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Psalm 102:11

My days are like a long shadow. I have withered like grass.

9For I have eaten ashes like bread, and mixed my drink with tears,
10because of your indignation and your wrath; for you have taken me up and thrown me away.
11My days are like a long shadow. I have withered like grass.
12But you, LORD, will remain forever; your renown endures to all generations.
13You will arise and have mercy on Zion, for it is time to have pity on her. Yes, the set time has come.
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← Psalm 102:10Psalm 102:12 →
Notice

A long shadow and withered grass make passing days feel tangible, carrying the weight of a life whose strength seems to be fading.

Questions to write on. Each one opens a new entry with this verse already attached.

Which image comes closer to your experience today, a long shadow or withered grass, if either?

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What does comparing days to a shadow suggest about how you count your own days?

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Connect

Where else Scripture says this

11 passages readers most often link with this verse, and the thread each one shares with it.

This verse's connections, by chapterThe Bible's strongest chapter linksHover or tap a book to trace it
Job 14:2He grows up like a flower, and is cut down. He also flees like a shadow, and doesn’t continue.Both passages compare human life to a shadow and to plant life that cannot last.
Isaiah 40:6The voice of one saying, “Cry out!” One said, “What shall I cry?” “All flesh is like grass, and all its glory is like the flower of the field.Grass pictures human frailty in both passages, with Isaiah extending the comparison to all flesh.
Psalm 144:4Man is like a breath. His days are like a shadow that passes away.Both psalms compare human days to a shadow, describing how brief and passing life is.
1 Chronicles 29:15For we are strangers before you and foreigners, as all our fathers were. Our days on the earth are as a shadow, and there is no remaining.Both passages describe days as a shadow, speaking to God about the transience of human life.
Job 8:9(For we are but of yesterday, and know nothing, because our days on earth are a shadow.)Days on earth are a shadow in both texts; Job also connects that brevity with limited human knowledge.
Psalm 109:23I fade away like an evening shadow. I am shaken off like a locust.Both speakers describe their own fading life through a shadow, with Psalm 109 naming the evening.
1 Peter 1:24For, “All flesh is like grass, and all of man’s glory like the flower in the grass. The grass withers, and its flower falls;Withering grass describes human frailty in both passages, though Peter speaks of all flesh rather than one sufferer.
Job 7:6My days are swifter than a weaver’s shuttle, and are spent without hope.Both speakers lament their passing days, using different images to express how life is slipping away.
Ecclesiastes 6:12For who knows what is good for man in life, all the days of his vain life which he spends like a shadow? For who can tell a man what will be after him under …Both passages compare the days of human life to a shadow, stressing their fleeting nature.
James 1:10and the rich, in that he is made humble, because like the flower in the grass, he will pass away.Both use short-lived plant life to describe human mortality; James applies the image to the rich.
James 4:14Yet you don’t know what your life will be like tomorrow. For what is your life? For you are a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away.A shadow and a vanishing vapor serve a shared purpose: portraying the brevity of human life.
Where this verse fits

Aging. illness or diagnosis. death and what comes after.

What the Bible says about death →
One step

Something small to carry out of this verse

Pray Psalm 102:11 aloud at sunset

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Encouragement

The prayer addresses YHWH who remains forever, even as the speaker feels withered. Human frailty is spoken before God without disguise.

Now put it in your words.

Start an entry on Psalm 102:11. Write what it stirs. Psalmlog sets your words beside Scripture and gives you one next step. Your first entry is free, no account needed.

Keep goingPsalm 102 · the whole chapter with its connection mapPsalms · every chapterBuild a reading plan through Psalms

Cross-reference data from OpenBible.info (CC BY). Scripture from the World English Bible (public domain). Arc diagram after Chris Harrison and Christoph Römhild (2007).