Psalms 102:1

The Bible says in Psalm 102:1-2, “Hear my prayer, O LORD, and let my cry come unto thee.[2] Hide not thy face from me in the day when I am in trouble; incline thine ear unto me: in the day when I call answer me speedily.” This is a prayer request asking that the prayers be answered. And of course, such a prayer is answered before it is even asked because the Lord has promised to answer prayer. God always keeps His promises. Many times Jesus Himself promised answer to prayer. For example, Jesus said in John 14:13, “And whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son.” In verse two above the Psalmist asked that God would answer “when I am in trouble.” We are going to be in trouble in this life. There is no doubt about that. But always remember that God has a solution to every problem and a way to help in every trouble. The way that He helps Christians most importantly is that we pray to Him about our trouble, and He answers and helps us in any trouble. There is nothing too hard for Him.

The Bible says in Psalm 102:3-9, “For my days are consumed like smoke, and my bones are burned as an hearth.[4] My heart is smitten, and withered like grass; so that I forget to eat my bread.[5] By reason of the voice of my groaning my bones cleave to my skin.[6] I am like a pelican of the wilderness: I am like an owl of the desert.[7] I watch, and am as a sparrow alone upon the house top.[8] Mine enemies reproach me all the day; and they that are mad against me are sworn against me.[9] For I have eaten ashes like bread, and mingled my drink with weeping.” These are the words of a person who is suffering greatly. Some sufferings are absolutely terrible. Think of a person who has lost a child. Some people lose a child to rape, and kidnapping, and murder. Can there be anything worse? Some people lose their soulmate in youth. Some people lose their health. Some people are falsely accused and imprisoned wrongfully. Some people lose everything they have materially and go bankrupt. Life can bring a lot of troubles. Life can bring weeping, and suffering, and unbearable sorrow. No wonder the Psalmist was reaching out to the Lord. The Lord was his only hope.

The Bible says in Psalm 102:10, “Because of thine indignation and thy wrath: for thou hast lifted me up, and cast me down.” This is an important truth to remember if you are going to live by faith your whole life. God is involved in everything that happens. And it is even more than an involvement. God does everything that happens. When good things happen to you, God has done them. Make sure you are thankful. When bad things happen to you, God has done them too. Make sure you keep the faith, stay positive, and look for the good to come out of it. Romans 8:28 applies here: “And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God and to them that are the called according to His purpose.”

The Bible says in Psalm 102:11-12, “My days are like a shadow that declineth; and I am withered like grass.[12] But thou, O LORD, shalt endure for ever; and thy remembrance unto all generations.” In verse eleven the Psalmist is thinking about his own mortality. That is a smart thing to do because life is temporary and very short compared to eternity. Verse twelve mentions the solution to this problem: God endures forever. Jesus is life. In Christ is eternal life. Whoever becomes joined to Christ, automatically has eternal life because of their connection with Him. It says about Jesus in John 1:4, “In him was life; and the life was the light of men.”

The Bible says in Psalm 102:13-18, “Thou shalt arise, and have mercy upon Zion: for the time to favour her, yea, the set time, is come.[14] For thy servants take pleasure in her stones, and favour the dust thereof.[15] So the heathen shall fear the name of the LORD, and all the kings of the earth thy glory.[16] When the LORD shall build up Zion, he shall appear in his glory.[17] He will regard the prayer of the destitute, and not despise their prayer.[18] This shall be written for the generation to come: and the people which shall be created shall praise the LORD.” In these verses the Psalmist looks to the future, and the Psalmist knows certain things about the future that every believer knows who knows the Bible. First of all just as it says in verse thirteen, we know that we will have “mercy” in the future just as we have had it in the past. Because of the death of Christ on the cross, there will always be mercy available for any sins from any person. Jesus is an expert at forgiving. He loves to forgive. You are a sinner just like everyone else, and you just might fail again. The goal is to do right and not fail, but if you do fail, you can get right by asking Jesus to forgive you. It says in First John 2:1, “My little children, these things I write unto you that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.”

Verse fourteen means that the people of God love the things that God loves. “For thy servants take pleasure in her stones, and favour the dust thereof.” God loves Israel and Jerusalem. That means that God and true believers love even the stones and the dust that make up that city and that land. God loves them because of the promises that He made to Abraham and to King David.

