Joy Of Our Salvation!
"Restore to me the joy of Your salvation,
and uphold me by Your generous Spirit."
Psalm 51: 12
We all know this well-known proverb:
“You never miss the water till the well runs dry”
and some of us have experienced it.
We never realized what a great friend a person was until
they moved away. We never realized the blessings of our
church home until a relocation took us to a new city. And,
it’s possible, we never realized the joy of our salvation
until we found ourselves without that joy.
That’s what happened to David, the king of Israel.
We know of his sins: adultery with Bathsheba and
complicity in the murder of her husband, Uriah
(2 Samuel 11–12).
It was not until Bathsheba bore David
a son that he repented of his sins.
For almost a year, he lived without the joy of his salvation—possibly
described in Psalm 32. In Psalm 51, we have David’s heartfelt prayer
of confession to God. And in verse 12 we have his request for what
he had lost: “Restore to me the joy of Your salvation.”
It’s easy to take salvation for granted. But when sins, attitudes,
and behaviors lead us into darkness, we suddenly realize what
we have lost: joy. Fortunately, joy is only a prayer away.
