"Just a Lonely Shrub"

“(The Lord) will regard the prayer of the destitute, and will not despise their supplication.” Psalm 102:17

Every person who has ever struggled with their faith goes through times when it seems as if God is silent. The writer of this Psalm feels pleads with God to not hide His face and to incline His ear; wanting a speedy answer in his distress.


These moments, days, or even weeks at a time can feel like a spiritual desert. Life is nowhere to be found, our spiritual senses are numb and God’s apparent absence troubles us deeply. Just like the psalmist, we may feel these effects within our body (vs. 3).

His days seem meaningless. He cannot eat. He has lost weight so that his bones “cleave to my flesh”. Sleep flees from him and he feels completely isolated. He says he is an “owl of the waste places…a lonely bird on the housetop”.

What is worse, those who can’t wait to find one fatal flaw in his faith now taunt him. They may have echoed his own concerns. “Where is your God now?” “What power does prayer have, after all?” “What are these tears but the result of a dead faith believing in some phantom God who refuses to show up?” We have all been there. And if outward enemies did not taunt us, our own minds will, as well as the Accuser, the devil himself, who loves to sow doubt into our hearts.

Sometimes God seems distant because we have issues which we need to deal with. He leaves us in the solitary place to allow for honest self appraisal. The Psalmists seems to feel this way, saying God is absent “because of Thy indignation and anger.” We must not assume, though, that God is angry every time He feels distant.

The very idea of finite human flesh experiencing relationship with the Almighty God who is spirit and eternal should cause us to suspect there will be times the relationship is difficult to comprehend. Even in human relationships we can doubt the affections of one who has not lost an iota of love for us. In some ways it is even easier to doubt the One whom we cannot see or touch or hear with our human ears.

But the Psalmist comes around to faith. He reminds himself of what he does know about God; that He does regard the prayer of the destitute and does not despise their supplications. The writer is at a time when he feels no better than the destitute; a word in the Hebrew that describes someone completely stripped of all support. The same word is used for tiny shrubs in the desert.

I suppose that just about sums up the Psalmists feelings. He is just a little shrub in a vast desert. He feels completely abandoned, like one of the ghost towns dotting the Mohave Desert. Perhaps he even had thrived previously, just like those empty towns decades before. But now he feels destitute, empty and discarded.

The good news is God regards the prayer of just those people! We don’t have to be the president of a huge Christian ministry or a political leader to get God’s attention. If God were a restaurant owner, it would be the destitute who sit at the Chef’s table. If owned a line of high-class stores, it would be the poor who get the family discount. The very fact we feel disconnected is encouragement to know that God especially listens at those times.

God will not despise the supplications of those to whom the rest of the world won’t give a moment’s notice. As followers of Jesus, paupers stand right alongside the prosperous; there is no difference in their voices to Him. He shows no preference for those at the top of this world’s ladder. So, if the Lord seems distant, if you have felt abandoned and useless, be greatly encouraged. In fact, let your heart be filled to overflowing because the Lord truly regards the prayer of the destitute.