The enemies of Israel and the enemies of God are involved in a spiritual conflict against the Lord Jesus Christ, and guess who is going to win that contest? Of course, the all powerful God will win in His way and in His time. At the very end this is what will happen as described in verse 15, “So the heathen shall fear the name of the LORD, and all the kings of the earth thy glory.” They will fear the name of the Lord Jesus after the Battle of Armageddon when they bow before Him in judgment. Every one of the kings of the earth will see the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ as they bow before Him in judgment. When will all this happen? Verse sixteen tells us when because it says, “he shall appear in his glory.” Jesus will “appear.” He will come back. He will return. You will find out a lot of details about His return and especially the time just before His return in the book of Revelation.

But until Jesus returns, believers have a lot of prayers that they pray. We have a lot to pray about. Some believers are suffering horribly. That is a lot of suffering over the years and over the centuries for the innocent lovers of God. That is a lot of prayers that have been prayed that Jesus would return, and that justice would prevail, and that believers would no longer be persecuted by the evil people of the world. God is not ignoring the prayer. He will answer them all, as it says in verse seventeen, “He will regard the prayer of the destitute, and not despise their prayer.”

Verse eighteen describes one detail about the future of all believers, “This shall be written for the generation to come: and the people which shall be created shall praise the LORD.” Here is our future: we “shall praise the LORD.” If we are going to praise Him in the future, then let’s go ahead and start praising Him now. The point is that our future is a blessed future. We will live in eternal joy and bliss with our Savior. We will be forever happy. We will sing praises forever. Do you want to be happy? Do you want to sing and laugh? Then believe on Jesus, and that kind of existence will be your future too.

Notice that the first phrase of verse eighteen: “This shall be written for the generation to come.” God has given to the human race the written scriptures. “All scripture is given by inspiration of God.” It only makes sense that God would have His truth written down so that anyone in any generation who is an honest seeker of truth can read for himself or herself. That was one of the purposes of the apostles and prophets in the first century. They wrote God’s Word in the New Testament by inspiration from God so that we could know the truth about Jesus, His death on the cross, and what it all really means.

The Bible says in Psalm 102:19-21, “For he hath looked down from the height of his sanctuary; from heaven did the LORD behold the earth;[20] To hear the groaning of the prisoner; to loose those that are appointed to death;[21] To declare the name of the LORD in Zion, and his praise in Jerusalem;” The Lord sees, hears, and knows all things that are happening on the earth. According to verse twenty, the Lord is very concerned about those who suffer. First the Psalmist mentions “the groaning of the prisoner.” Most prisons in the history of the human race have been horrible places: filthy, full of disease, and many violent people. God cares about those who suffer in prisons. There are several ways to help prisoners. One way is to make sure they have clean and decent quarters. Another way is to make sure they have access to proper medical care. But most importantly, prisoners need to hear the Gospel of Christ. Some people are imprisoned to the ways of an unbelieving world and are chained to the chords of their own sins. They suffer from that kind of prison too. Jesus wants to relieve your suffering.

According to verse twenty above, God also wants “to loose those that are appointed to death.” Death is the last great enemy of mankind. You will die no matter who you are or what you have accomplished in life. You better be ready for death, especially from a spiritual standpoint. The Lord wants you to be a victor over death. That is why Jesus was sent to die in your place. We certainly are “appointed to death.” Each of us are just one heartbeat away from death. We are appointed by God to death. He created death. God is the expert on the subject, but He does not want us to be ignorant about it. The Lord reveals essential truths about death in His precious Word. Death has a strangle-hold on every human being. And the Lord Jesus wants to “loose” us from death. He wants us to be free: free from sin, free from guilt, and free from death. Once you accept Jesus as your Savior, death will not be the end, but death will be when you enter into heaven and live forever.

