The Unchanging God and His Unbreakable Promise Text: Psalm 102:23-28
Introduction: The Great Contrast
We come now to the hinge of this psalm. The first part of Psalm 102 is the prayer of a man in deep affliction. His days are consumed like smoke, his bones are burned, his heart is withered like grass. He is isolated, reproached by enemies, eating ashes for bread, and mingling his drink with weeping. He feels that God has lifted him up only to cast him down. His life is like a declining shadow, and he is withering away. This is the cry of a man who feels his life is fragile, fleeting, and falling apart. It is the prayer of one who is overwhelmed.
And it is in the midst of this profound personal fragility that the psalmist performs the most necessary of all spiritual maneuvers. He lifts his eyes from his own transient weakness to the eternal strength of God. He pivots from his own shortened days to the God whose years have no end. This is the great contrast that gives Christians their stability in a world that is constantly shaking. Our lives are a vapor, but our God is a rock. The creation itself is temporary, but the Creator is eternal. This is not just a comfort; it is the bedrock of all reality. Without this great contrast, our affliction would be the final word. But because God is God, our affliction is merely a passing chapter in a story that He is writing, a story that ends in glory.
The logic of this passage is the logic of faith. It moves from the problem of personal suffering to the person of the eternal God, and then from the person of the eternal God to the promise of a lasting heritage. This is how a man in deep trouble ought to pray. He acknowledges his weakness, he adores God's strength, and he anchors his hope for the future in God's covenant faithfulness. This is not wishful thinking; it is the most robust reasoning in the universe.
The Text
He has afflicted my strength in the way; He has shortened my days. I say, "O my God, do not take me away in the midst of my days, Your years are from generation to all generations. Of old You founded the earth, And the heavens are the work of Your hands. Even they will perish, but You will remain; And all of them will wear out like a garment; Like clothing You will change them and they will be changed. But You are the same, And Your years will not come to an end. The children of Your slaves will dwell securely, And their seed will be established before You."
(Psalm 102:23-28 LSB)
A Plea from the Dust (v. 23-24)
The psalmist begins this section by returning to his personal crisis.
"He has afflicted my strength in the way; He has shortened my days. I say, 'O my God, do not take me away in the midst of my days, Your years are from generation to all generations.'" (Psalm 102:23-24)
Notice the blunt honesty. "He has afflicted my strength." The psalmist knows that God is sovereign over his suffering. This is not random chance or bad luck. God is behind it all. As he said earlier in the psalm, "You have lifted me up and cast me down." This is a hard-won theological conviction. Our troubles are hand-stitched for us; they fit the outline of our lives perfectly. God brings affliction into our lives to teach us how small we are. He gives us things we cannot handle to teach us the important lesson that we cannot really handle anything.
His plea is raw and direct: "Do not take me away in the midst of my days." He feels his life is being cut short. He is a man who sees the finish line rushing up to meet him far too soon. But look where he immediately turns. He contrasts his "midst of my days" with God's eternal nature: "Your years are from generation to all generations." My life is a blip, a fleeting shadow. But You, my God, are the everlasting one. My time is running out, but Your time never runs out. This is the beginning of wisdom. When we feel our own foundation cracking, we must learn to stand on His, which is unshakable. The psalmist is in deep trouble, and he knows he is praying to a God who is not in deep trouble. And this is precisely why prayer makes sense.
The Creator and His Worn-Out Clothes (v. 25-27)
From God's eternal nature, the psalmist moves to His creative power and His utter transcendence over that creation.
"Of old You founded the earth, And the heavens are the work of Your hands. Even they will perish, but You will remain; And all of them will wear out like a garment; Like clothing You will change them and they will be changed. But You are the same, And Your years will not come to an end." (Psalm 102:25-27 LSB)
This is one of the most magnificent declarations of God's immutability in all of Scripture. The psalmist looks at the most permanent things he can imagine, the earth beneath his feet and the heavens above his head, and declares that they are nothing more than God's handiwork. They had a beginning: "Of old You founded the earth."
