Psalm 102:1-11
A Prayer of the afflicted, when he is overwhelmed and pours
out his complaint before the LORD.
1 Hear my prayer, O LORD, And let my cry come to You.
2 Do not hide Your face from me in the day of my trouble;
Incline Your ear to me; In the day that I call, answer me speedily.
Years ago, I wrote over the top of this psalm in my Bible
the words, “The ‘Me’, ‘My’, ‘I’, Psalm”. On another occasion as I was reading it,
I wrote, “The ‘Oh Me’ Psalm”. The title doesn’t tell us who the writer of this psalm
is, but it is very obvious whoever he is, that he is someone who is suffering
and feels overwhelmed with personal sorry. This psalm has a title, and it lets
us know that it was written as a prayer of someone who is “afflicted” and “overwhelmed”
and simply wants to pour out his “troubles and complaints” to the LORD.
Psalm 102 is recognized as one of the seven penitential
psalms (Psalms 6; 32; 38; 51; 130; 143), but it is unlike the others. The
psalmist does not seem to have any personal guilt to confess. If there is
penitence in the psalm, it is more of a national than a personal character. The
psalmist is primarily lamenting the condition of the nation of Israel. The
title relates more to the purpose of the psalm than the period of the psalm,
which shows that it is intended for devotional use by those suffering
affliction.
Psalm 102 is also recognized as messianic because the
closing verses (25-26) are directly related to Christ in Hebrews 1:10-12.
Moreover, the entire psalm can be viewed in the light of the great tribulation
and the millennial age to follow. The anonymous author probably wrote it long
after the destruction of Jerusalem (vv. 8, 14,16), about the time he thought
Jeremiah's prophecy of the seventy-year captivity was about to be fulfilled (v.
13; Jer. 25:11-12; 29:10; see Dan. 9:2). Interestingly, some commentators have
speculated who this anonymous writer might be. John Phillips thinks that Daniel,
at the end of the captivity in Babylon, might be the author, while J. Vernon
McGee thinks that David could be.
I believe this is one of those psalms that gives us the
opportunity to express our emotions and feelings to the LORD in prayer. God
made us in His image, which means He created us to have emotions. There are a
wide range of emotions that we can experience. There are some that we don’t
particularly like such as anger, fear, worry, jealousy, rejection, sadness, discouragement,
and even depression. But if we didn’t know and experience sadness and sorrow,
we couldn’t feel comfort and joy. It is not wrong or sinful to have “bad”
emotional feelings. God created us to have them. But how we respond to them and
what we do with them is what is really crucial.
Some people get angry, and they attack and tear up things and
hurt people. Others get angry but then use that energy to attack the root
problem that caused the anger. I believe God wants us to take our “burdens” and
“cares” to the LORD and release our emotions to Him (1 Peter 5:7). We can do
that by looking up to Him in prayer, and by reading and searching His Word to find
the right response to our troubles and cares. It is there that we will find His
“mercy and grace and help” in our time of need! (Hebrews 4:16).
Psalm 102 is a great psalm and prayer to keep close by and
in mind whenever you are going through a ‘Me’, ‘My’, or ‘I’ time!
God bless!