In Psalm 102:21 there are two things mentioned that God wants to see happen as He looks down from heaven: “To declare the name of the LORD in Zion, and his praise in Jerusalem.” God wants His name to be declared in Zion. Zion stands for Jerusalem, and spiritually speaking it stands for all of the believers. The day will come when everyone in Jerusalem will look up to Jesus. The name of Jesus will be declared among the true believers, as it should be. It is all about Jesus. He is our Savior. He died for us. We need to be talking about Him and what He has done for us. And then also we should be praising His name in Jerusalem. That is God’s will for Jerusalem. God wants everyone in Jerusalem to know the truth about Him and the Savior. Jerusalem is the focal-point of God’s activities on earth. But how will this ever happen? What will make the people of Jerusalem see their need of Jesus the Savior? After the rapture of the church, there will be a seven-year period of time called the Great Tribulation, and there will be a world leader called the antichrist who will hate Christians and Jews. The Jewish people will be prepared by the worst time to ever come on the earth, and all who are still alive will turn to Jesus just in time: right at the Second Coming of Christ.

The Bible says in Psalm 102:22, “When the people are gathered together, and the kingdoms, to serve the LORD.” This verse starts with the word “when.” It is explaining when God will do the things mentioned in the previous verse. God will do them “When the people are gathered together, and the kingdoms, to serve the LORD.” The people are the Jewish people. They were first scattered when the Assyrians and the Babylonians conquered them, killed many of them, and scattered them outside of the Promised Land. Since 586 BC, the Jewish people have been scattered around the world in many other countries. More Jewish people live outside of Israel than live within it. But that is a temporary situation. The day will come when God will gather all Jewish people back into Israel. That will happen at the return of Christ their Messiah. Why will the Jewish people be gathered together: “to serve the LORD.” That is why we were all born: “to serve the LORD.” Not only will all the Jewish people serve the Lord Jesus Christ in that day, but also “the kingdoms” will serve Him. At least those who survive the Great Tribulation will serve Him. God has ways of touching people’s hearts so they will turn to the Lord Jesus. Evidently, tribulation does the trick.

The Bible says in Psalm 102:23-24, “He weakened my strength in the way; he shortened my days.[24] I said, O my God, take me not away in the midst of my days: thy years are throughout all generations.” The Psalmist had tribulation. We all do. The Psalmist saw that he was becoming weaker and that his days were becoming fewer. Today we are all one day closer to death. But life is precious, and if you have any sense then you understand that. If you serve the Lord Jesus, then you will want to live as long as you can so that you can bear more fruit, lead more lost souls to Christ, teach more Christians to be stronger Christians, and in many other ways see answers to prayer. You will not want to go “away in the midst” of your years: in other words, die earlier than necessary. There is more to accomplish for Christ, and there is more that you can accomplish if God gives you the years to do it.

In the last phrase of verse twenty-four the Psalmist says, “thy years are throughout all generations.” The Psalmist is recognizing the fact that God lives forever. Jesus is eternal life. And therefore, all life comes from Jesus. Jesus decides who lives and how long we live. The right kind of contact with Jesus by putting our faith in Him for forgiveness and salvation, gives us eternal life. Once my life is connected to His life, I have eternal life.

The Bible says in Psalm 102:25-27, “Of old hast thou laid the foundation of the earth: and the heavens are the work of thy hands.[26] They shall perish, but thou shalt endure: yea, all of them shall wax old like a garment; as a vesture shalt thou change them, and they shall be changed:[27] But thou art the same, and thy years shall have no end.” These verses continue on the theme of the last verse: God is eternal. The earth and the heavens are very old. God created them, and the heavens and the earth will perish one day, but God will live forever. The heavens and the earth shall “wax old like a garment.” Also, using the symbolism of a garment, God will change the earth and the universe just like a human being changes an article of clothing. The earth is changing and the universe is changing every moment. The only thing that is constant is change. But the Lord never changes. That is a good thought. Once you learn how much Jesus loves you and how merciful He has been towards you, then you know that the same love and mercy and grace will always be available for you.

The Bible says in Psalm 102:28, “The children of thy servants shall continue, and their seed shall be established before thee.” This verse refers to future generations. The children are the future, and that was especially the case for the Israelites. In order for the Jewish nation to continue and to thrive, God needed to bless the children as much as He did the parents. The Psalmist is saying that he had confidence in the Lord in regards to the children. If the Lord has touched your heart, He can touch the heart of your children too. Jesus does not change.

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