But then he goes further. These seemingly permanent things have an expiration date. "Even they will perish." The entire cosmos is temporary. It is winding down. It will "wear out like a garment." This is a stunningly modern concept, this idea of cosmic entropy, but it is right here in this ancient prayer. The universe is like a suit of clothes that God put on. It is glorious, but it is still just a garment. And a day is coming when He will take it off, fold it up, and put it away. "Like clothing You will change them and they will be changed."
But the central point is the contrast. The creation perishes, "but You will remain." The creation wears out, "but You are the same." The Hebrew here is emphatic: "But You, He." You are the one who is. This is the name God revealed to Moses at the burning bush, I AM THAT I AM. He is the eternally self-existent one. He does not change. There is no variation or shadow due to change in Him. His years "will not come to an end."
Now, who is this unchanging, eternal Creator? The author of Hebrews grabs these very verses and applies them directly and unequivocally to the Lord Jesus Christ. In Hebrews 1, arguing for the supremacy of the Son over the angels, he quotes this passage: "But of the Son He says... 'You, Lord, in the beginning laid the foundation of the earth, and the heavens are the works of Your hands. They will perish, but You remain'" (Hebrews 1:8, 10-11). The God who is addressed in Psalm 102 is the eternal Son of God, the second person of the Trinity. Jesus Christ is the unchanging Jehovah who spoke the universe into existence. This is a massive, Christological anchor. The one who died on a cross for our sins is the same one who founded the earth. The one who holds us in His hand is the same one who will one day fold up the universe like an old coat.
The Covenantal Hope (v. 28)
After establishing the absolute, eternal, unchanging nature of God the Son, the psalmist draws his final, glorious conclusion. This is where the rubber of high theology meets the road of our fragile lives.
"The children of Your slaves will dwell securely, And their seed will be established before You." (Psalm 102:28 LSB)
This is the payoff. Because God is eternal and unchanging, His promises are eternal and unchanging. Because He is the covenant-keeping God, His covenant people have a future. The psalmist, who began by fearing his own days were being cut short, now finds his hope not in his own longevity, but in the longevity of his children, his seed. This is covenantal succession.
He is saying, "I may die. My life may be smoke and withering grass. But because You are the same yesterday, today, and forever, the covenant You made with us will stand. My children, and their children after them, will be established." Where will they be established? "Before You." In Your presence. In Your favor. Their security is not in themselves, but in their relationship to the unchanging God.
This is a profound promise. It is the promise that God's work in this world will not die out with any one generation. We are to believe God for our children. We are to raise them in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, trusting that the God who is faithful to a thousand generations will establish our seed. This is not an automatic, mechanical process. It is a promise that is laid hold of by faith. We believe God, and He establishes our children.
Conclusion: From Withering Grass to an Established Seed
The movement of this psalm is the pattern for every Christian life. We begin with the reality of our affliction. We are finite, frail, and frequently failing. We are withering grass. If we stop there, we end in despair.
But faith does not stop there. Faith lifts its eyes from the fleeting to the eternal, from our weakness to His strength, from our changing circumstances to our unchanging God. We look to the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the same yesterday, today, and forever. He is the Creator who became a creature. He is the eternal one who entered time to die for us, so that we who are dying might live eternally.
And because He is who He is, we can have confidence. Not confidence in our own strength, but confidence in His covenant. Our personal lives are short, but the purposes of God are long. He is building a people for Himself, a great multitude from every tribe and tongue and nation. And He has promised that the children of His servants will be a part of that. Our seed will be established before Him.
Therefore, when you are overwhelmed, when your days feel like smoke, when your heart is withering, do what the psalmist did. Look away from yourself. Look to the eternal Creator, the Lord Jesus Christ. Remind yourself that the heavens are just His old coat. And then, lay hold of His promise. Anchor your hope for your family, for your children, and for your children's children in the character of the God who cannot change and whose years will never end. This is the only solid ground in a sinking world.