Psalms 102:24

I said, O my God, take me not away in the midst of my days;.... Which was always reckoned as a judgment, as a token of God's sore displeasure, and as what only befell wicked men, Psalms 55:23, in the

This shall be written for the generation to come: and the people which shall be created shall praise the LORD.

Take me not away; do not wholly cut off and destroy thy people of Israel. In the midst of my days; before they come to a full age and stature, and to the plenary possession of thy promises, and especially of that great and fundamental promise of the Messias, in and by whom alone their happiness is to be completed, and until whose coming thy church is in its nonage; of which see . Possibly the psalmist (whom some learned interpreters suppose to be Daniel) may have respect to that prophecy, ,25, which probably was published before this time; for this time was almost precisely the midst of the days between the building of the material temple by Solomon, and the building of the spiritual temple, or the church, by the Messias; there being about a thousand years distance between those two periods, whereof seventy prophetical weeks, or four hundred and ninety years, were yet to come. And so he prays that God would not root them out in this Babylonish captivity, but would graciously restore them to their own land, and preserve them as a church and nation there until the coming of the Messias. Thy years are throughout all generations: though we successively die and perish, yet thou art the everlasting and unchangeable God, and therefore art and wilt ever be able to deliver thy people, and faithful in performing all thy promises; and therefore we beseech thee to pity our frail and languishing state, and give us a more settled and lasting felicity than yet we have enjoyed; and therefore we trust that thy people shall continue and be established before thee, as he saith, , because as thou art the everlasting God, so thou hast made an everlasting covenant with them, , to be their God for ever, and therefore thou wilt not now forsake or reject us.

Psalms 102:24 I said, O my God, take me not away in the midst of my days: thy years [are] throughout all generations.Ver. 24. Take me not away in the midst of my days] Heb. Make me not to ascend, Serus in coelum redeam. Fain I would live to see those golden days of redemption. Abraham desired to see the day of Christ, John 8:56; Simeon did, and then sang out his soul. All the saints after the captivity looked hard for the consolation of Israel. Thy years are throughout all generations] And that is the comfort of thy poor covenanters, who are sure to participate of all thy goods.

(24) Take me not away.—The fear of not living to see the restoration of his race prompts the psalmist to this prayer to the God whose years are not, like man’s, for one generation, but endure from age to age.

Verse 24. I said, O my God] This and the following verses seem to be the form of prayer which the captives used previously to their deliverance. Thy years are throughout all generations.] This was a frequent argument used to induce God to hear prayer. We are frail and perishing; thou art everlasting: deliver us, and we will glorify thee.

24. I will say introduces the prayer which follows with additional emphasis. Cp. Job 10:2. in the midst of my days] Cp. Psalms 55:23; Isaiah 38:10. thy years &c.] The eternity of God is contrasted with the transitoriness of man as in Psalms 102:12; Psalms 102:11.

I said, O my God, take me not away in the midst of my days - This was the burden of my prayer, for this I earnestly pleaded. See Psalms 30:9; Isaiah 38:1-3, Isaiah 38:9-18.

24. In the midst of my days—In the half of “my days”—when my life is only half spent. This cutting short of life was regarded as a great calamity—often a sign of judgment.