In this whole world, there will hardly be anyone who has not lost something because of some mistake. This could be a relationship, money or health and some have lost themselves in the darkness of this world. But only Lord Jesus is the Light and life of this creation, who can show us the way and help in restoration of all that we have lost. In addition, only He helps us in using our God given gifts in the right way for God’s glory and good of others.
How is restoration possible in this fast-paced world? Restoration is a wonderful idea in our walk of faith and it is about turning back and receiving what we once had, but in a renewed and a transformed state. In our life we face great challenges and trials that leave us in a sense of defeat and helplessness. God hears our cry of despair from the deep pit of our pain, shame and anguish and no place is beyond His reach. The All-knowing God has created us with that internal strength to cope with any situation by overcoming its ill-effects through forgetting them over time. The scars remain but He applies the balm of healing and renewed strength to move forward, holding His hand of guidance and blessings. The new state is always better than what we were having before, for the touch of God’s grace and mercy transforms everything into a better state.
On His way to Jerusalem, Lord Jesus heard the desperate cries of ten lepers for mercy (Luke 17:11-19). Our Lord ‘saw them’ and His very look healed them from within, but it manifested on the way through their obedience to go to the priests. Seeing himself in this new restored state, one who was a Samaritan, people hated by the Jews for being of a mixed race, turned back to the Saviour Lord, ‘and with a loud voice glorified God’. Seeing his attitude of love and gratitude, Lord Jesus said to him, ‘Arise, go your way. Your faith has made you well’. The Greek word ‘sozo’ used by the Lord means ‘to save, made whole’. The other nine received physical restoration only, while this man received total bodily, worldly and spiritual wholeness, connecting him directly to God’s grace. When God writes a story anew, the new state and the inner transformation that happens becomes a testimony for others to follow.
Apostle Peter had undergone a similar experience and the leprosy of fear had afflicted him, to make him emphatically deny His Master. While Lord Jesus was being mocked, hit and spit on by the Jewish leaders and High Priests, Apostle Peter sat outside in the courtyard near a charcoal fire to warm himself (Luke 22:56). He was so shaken by this lack of faith in him, that he told the other disciples, ‘I am going fishing’ and the others also joined him (John 21:3-17). He wanted to return to his old profession, admitting his failure to follow Lord Jesus, but He appeared to them on the shore of the ‘Sea of Tiberias’. When they answered His call, they found the Lord with ‘a fire of coals there, and fish laid on it, and bread’. They were called by the Lord, ‘Come and eat breakfast’.
When the Lord restores us, He takes us through the past experience, to refine us by helping us leave the past in the charcoal fire of the past troubles. Lord Jesus reached down to the level of ’phileo’ love of Apostle Peter, the love between two friends, from His own ‘agape’ love, the love of God towards humanity. Having suffered the inner turmoil of his heart, Apostle Peter could assure all of us, ‘may the God of all grace, who called us to His eternal glory by Christ, after you have suffered a while, perfect, establish, strengthen and settle you’ (1 Peter 5:10). He had suffered the pain and tears for three days, till our Risen Lord appeared to them and blessed them with His peace.
The call from the LORD God to the Israelites and to all who move away from Him for any reason, ‘Turn to Me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning’ (Joen 2:12; 25). The promise of the Lord to the repentant ones’ is, ‘So I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten, the crawling locust, the consuming locust, and the chewing locust, My great army which I sent among you’. We hold to this promise and prayerfully wait for God to fulfil His own desire to restore us to a complete state of joy and peace in Him. King Hezekiah of Judah became ‘sick and near death’ (2 Kings 20:1-11). Prophet Isaiah went to him with the message, ‘Thus says, the LORD, ‘Set your house in order, for you shall die and not live’. Immediately, the king turned his face to the wall, away from all worldly means and prayed to the LORD. He sought mercy from God for his obedience, a loyal heart and diligently doing what was good in God’s sight. Even before the prophet had walked out of the palace of the king, God sent him back to the king with healing of his ailment. With that his life was extended by fifteen years and he is the only person in the Scripture with the knowledge of the exact time of his death. As proof of the blessing, the LORD turned time backwards by approximately 40-50 minutes and all lived that time again. God is above time while we are controlled by time and He can move time forward or backward as per His wish.
A sinful humanity has been brought back into the blessings of God’s presence by the sacrifice of Lord Jesus and His resurrection from the dead. Our Lord declared and fulfilled all that was prophesied about Him more than 700 years before (Luke 4:18-19). He was sent by God, the Father, ‘to heal the broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed’ (Isaiah 61:1-2). When we seek God in earnestness, He rewrites our stories and gives all that we lost and that too in a much better state.
Remaining hopeful in seemingly impossible situations – The result of eating of the tree of knowledge of good and evil was to bring certain death (Genesis 2:17). Adam and Eve hid themselves from the loving God, from His very presence in the trees of the Garden. They were hiding from Him in His blessings only and tried to cover their sin also with the same. We have nothing to cover our sinfulness except to reach out to the love of God. The first death was spiritual, for they were separated from the loving God and fell into the hands of a tyrant liar, the devil. The second death was emotional death, for they were filled with fear and shame at their fallen state. The third was relational, for they lost fellowship with God and with each other. The fourth was death to self for they lost the authority that they had over all other created beings and themselves came under devil’s control. The fifth death was economic for they were pushed out from the abundance, to a life of toil and hard work, with thorns and thistles also afflicting their work. The sixth death was physical death which brought disease and sickness and suffering. And the seventh death was eternal death of separation from the heavenly life into life in hell.
