4 A thousand years in your sight are like a day that has just gone by, or like a watch in the night.

Other Translations of Psalm 90:4

King James Version

4 For a thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night.

English Standard Version

4 For a thousand years in your sight are but as yesterday when it is past, or as a watch in the night.

The Message

4 Patience! You've got all the time in the world - whether a thousand years or a day, it's all the same to you.

New King James Version

4 For a thousand years in Your sight Are like yesterday when it is past, And like a watch in the night.

New Living Translation

4 For you, a thousand years are as a passing day, as brief as a few night hours.

Matthew Henry's Commentary on Psalm 90:4

Commentary on Psalm 90:1-6

(Read Psalm 90:1-6)

It is supposed that this psalm refers to the sentence passed on Israel in the wilderness, Numbers 14. The favour and protection of God are the only sure rest and comfort of the soul in this evil world. Christ Jesus is the refuge and dwelling-place to which we may repair. We are dying creatures, all our comforts in the world are dying comforts, but God is an ever-living God, and believers find him so. When God, by sickness, or other afflictions, turns men to destruction, he thereby calls men to return unto him to repent of their sins, and live a new life. A thousand years are nothing to God's eternity: between a minute and a million of years there is some proportion; between time and eternity there is none. All the events of a thousand years, whether past or to come, are more present to the Eternal Mind, than what was done in the last hour is to us. And in the resurrection, the body and soul shall both return and be united again. Time passes unobserved by us, as with men asleep; and when it is past, it is as nothing. It is a short and quickly-passing life, as the waters of a flood. Man does but flourish as the grass, which, when the winter of old age comes, will wither; but he may be mown down by disease or disaster.