We’ve read so much about God in Psalm 103. My prayer is that our picture of God is much bigger, much harder to comprehend, much more appreciated than it was when we started our study almost a month ago.
What does this psalm say about man? That’s what we’re going to look at today.
Assignment: Pray for God’s continued guidance as you study His Word. Then get out the colored pencils and notebook, and open up your Bible to Psalm 103.
- Read the entire psalm, highlighting with green every appearance of the word man in the psalm. You should also mark any pronouns such as he and his that refer to man. (Note: If you are using the NIV, look for the word mortals instead.)
- When you have finished, look back over what you have marked. On Day 6 we highlighted in yellow all the words that referred to God in this psalm. Look at your text. How much yellow do you see compared to green?
- On Day 7 we made a chart and recorded all the verbs related to God. We saw what He has done, what He is doing, and what He will or won’t do.
Let’s do the same for man. Locate those green highlighted words, and find out what man does. Look for verbs related to the word man, draw a red box around them, and list them in your notebook.
- Then note what man is compared to. This is a verse we marked when we were looking for comparisons on Day 20. You should have diagonal lines through the word like two times in verse 15. Write these phrases in your notebook.
- Then, we also see our last marking of the word for from Day 22. (If you are studying in the NIV or NASB, the word for is not present in verse 16.) Why does man flourish like a flower of the field? This is such a sad picture (unless you have Jesus):
For the wind passes over it,
and it is gone,
and its place knows it no more.
Flowers don’t last. I know. My latest experience was the demise of the glorious red nasturtiums that not only successfully camouflaged my compost bin, as I had hoped they would, but then went on to find their way into the paths between some of my raised beds. Every time I walked past those flowers, they made me smile.
And then the first heavy frost arrived and they were gone. They ended up in the compost bin instead of adorning it. Their place knows them no more. 
The life of a wildflower in the field is even shorter. Many of those flowers only last a day or two.
That’s what man’s life is compared to. God knows we’re dust. We come and go like the flowers. We’re here and then we’re gone.
Compare this to the glorious blessings and attributes of God that David lists for us in this psalm. Our God is a great God, and we’re not nearly as great as we like to think we are.
Depressing?
No, I don’t think so. In our study of Psalm 103, we still need to look for the word but. That little word is an important one. It will give us hope and meaning.
But our study of but is for another day. 
For your children:
- Read all of Psalm 103 with your children. Have them raise their hands every time they hear any words referring to God. This will include the word Lord, but also pronouns like he, him, his, and who when they are referring to God. (As you read the psalm aloud, put a little more emphasis on those words to help the children notice them.)
- Have them stand up when they hear the word man (or mortals in NIV) and the pronouns he and his when referring to man.
- When you have finished, discuss the difference. How often is God mentioned in this psalm compared to man?
- Then discuss what man is compared to. How is he like a flower of the field? How are we like flowers in the field?