Run –Down Souls Jeremiah 30:12-22: “For I will restore health to you, and I will heal your wounds, says the Lord, because they have called you an outcast, saying, This is Zion, whom no one seeks after and for whom no one cares!” (v17)
28th January 2024 | | sermon source |
In the past two weeks we have explored two different understandings of the phrase: ‘He restores my soul’. Today we examine another –one that claims these words refer to the way God ministers to us when we become spiritually debilitated. Personally, this is the view I find most appealing. Life has a tendency to run down, to get jaded (bored or lacking enthusiasm, typically after having had too much of something) and ragged ((of cloth or clothes) old and torn) or (having an irregular or uneven surface, edge, or outline) at the edges, tired and lacking in zest. In this one phrase ‘He restores my soul’, we have looked or viewed life in many dimension, on the 7th Jan. 2024 we looked at life as a bruised reed, a dimly burning wick, which prompted the good Shepherd to care, provide, guide, protect and secure; on the 14th of Jan. 2024 we studied and learned that life could be restored by a look, whereby Apostle Peter when his denial of our Lord Jesus nearly destroyed him our Lord Jesus having previously prayed for him unlike Judas was finally restored to life by a look and on the 21st Jan. 2024 we looked at when one carelessly and thoughtlessly wander away from the path of life in a sermon titled ‘little islands of worldliness’. These go a long way to tell us that we just have to be more and most conversant with the word of God because it is the only thing that can help us have life and have it more abundantly!
A sample of the kind of thing I mean is found in a letter which arrived today: ‘I’m worn down by my circumstances …tired of the pressures …wearied by the constant demands that are being made upon me. Can God do anything for me in this situation?’ I was happy to respond that He can! The Good Shepherd can step into our lives when we feel tired and jaded and provided we let Him in through our belief and faith, He will quickly restore our spiritual life, energy and enthusiasm.
In the New Testament, in the Moffatt translation. Lord Jesus is described as a stimulator: “So by all the stimulus of Christ, by every incentive of love, by all your participation in the Spirit, by all your affectionate tenderness” (Phil.2:1). Or Ampc version gives it this way, “So by whatever [appeal to you there is in our mutual dwelling in Christ, by whatever] strengthening and consoling and encouraging [our relationship] in Him [affords], by whatever persuasive [a]incentive there is in love, by whatever participation in the [Holy] Spirit [we share], and by whatever depth of affection and compassionate sympathy” those who know nothing of Christ’s stimulus –His ability to restore tired and jaded souls –are forced to turn to other stimulants to tide them over. Listen to the way that a famous missionary to India describes Christ’s ministry of spiritual restoration: ‘He is like the first rainfall of the monsoon in India –the dry, dusty ground, so barren and hard, the very next day has a green film of vegetation over it. The moisture apparently touches the dead soil …it is alive. So as Lord Jesus touches our parched and barren lives, and [they are revived] with life, with vitality and with hope.’ May you know the wonder of His restoring touch this very moment as you hear and listen to the invigorating words of God Almighty. Faith comes by hearing the word of God and with it come many other things such as healing, providence, protection, caring, security and the total well being of our soul in terms of peace, the Peace of our Lord God that passes all understanding and such the world cannot give, but give He unto us!