1 A Prayer of the man who is in trouble, when he is overcome, and puts his grief before the Lord.
2 \102:1\Give ear to my prayer, O Lord, and let my cry come to you.
3 \102:2\Let not your face be veiled from me in the day of my trouble; give ear to me, and let my cry be answered quickly.
4 \102:3\My days are wasted like smoke, and my bones are burned up as in a fire.
5 \102:4\My heart is broken; it has become dry and dead like grass, so that I give no thought to food.
6 \102:5\Because of the voice of my sorrow, my flesh is wasted to the bone.
7 \102:6\I am like a bird living by itself in the waste places; like the night-bird in a waste of sand.
8 \102:7\I keep watch like a bird by itself on the house-top.
9 \102:8\My haters say evil of me all day; those who are violent against me make use of my name as a curse.
10 \102:9\I have had dust for bread and my drink has been mixed with weeping:
11 \102:10\Because of your passion and your wrath, for I have been lifted up and then made low by you.
12 \102:11\My days are like a shade which is stretched out; I am dry like the grass.
13 \102:12\But you, O Lord, are eternal; and your name will never come to an end.
14 \102:13\You will again get up and have mercy on Zion: for the time has come for her to be comforted.
15 \102:14\For your servants take pleasure in her stones, looking with love on her dust.
16 \102:15\So the nations will give honour to the name of the Lord, and all the kings of the earth will be in fear of his glory:
17 \102:16\When the Lord has put up the walls of Zion, and has been been in his glory;
18 \102:17\When he has given ear to the prayer of the poor, and has not put his request on one side.
19 \102:18\This will be put in writing for the coming generation, and the people of the future will give praise to the Lord.
20 \102:19\For from his holy place the Lord has seen, looking down on the earth from heaven;
21 \102:20\Hearing the cry of the prisoner, making free those for whom death is ordered;
22 \102:21\So that they may give out the name of the Lord in Zion, and his praise in Jerusalem;
23 \102:22\When the peoples are come together, and the kingdoms, to give worship to the Lord.
24 \102:23\He has taken my strength from me in the way; he has made short my days.
25 \102:24\I will say, O my God, take me not away before my time; your years go on through all generations:
26 \102:25\In the past you put the earth on its base, and the heavens are the work of your hands.
27 \102:26\They will come to an end, but you will still go on; they all will become old like a coat, and like a robe they will be changed:
28 \102:27\But you are the unchanging One, and your years will have no end.
29 \102:28\The children of your servants will have a safe resting-place, and their seed will be ever before you.