Slices
Prepare
Where do you need God’s help now? Maybe you need him to bring reassurance or intervene in some way, or maybe you want him to move in someone else’s life. Let him hear your cry for help.
Bible passage
A prayer of an afflicted person who has grown weak and pours out a lament before the Lord.
1 Hear my prayer, Lord;
let my cry for help come to you.
2 Do not hide your face from me
when I am in distress.
Turn your ear to me;
when I call, answer me quickly.
3 For my days vanish like smoke;
my bones burn like glowing embers.
4 My heart is blighted and withered like grass;
I forget to eat my food.
5 In my distress I groan aloud
and am reduced to skin and bones.
6 I am like a desert owl,
like an owl among the ruins.
7 I lie awake; I have become
like a bird alone on a roof.
8 All day long my enemies taunt me;
those who rail against me use my name as a curse.
9 For I eat ashes as my food
and mingle my drink with tears
10 because of your great wrath,
for you have taken me up and thrown me aside.
11 My days are like the evening shadow;
I wither away like grass.
12 But you, Lord, sit enthroned for ever;
your renown endures through all generations.
13 You will arise and have compassion on Zion,
for it is time to show favour to her;
the appointed time has come.
14 For her stones are dear to your servants;
her very dust moves them to pity.
15 The nations will fear the name of the Lord,
all the kings of the earth will revere your glory.
16 For the Lord will rebuild Zion
and appear in his glory.
17 He will respond to the prayer of the destitute;
he will not despise their plea.
18 Let this be written for a future generation,
that a people not yet created may praise the Lord:
19 ‘The Lord looked down from his sanctuary on high,
from heaven he viewed the earth,
20 to hear the groans of the prisoners
and release those condemned to death.’
21 So the name of the Lord will be declared in Zion
and his praise in Jerusalem
22 when the peoples and the kingdoms
assemble to worship the Lord.
23 In the course of my life he broke my strength;
he cut short my days.
24 So I said:
‘Do not take me away, my God, in the midst of my days;
your years go on through all generations.
25 In the beginning you laid the foundations of the earth,
and the heavens are the work of your hands.
26 They will perish, but you remain;
they will all wear out like a garment.
Like clothing you will change them
and they will be discarded.
27 But you remain the same,
and your years will never end.
28 The children of your servants will live in your presence;
their descendants will be established before you.’
Explore
This psalm is the fifth of the so-called penitential psalms (Psalms 6; 32; 38; 51; 102; 130; 143). They have been given this title because of their use in church liturgy at the beginning of the season of Lent on Ash Wednesday. Its superscription (the words which introduce the psalm in verse 1) identifies the writer’s state of mind. He feels afflicted and weak; this is his lament.
Some commentators see this psalm as the words of the king, while others date it to a time when the nation is in exile and the psalmist is lamenting his nation’s losses. But our attention is drawn to the poet’s spiritual and emotional condition. He is not in a good way, and he pours out a lament. Lament is not a popular genre within modern worship. We generally like our songs to be happy, even triumphant. But there are many psalms of lament in the collection we have – almost a third. These are sometimes of a personal nature (eg Psalm 86) and at other times express the grievances of a community (eg Psalm 12). Just as loss is inevitable in our lives, so must lament form a regular part of our personal and corporate worship.
Respond
Take time to pour out your deepest cries and laments to the Lord.
Deeper Bible study
God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, hear our prayer and answer our cries. We trust your timing, as we cling to your promises.
Psalm 100 provides us with words to express gratitude. This psalm enables us to express distress, although it will also help us to view our lament in a context of hope. There are times when we feel abandoned. We feel our own mortality keenly as we wither away inside. Troubled day and night, we feel unheard, and there are people criticising us. Worst of all, God does not seem to hear us. We perceive God’s wrath in our circumstances (v 10). Life is falling apart for the psalmist, and the anguish is not just personal. It chimes with, and may be caused by, feelings about Zion. The psalmist loves the city of Jerusalem because it is (or has been) the place of God’s glory. The mix of personal affliction and a sense of deep grief for the spiritual malaise of God’s people makes for a perfect storm. Do we perhaps identify more with the personal than the corporate lament? Whatever, it’s heavy sometimes to be a believer.
‘But God’ (see v 12) is a New Testament transition from darkness to light.1 Here the psalmist gives his heart reasons for hope, with reminders of God’s perpetual reign and his compassionate listening ear. God will never change. He is the Lord who has made promises that we can cling to, promises that secure his listening, healing and restoring. The repeated ‘you will’ and ‘will’ (see vs 13,15,16,21,26,27) exude optimistic confidence as the psalmist considers a future in which God will be glorified. This must not go unreported (v 18). The lament of the psalmist is real and not to be minimised. It is echoed by compatriots (perhaps in exile) who are like prisoners on death row (v 20). These are real feelings, not easily dismissed, but the trajectory must always be towards belief in a God who transforms.
The final verses of this psalm are taken up in Hebrews as words spoken ‘about the Son’.2 Use these verses to give thanks for the Lord Jesus Christ.
1 Heb 1:8,10–12 2 See, for example, Heb 1:1,2
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