Why Did the First Humans Live for So Long?
00:00:00.000 | (upbeat music)
00:00:02.580 | - Why are our lifespans so short today?
00:00:08.940 | If you've read the early chapters of Genesis,
00:00:12.040 | our average lifespan of 80 years is woefully short
00:00:15.820 | compared to when folks lived to be 300, 400,
00:00:20.240 | even 900 years old.
00:00:22.560 | The question today is from a listener named Steven.
00:00:24.760 | Dear Pastor John, thank you for this ministry.
00:00:27.200 | Would you provide your thoughts on why people live
00:00:29.760 | so long in the early chapters of Genesis?
00:00:33.480 | Thank you.
00:00:34.520 | - The question why people lived so long
00:00:38.400 | in the early history of mankind,
00:00:41.160 | as described in Genesis 1 to 10,
00:00:45.560 | is the flip side of why people for thousands of years
00:00:50.520 | have lived only 70 or 80 years
00:00:53.240 | compared to hundreds of years.
00:00:56.720 | Of course, it's also the flip side of why people
00:01:00.560 | by the millions have died at five years old or 45 years old.
00:01:05.120 | In other words, the issue of mortality in this world
00:01:09.120 | is a massive contrast, not only to eternal life,
00:01:14.120 | but also to living 900 years.
00:01:17.960 | So what's up?
00:01:18.860 | That's what the question is.
00:01:21.120 | In Genesis 5, Adam lives to be 930 years old.
00:01:26.960 | His son, Seth, 912 years.
00:01:31.160 | Seth's son, 910 years.
00:01:34.400 | Methuselah, the oldest, 969 years.
00:01:39.200 | And Noah, 950 years.
00:01:42.400 | Then, after the flood, Noah's son Shem lives 600 years.
00:01:47.400 | His son, 438 years.
00:01:52.800 | Then, Shelah, 433 years.
00:01:57.160 | Then, Pila, 239 years.
00:02:01.160 | And then, Terah, the father of Abraham, 148 years.
00:02:06.160 | And then, the age of the patriarchs, Abraham, 175 years.
00:02:12.520 | Isaac, 180 years.
00:02:15.720 | Jacob, 147 years.
00:02:19.760 | And then, after the 400-year bondage in Egypt,
00:02:24.600 | Moses, 120 years.
00:02:26.440 | Joshua, 110 years.
00:02:28.640 | And when we get to the period of the kings,
00:02:31.880 | David died at 70, Solomon at 80,
00:02:36.240 | which is where things have stood,
00:02:38.180 | I suppose you could say, for 3,000 years.
00:02:40.880 | - Right.
00:02:42.160 | - 70 or 80 years, at best.
00:02:44.840 | Now, as far as I can see,
00:02:46.360 | the Bible does not state explicitly
00:02:50.280 | why God would ordain that early mankind would live so long.
00:02:55.280 | But I think if we ponder what the Bible says
00:02:58.680 | about why our lives are so short,
00:03:02.000 | we will get a clue as to why
00:03:04.720 | the early generations lived so long.
00:03:08.000 | We know from the story of creation in Genesis 1-3
00:03:13.840 | and in Romans 5, verses 12 following,
00:03:17.720 | that death was not intended to be a part
00:03:21.520 | of the perfect world before sin
00:03:24.800 | entered the world and with it, death.
00:03:27.800 | Death was threatened by God as a penalty
00:03:31.180 | for disobedience, Genesis 2-17.
00:03:34.280 | Therefore, the presence of death in the world
00:03:37.880 | is not a natural part of the original perfect creation,
00:03:43.100 | but a judicial part of the fallen creation.
00:03:48.100 | It's a punishment.
00:03:49.280 | The apostle Paul puts it like this, Romans 8-20.
00:03:54.560 | The creation was subjected,
00:03:57.780 | so that's the fall under God's judgment.
00:04:01.080 | Creation was subjected to futility by God,
00:04:05.760 | not willingly, but because of him who subjected it
00:04:09.340 | in hope that the creation itself
00:04:12.020 | would be set free from its bondage to corruption
00:04:15.620 | and obtain the freedom of the glory
00:04:17.260 | of the children of God.
00:04:19.680 | So he describes the present situation
00:04:22.560 | of the created world as subjected to futility
00:04:26.940 | and in bondage to corruption.
00:04:29.320 | And that word corruption regularly refers to mortality
00:04:34.040 | and how things move from a state of vitality
00:04:36.480 | to dissolution and death.
00:04:38.480 | So God subjected the world to corruption,
00:04:41.160 | futility, death.
00:04:43.060 | Death is a divine judicial sentence
00:04:47.960 | upon humanity because of sin.
00:04:51.640 | The psalmist put it like this.
00:04:54.260 | This is Psalm 90 verses four following.
00:04:58.080 | A thousand years in your sight
00:05:00.800 | are but as yesterday when it is past.
00:05:03.700 | Or as a watch in the night,
00:05:05.580 | you sweep them away as with a flood.
00:05:08.720 | They are like a dream, like grass
00:05:11.320 | that is renewed in the morning.
00:05:13.960 | For all our days pass away under your wrath.
00:05:17.720 | That's the judicial part of death.
00:05:19.660 | We bring our years to an end like a sigh.
00:05:25.000 | The years of our life are 70 or even by reason of strength, 80
00:05:29.800 | yet their span is but toil and trouble.
00:05:33.280 | They are soon gone and we fly away.
00:05:37.720 | Now, if we ask what the aim of this divine judgment is,
00:05:42.720 | the answer is at least partly to make us aware
00:05:48.440 | that sin is horrible.
00:05:51.440 | Sin is a great outrage against God
00:05:55.560 | and life is short and eternity is long.
