For Restoration to Favor
“Restore unto me the joy of Thy salvation.” — Ps. li. 12.
0 God, another morning has dawned upon me. “Thou better Sun of righteousness” — with the brightness of Thy rising, may all the shadows of guilt and sin be dispersed. I come, weak and weary, guilty and heavy-laden, to Thee, beseeching Thee to bend Thy pitying eye upon me — to deal not with me as I have deserved, nor reward me according to mine iniquity. Blessed Jesus, look upon me. In Thee may I be pitied, pardoned, and forgiven!
1 have erred and strayed from Thy way as a lost sheep. I have wandered from the home of my God. I have been seeking my happiness in what is shadowy and unreal. The world and its delusive hopes have been preferred to Thee. My heart, which ought ever to be a little altar and sanctuary of praise, has burned with false incense. Thy love and glory have not maintained their paramount place in my affections. I have righteously forfeited “the joys of Thy salvation.” My only marvel is, that, as a wandering star, Thou hast not left me to drift onwards to the blackness of darkness forever. O leave me not to perish! I mourn my wanderings. In leaving Thee, I feel I have left my Best Friend. I have caused an aching void in this heart, which the world, with all its joys and riches and pleasures, can never fill. I cannot have one hour of happiness, if mingled with the thought that I am estranged from Thee, my God. Blissful hours of Thy favor I once enjoyed, come sorrowfully to my remembrance; and, though the cup of earthly happiness be full to the brim, I have still to breathe the prayer —” Oh that it were with me as in
months past, when the candle of the Lord did shine!”
“Restore unto me the joy of Thy salvation.” Leave me not in this state of distance and alienation. “O Lord, I beseech Thee, deliver my soul.” Snap these chains of earthliness that are still binding me to the dust, that, on the wings of faith, I may soar upwards, and find rest and quietude where alone it can be found — in Thy renewed love and favor. May past backslidings drive me more to Thy grace. ITothing in myself, may I find and feel that my all in all is in Thee. Discover to me my own emptiness, and the overflowing fulness of Jesus. May I every day see more of His matchless excellencies — His incomparable loveliness — the sweets of His service — that I may never feel tempted to wander from His fold, and carefully avoid all that would risk the forfeiture of that favor which indeed is “life.”
Lord, let me know this day something of this happiness. Let me not be content with the name to live. Let religion be with me a real thing — let it be everything; — life-influencing, sin-subduing, self-renouncing. Let nae diffuse all around me the happy glow of a spirit that feels at peace with God.
And now, Lord, what wait I for? “My hope” for myself, my friends, and all for whom I ought to pray, “is in Thee.” Listen to these my supplications; and all I ask is for Jesus’ sake. Amen.
CAUSE ME TO HEAR THY LOVING-KINDNESS IN THE MORNING, FOR IN THEE DO I TRUST.”
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