Alone on the Roof

Psalm 102 is the prayer of a man in deep trouble, at a time when the stones of Zion lay in the dust. He cannot sleep, and he pictures himself on a flat roof. In that country a roof was like an extra room: people slept up there in the heat, ate there, and called across to the next house. Alone up there, he reaches for a bird: "I watch, and am as a sparrow alone upon the house top." To watch here means to lie awake.

Two other birds come in the same breath, and both live far from town: "I am like a pelican of the wilderness: I am like an owl of the desert." The sparrow is different. It lives where people are, which is what makes the picture so exact. Anyone who has been lonely in a full house knows that place, with the street awake below and the lamps lit next door. The rest of the first half describes his body in trouble. His "bones are burned as an hearth." He forgets to eat his bread. He has "eaten ashes like bread, and mingled my drink with weeping."

Then, in the middle of the psalm, he turns from himself to God: "But thou, O LORD, shalt endure for ever." After that, the roof becomes a writing desk. "He will regard the prayer of the destitute, and not despise their prayer. This shall be written for the generation to come: and the people which shall be created shall praise the LORD." He is writing so that people not yet born will have words for their own lonely night, and that is how these words reached you.

So do a small version of the same thing. Write down one true sentence about your own night and put it somewhere it will last, perhaps in the margin of your Bible or in a message to the friend who thinks you are fine. You can write it honestly, because the God who heard this man has not changed: "But thou art the same, and thy years shall have no end." He did not leave the man on that roof alone, and He will not leave you.

Daily Manna runs on a two-year cycle. The year one reading for day 293 is The Angel Encamped Around You (Psalm 34:7).

All 365 readings in Daily Manna, Year Two