00:05:59.100 | And we need wisdom to know how to think
00:06:01.960 | and live with so little time on earth compared to eternity.
00:06:07.020 | So the Psalmist prays in Psalm 39 verse four,
00:06:11.860 | "Oh Lord, make me know my end
00:06:16.060 | and what is the measure of my days.
00:06:18.520 | Let me know how fleeting I am.
00:06:21.080 | Behold, you have made my days a few hand breaths
00:06:25.440 | and my lifetime is as nothing before you.
00:06:29.360 | Surely all mankind stands as a mere breath.
00:06:33.480 | Surely a man goes about as a shadow."
00:06:37.700 | And James in the New Testament makes the same point
00:06:41.820 | when he says, James 1, 9,
00:06:44.000 | "Let the rich boast in his humiliation
00:06:48.500 | because like a flower of the grass, he will pass away."
00:06:53.500 | Peter makes the same point.
00:06:55.280 | Chapter one, verse 24, "All flesh is like grass
00:07:00.240 | and all its glory like the flower of grass.
00:07:02.900 | The grass withers and the flower falls,
00:07:05.180 | but the word of the Lord remains forever."
00:07:08.660 | In other words, human mortality
00:07:11.740 | and the shortness of life cries out to the world.
00:07:15.420 | Your life is a vapor.
00:07:17.100 | Your life is a vapor.
00:07:19.620 | Take hold of what lasts.
00:07:21.620 | Take hold of God.
00:07:22.620 | Take hold of Christ.
00:07:23.680 | Take hold of the gospel.
00:07:25.780 | God's point to the world in the brevity of life
00:07:30.020 | is that a trumpet blast be sounded from every funeral
00:07:35.420 | millions upon millions of funerals.
00:07:38.700 | Look away.
00:07:39.620 | Look away from this mortal life.
00:07:42.100 | Look away from this fallen world of sin
00:07:45.040 | and corruption and futility.
00:07:47.300 | Look for your portion and your hope
00:07:50.100 | and your treasure outside this world.
00:07:52.640 | Look to God, look to Christ, look to the gospel.
00:07:55.620 | That's the point of mortality.
00:07:59.600 | So what can we say about the extraordinarily long lives then
00:08:03.460 | of those first humans in Genesis 1 to 10?
00:08:05.780 | Why did they live 900 years?
00:08:08.340 | Perhaps there's a clue in listening to the patriarch Jacob
00:08:13.340 | before he died.
00:08:14.700 | He said in Genesis 47, 9,
00:08:17.080 | "The days of the years of my sojourning are 130 years.
00:08:22.400 | Few and evil have been the days of the years of my life,
00:08:29.060 | and they have not attained to the days of the years
00:08:33.980 | of the life of my fathers in the days of their sojourning."
00:08:38.420 | So Jacob feels the contrast between his length of life,
00:08:43.420 | which we would consider long,
00:08:46.600 | and the length of those who have gone before.
00:08:49.460 | And surely we feel it.
00:08:51.480 | We should feel it.
00:08:52.720 | When we look at our three score in 10,
00:08:55.560 | or by reason of strength, four score,
00:08:57.900 | or 87 or 88, like my dad,
00:09:01.020 | surely we are to feel that some of our ancestors
00:09:05.620 | live 10 times that long,
00:09:08.380 | and we are to wonder at it.
00:09:11.180 | So my suggestion is that God granted those long lives
00:09:15.200 | so that we, looking back,
00:09:17.780 | could see from which we have fallen.
00:09:21.700 | In other words, those long lives testify
00:09:25.260 | that death was not part of the perfect creation.
00:09:29.020 | God ordains as a lesson to us
00:09:33.340 | that the force of life be preserved for hundreds of years
00:09:38.340 | in very long lives in those early centuries
00:09:43.620 | to show that life, not death, was his design
00:09:48.580 | and our portion in creation at the beginning.
00:09:53.780 | So the long lives of those first humans
00:09:57.780 | stands as a testimony of how utterly short our lives are
00:10:02.780 | and how God's design at the beginning
00:10:06.620 | and his design in the future is life,
00:10:10.060 | life, indeed, eternal life.
00:10:14.060 | Paul says in 2 Timothy 1:10,
00:10:17.740 | "Grace has now been manifested
00:10:21.580 | through the appearing of our Savior, Jesus Christ,
00:10:26.580 | who abolished death and brought life and immortality
00:10:31.620 | to light through the gospel."
00:10:35.980 | In other words, the gospel of Christ reverses
00:10:40.520 | the curse of mortality
00:10:43.080 | and opens the door of eternal life
00:10:47.540 | for all who believe.
00:10:50.160 | Those long lives were just pointers.
00:10:53.140 | It's about life, it's about life,
00:10:55.660 | and then it's taken from us in its fullness
00:10:58.380 | and restored in the gospel through Jesus.
00:11:01.380 | - Amen, very long life was God's original design,
00:11:05.720 | something that we can now look forward to
00:11:07.340 | in our glorification in Christ.
00:11:09.740 | Thank you, Pastor John.
00:11:11.220 | Thank you for listening today.
00:11:12.100 | You can ask a question of your own.
00:11:13.580 | You can search through or browse all 1,600
00:11:15.580 | of our past episodes or subscribe to the podcast.
00:11:17.940 | You can do all that at desiringgod.org/askpastorjohn.
00:11:22.940 | I am your host, Tony Reiki.
00:11:24.800 | We'll see you back here on Monday.
00:11:26.800 | Have a great weekend, everyone.
00:11:27.940 | We'll see you next time.
00:11:29.140 | (upbeat music)
00:11:31.720 | (upbeat music)
00:11:34.300 | [BLANK_AUDIO]