Revive to Rejoice!

May 5

We know we deserve God’s wrath. We know we live lives that are often a stench in His nostrils and that we should be abandoned by Him—cast out of His presence and left to the abysmal garbage heap we’ve littered around ourselves. But that‘s not what we want and that’s not what we hope for.

Though we know we’ve broken the heart of Jesus by our sin, by our indifference to the great salvation He has held out to us, we still want something from Him that defies reason and allows our fullness of blessing in time and our assurance of Heaven in eternity.

When we fall short of His blessings, we know it’s what we deserve. We know that His wrath unleashed against us would be our just due, yet we cry out to Him as David did in Psalm 85:5, 6, “Will You prolong Your anger for all generations? Will You not revive us again so Your people may rejoice in You?”

We know He is justified in His anger against us; we know that we deserve His wrath to be prolonged against even future generations as the Word says it will be (Exodus 20:5), yet we long for His mercy to us and our children. We long for revival that will enable us to rejoice in the fullness of His salvation once again!