thing in His life was the time He spent with the Father. If it was that important for Him, as the God-man, what about you?

Consider praying a pray like that uttered by Moses the friend and servant of God who said

So teach us to number our days, that we may present to Thee a heart of wisdom. (Ps 90:12) (See Spurgeon's note)

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Buying Up the Time - Consider this: “If we had to buy time, would there be any difference in how we would spend it? Would the days of our lives be used more wisely?” That’s what time management consultant Antonio Herrera asked the participants in a seminar he conducted on the subject. Then Dr. Herrera became more specific. He asked, “What if you had to pay in advance $100 an hour for the time allotted to you? Would you waste it?” The answer should be obvious. Of course, we can’t put a price tag on the minutes and hours we possess. They are given to us freely. But that doesn’t excuse us from using them conscientiously, carefully, and wisely. The giver of time is God Himself, and that places a far greater value upon it than any monetary figure could suggest. We must therefore use our time intelligently, taking advantage of opportunities it provides for us to serve the Lord and to do His will. - R W De Haan (Our Daily Bread, Copyright RBC Ministries, Grand Rapids, MI. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved)

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If we live 65 years, we have about 600,000 hours at our disposal. Assuming we are 18 when we complete high school, we have 47 years, or nearly 412,000 hours to live after graduation.

If we spend 8 hours a day sleeping, 8 hours for personal, social, and recreational activities, and 8 hours for working, that amounts to 137,333 hours in each category When we think of the time we have to work and play in terms of hours, it doesn't seem like much. And when seen in the light of eternity, it's but a fleeting moment. How important, therefore, that we spend our waking hours wisely!

D. J. De Pree, a former member of the RBC Board of Directors always calculated his age in terms of days. If you asked him, "How old are you?" he answered immediately with the number of days.

He based this practice on Psalm 90:12,  "Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom."

Literally counting his days reminded him of the swift passage of time and the need to live with eternity's values in view. —R W De Haan

Future prospects bring present joys.

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Time: Handle With Care -