He has made my flesh and my skin waste away; he has broken my bones;
These, as it evidently appears, are metaphorical words. Illness often makes people to look old, for from pain proceeds leanness: thus the skin is contracted, and the wrinkles of old age appear even in youths. As, then, sorrows exhaust moisture and strength, hence he is said to grow old who pines away in mourning. This is what the Prophet now means.
The title of the 102nd Psalm might very fitly be prefixed to this chapter - The prayer of the afflicted, when he is overwhelmed, and pours out his complaint before the Lord; for it is very feelingly and fluently that the complaint is here poured out. Let us observe the particulars of it. The prophet complains, 1. That God is angry.
Commenting on Lamentations 3:1-20
My flesh and my skin hath he made old,.... His flesh with blows, and his skin with smiting, as the Targum; his flesh was so emaciated, and his skin so withered and wrinkled, that he looked like an old man; as our Lord, when little more than thirty years of age, what with his sorrows and troubles, looked like one about fifty: he hath broken...