As per Greek mythology, their god Zeus got angry with Prometheus for stealing the fire and giving it to mankind and he created a woman named Pandora. Aphrodite gave her beauty, cleverness was from Athena and curiosity from Zeus, who gave her a box with its key for the lock. She was told to enjoy the beauty of the box but never to open it and was sent to marry the offender of Zeus. Out of sheer curiosity, she opened the box and out of it came out miseries and sufferings, disease and sorrows. She immediately closed the box and started crying bitterly. When her husband came, he learnt of the problem and opened the box again to find a small thing lying there. He pulled it out and found ‘hope’ written on it. God provided this hope of salvation and restoration through the ‘seed of the woman’, His own Beloved Son, right at the time of commission of sin.
In return for death given by the devil, Lord Jesus came ‘to give life and that they may have it more abundantly’ (John 10:10). The relationship with God, the Father, is restored, for we not only become His children in faith but also receive His Holy Spirit in us to guide and lead us on the right paths. With this came the blessing of answered prayers, for our Lord has promised, ‘Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you’ (Matthew 7:7). We have the blessings not because of our good works but out of God’s love. To redeem the sinful humanity out of their bondage to sin and the devil, God sent His Son, not to condemn us but that all be saved through Him (John 3:16-17). To the repentant sinner, who turns from his old ways to follow God with commitment, God has promised, ‘Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall be as wool’ (Isaiah 1:18).
God is love and everything that He does is in love only, though we, with our worldly knowledge, may not perceive it as such. Apostle John reveals this loving nature of God further, ‘If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all our unrighteousness’ (1 John 1:9). We are created in God’s image and likeness, which Lord Jesus has restored. The glory of the Second Adam has been given to every believer, with the Holy Spirit in us helping us to live in that manner. We remain stuck in unbelief and like Eve, start attempting to be like God under the influence of the devil’s lies. God does not force anyone and someone cannot be freed from something that he feels has never happened. When we start looking for worldly signs first, we stop the flow, for God sends from heaven, the spiritual to the worldly. Judas Iscariot and the Jewish leaders looked for restoration of the earthly kingdom of Israel while the Son of God came to set up the kingdom in their hearts first. Those who ‘believe and receive’ have the restoration quickly but many miss out.
Reasons for remaining stuck in darkness and suffering – Nehemiah sought permission of the king Artaxerxes for permission to return to Jerusalem to build its walls and thus ensure security of the residents. After the work was finished, he set up a just administration as Governor. He prayed to God, ‘Remember me, O my God, concerning this, and do not wipe out my good deeds that I have done for the house of my God, and for His service!’ (Nehemiah 13:14). He led the Israelites with total commitment during the building of the wall around Jerusalem, when their enemies were openly threatening them.
God commanded Moses to tell the Israelites about animal sacrifices to be offered ‘of your own free will a male without blemish’ (Leviticus 22:19-20). With this the warning was, ‘whatever has a defect, you shall not offer, for it shall not be acceptable on your behalf’. When we bring and offer defective offerings or prayers with defects of self-promotion or any such defect, the answer from God also cannot be right. A defective gift brings in return a defective answer only. We perceive that the All-knowing God is well aware of our busy work schedules and a hello God type of prayer will be sufficient.
The second time Moses went up on the mountain with the two tablets of stone cut by him ‘like the first ones’ (Exodus 34:28-29). He was with the LORD forty days and forty nights, without any food or water, but when he came down, ‘the skin of his face shone’. He was with God with his whole mind, heart, soul and body in fullness, committed to the moment and God’s glory covered him fully and his bodily needs could not interfere in his submission. God had promised Moses to send His Angel with them into the Promised Land (Exodus 33:14-15). But Moses prayed, ‘If Your Presence does not go with us, do not bring us up from here’. The value of success, money, power and all worldly treasures is of no value without God. When we seek His presence everywhere, during the day and night, He will bless all our works and His glory becomes visible in our lives
Garden of Eden or even heaven, with all its abundance, with gold paved streets will be full of darkness, without Lord Jesus, who is ‘life, and the life was the light of men’ (John 1:4). God sent His Son as the light to give us new birth and to fill us with His light and remove all blemishes of sin to make us acceptable before God. God is gentle and loving, forcing no one to turn to Him. The submission, fasting and prayer that God desires is different from what we perceive it to be (Isaiah 58:3-8). The first is to ‘loose the bonds of wickedness’ that we are under and we subject others to. The second is to untie the heavy burdens of our own efforts that we carry and force others to carry. The third is to break every yoke of controlling others for our own benefits and set them free. The fourth is to share what we have with others, for we enter into God’s presence in His Church to receive, to share and not store. We are supposed to be the branches of the True Vine to bear fruit for others to eat, for no tree can ever eat its own fruit. The fifth is to care for the hungry and the destitute by providing them shelter, food and clothing. When we follow this, the promise of God is clear, ‘Then your light shall break forth like the morning, your heling shall spring forth speedily, and your righteousness shall go before you; the glory of the LORD shall be your rear guard’. And with this comes the assurance, ‘Then you shall call and the LORD will answer; you shall cry, and He will say, ‘Here I am’.
All of creation is for God’s glory and must follow His ways only. His Son has opened the door for us to follow His Word and be blessed but has left the choice to us.
The Jewish people have suffered the continuous opposition of others, yet held on to the Word of God as their support and strength. While many old civilizations have long perished, the Jews continue to move on, holding on to God’s loving hand. It is because of this that despite having rejected the Son of God as their Messiah, they are still blessed by God. When we also, in like manner, walk and live in obedience to the commands and statutes of God, He keeps us with Him, ignoring our past and present works of disobedience!
