Restore to me the joy of your salvation,
and make me willing to obey you.
Then I will teach your ways to rebels,
and they will return to you.
(Psalm 51:12-13 NLT)
I have heard this scripture my entire life and never has it been so near and dear to my heart as it has been over the past few days. You see, there's a difference between a person who just has Salvation from God as opposed to a person who has the JOY of God's salvation.
Salvation is a blessing, no doubt. However, just like any other blessing, anything you are blessed with also comes with Responsibility. Even if someone blesses you with a new pair of shoes, it is your responsibility to take care of those shoes in order for them to remain in good condition. The bigger the blessing, the bigger the load of the responsibility. Can you imagine what level of responsibility is placed upon a person who is blessed to own and/or operate a corporation?!
For obvious reasons, salvation is by far one of the biggest blessings a person can obtain. Unfortunately, with great blessings comes great responsibility and, if we are not careful, great responsibility can sometimes appear to be more of a burden than a blessing.
This is what was happening to David when He prayed this prayer to God asking God to restore unto him the joy of his salvation. David had walked with God for the majority of his life and, for whatever reason, found himself in a place where the pleasures of his flesh seemed more worthwhile to him than the maintenance of his salvation!
When it was brought to David's attention that he sinned against God and put his salvation at risk, David prayed for God to restore unto him the joy of salvation. David did not just pray for God to restore his salvation; which would have been an adequate prayer that he could have prayed! Instead, he prayed for God to restore the JOY of His salvation.
In other words, David was asking for his passion back! He was asking God to make him excited about being saved again. He even went so far as to say that if the joy that comes from salvation was restored to him he would be "willing" (naturally in agreement) to obey God's will. Consequently, this would also make him become filled with enough zeal to go about and evangelize God's ways to others who had lost joy in their salvation! (See the scripture above.)
Last night a friend of mine tagged me in an Instagram post that joked about how new Believers are so passionate about God that they would even be willing to stand up to a gunman who was trying to rob or kill them. The Instagram post joked that new converts to Christianity are so full of faith in God that they trust Him, sometimes even foolishly in every situation! My response to her was, "We need to go back to those newborn Christian days!" Her reply: "Those days were the best!"
My prayer for you today is the same thing I pray for myself and for my loved ones. That is that you will never lose the joy that comes from God's salvation. And if for some reason you are wavering in that joy and consequently looking for fulfillment in all the wrong things, I pray to God for restoration in the JOY of His salvation all over your life.
In Philippians 2:12 Apostle Paul and Timothy tell the people of the church of Philippi that everyone needs to work out their salvation with fear and trembling! That means that we should never take our salvation for granted to the point that we ever stop guarding, protecting, and fighting for the maintenance of it. The joy of our salvation is what helps to keep us in the God's will and under God's protection and direction. Every day of our lives, may the Lord have much-needed mercy on all of us!
