Restore my Joy

I have been watching a podcast that Andy Mineo is on and he talked about something briefly that I think every Christian can relate to. He mentioned King David’s words in Psalm 51 that is entirely relevant for us. “Restore to me the joy of your salvation,” Psalm 51:12 reads, “and uphold me with a willing spirit.”

Restore to me the joy of your salvation. Restore my joy. This is, indeed, true. We all endure this. The Lord saves us, and we become ultra zealous for him (sometimes obnoxiously so, even if our hearts are in the right place). But as time passes, our zeal wanes, our desire fades, our passion dwindles. It’s not that we don’t love the Lord or that we don’t desire to follow him, but that we just don’t have the same zeal we once had.

What we need is to have the same zeal we had after conversion but with the years of sanctification we have now. I certainly wish that. We need to be restored to the joy of our salvation. We need a fresh reminder of why our salvation is so joyous! That’s part of why we lose that joy—we forget how wonderful salvation is. We forget the “lengths” God went through to save us by sending his only Son. We forget who we were.

So our passion dies down. Perhaps that’s due to our sin, as was the case for David in Psalm 51. He, of course, committed heinous sins but in this Psalm displays an example of genuine repentance and contrition for his sin. So in one case we may not be experiencing the joy of salvation because of our own sin. Maybe repentance is in order—search your heart, as we all should. Unfortunately sin shows up in our lives without us even noticing it.

And then other times our fire for the Lord just slowly decreases and fades. It doesn’t go away, but it’s not what it once was. That can be very discouraging because many times we recognize something has changed. We don’t get excited about going to church; we’d rather stay home instead of go to Bible study. Fellowship doesn’t rejuvenate us like it used to. In those moments we need to pray for God to renew our hearts and forgive us for our apathy.

We need to experience the joy of our salvation!

Friend, is this you? I know I see myself here. I have felt this too many times. It takes intentional effort to see through the fog of our lack of zeal. We need to remind ourselves of how amazing our salvation is and how wonderful the Lord is.