Context No. 3904 of 4322 · Psalms

Psalms 102:1-16: in context

1Hear my prayer, LORD! Let my cry come to you. 2Don’t hide your face from me in the day of my distress. Turn your ear to me. Answer me quickly in the day when I call. 3For my days consume away like smoke. My bones are burned as a torch. 4My heart is blighted like grass, and withered, for I forget to eat my bread. 5By reason of the voice of my groaning, my bones stick to my skin. 6I am like a pelican of the wilderness. I have become as an owl of the waste places. 7I watch, and have become like a sparrow that is alone on the housetop. 8My enemies reproach me all day. Those who are mad at me use my name as a curse. 9For I have eaten ashes like bread, and mixed my drink with tears, 10because of your indignation and your wrath; for you have taken me up and thrown me away. 11My days are like a long shadow. I have withered like grass. 12But you, LORD, will remain forever; your renown endures to all generations. 13You will arise and have mercy on Zion, for it is time to have pity on her. Yes, the set time has come. 14For your servants take pleasure in her stones, and have pity on her dust. 15So the nations will fear the LORD’s name, all the kings of the earth your glory. 16For the LORD has built up Zion. He has appeared in his glory.

This psalm of the afflicted begins in the depths of personal suffering. The psalmist's days are consumed like smoke, his bones burn, his heart withers like grass; he is so distressed that he forgets to eat, lonely as a solitary bird on a housetop. It is a raw picture of a person worn down by trouble and grief.

But then, in the midst of his withering, he lifts his eyes from himself to God, and everything changes register: but you, O LORD, are enthroned forever; you are remembered throughout all generations. You will arise and have pity on Zion, for the time to favor her has come. Here is the turn that steadies a suffering soul. Set against our fleeting, withering lives, here today and gone tomorrow like smoke and grass, stands the eternal, unchanging God who endures forever and remembers his people. The psalmist finds hope not by his circumstances improving but by fixing his eyes on the God who abides when everything else fades, and who will arise in mercy at the appointed time.

When my own life feels like fleeting smoke, worn down by trouble, do I lift my eyes from myself to the eternal God who endures forever and will arise in mercy at his appointed time?

Sources

Psalm 102:11-12: "My days are like a long shadow. I have withered like grass. But you, LORD, will remain forever; your renown endures to all generations."
Psalm 102:13: "You will arise and have mercy on Zion, for it is time to have pity on her. Yes, the set time has come."
Psalm 102:1: "Hear my prayer, LORD! Let my cry come to you."