December 2024
A blessed Advent to all of you.
As I headed on a week of retreat I had a friend ask me, “how do you want the Lord to restore you this week?” and my first thought was “He can’t.” It was honest. It was hard to look at, but it was exactly where I was at. I couldn’t see past the shambles of this year and in many ways I had resigned myself to find comfort in the shambles instead of the Savior.
It was a year of strong storms and they didn’t hit without doing some damage. So I sit in a season where there is a lot of restoring. Restoring spiritually through hours of prayer, physically through treatments and doctors appoints, and emotionally through good but hard counseling work. I imagine some of you are here or have been here too. I’m going back to foundational places. Places I did not even know could be damaged. And the struggle against despair is as real as it’s ever been.
This part isn’t sexy. It’s not flashy. It’s not even pretty. It’s a mundane work, a monotonous work, a very hidden work but this work is and it requires an immense amount of hope. A hope not in the work that we can do but in the person that He is.
And who is that? He is God. He is love. He is communion. He is your Father. He is your friend. He is your advocate. He is the one who wants to build again. And what strikes me the most is He is the one, and the only one, who can restore to even better than was was before.
So as we enter into this season of expectation and waiting I ask you the same question my friend asked me, “how do you want the Lord to restore you this December?”
Be at peace if your answer sounds a bit like mine. He knows. He is not worried about it. He only wants to show you His own heart through your very own.
Here is this month’s December prayer prompt: Restoration.
