In Psalm 51, David asks God to restore the joy of his salvation.

It got me wondering: how often do we live recognizing our need for restoration? How many times do we come to God, and say I need you? How often, instead, do we forget the joy of a unified life in Jesus?

When we read the story of David, we see that he intimately knew what God desired from His people: worship, adoration, and praise. He knew what God gave in return: life abundant, radiant joy, and eternal communion.

David was called a man after God’s own heart. Yet, he still found himself asking God to remind him of the wonder of salvation.

David’s petition for a renewed joy tells me that even the most faithful followers of Christ are vulnerable to living halfheartedly. We forget, like the people of Israel, that God is good and beautiful and kind. This is the meaning and the importance of daily bread: to come to God, so He can remind us who He is and what we’re made for. So He can restore our memory of the cross, and in turn, the joy of our salvation in Jesus.

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If I’m honest, often I find myself trying to prove something to those around me, to myself or to God, thinking that I don’t already have all that I need. That I have to go looking for something I don’t already have because somehow the cross wasn’t enough already (it was). I wear myself thin trying to make God proud, but fail to remember that He’s already here with me.

Other times, I’m running so fast through life that I don’t pause and savor the joy of abundant life in Jesus. I love him dearly, but in my broken humanity, I forget. At times, I live half-awake, in a slumber, focused on all the wrong tasks at hand. Meanwhile, God is waiting for me to approach His throne of grace, and delight in His immanence.

God sent His one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. This salvation can’t be taken away, but we can live in such a way that is quiet about Christ’s worthiness and holiness. Eternal life through Jesus has serious implications for the lives that we get to live, but we don’t always act like it. Some days, when we ask for it, the wonder of the cross wakes us up from our slumber and helps us live with purpose and meaning, in unity with God. Other days, our awe runs dormant. We don’t come and feast, and instead of holy remembrance, we forget our King. Oh how this grieves Christ’s heart.

But what if those days that we forget can be the moments where we come to God like David, praying that instead, he would restore our joy, repenting for our forgetfulness, and asking Him to redeem it?

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I had a moment like that this week as I read Luke 4.

As I read the events that transpired after Jesus spent 40 days fasting in the wilderness, I became overwhelmed with awe; I am astounded by Jesus’ faithfulness and resilience. I know He is the Son of Man – sinless, spotless, and perfect, sent by God – but it never ceases to amaze me that he, too, was human.

He wrestled with hunger like we do; he was tempted in every way that we are, and yet did not sin. As the enemy tried to convince Jesus that his way was better than God’s, that Jesus could have all the power God promised to Him without the cross – by bowing down and worshipping Satan instead – Jesus stood firm in resistance. Every time, he proclaimed truth over the temptations of the enemy, and willfully chose the cross instead.

The enemy gave Jesus the opportunity to forfeit his obedience which drew him to the point of death on a cross, but he never did. He saw you, and me, and the third and fourth generation, and he chose the cross. He was faithful because He knew the God who sent Him, and the eternal glory that awaited us through his blood. Jesus saw our sin and our brokenness, knowing the ways we would fall short of the glory of God, and he chose the cross.

Why would someone willfully die a death they didn’t deserve? Jesus wanted us to know God; he made a way so that we could.

As Jesus knelt down in the Garden of Gethsemane the night before his arrest, praying with such agony that his sweat pooled with blood, he prayed that God would take this cup from him. Yet in the same breath, Jesus concluded by praying yet not my will, but yours be done.

He accepted his fate because He trusted the one who spoke it.

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In a Sunday gathering, I recently shared this scripture and these thoughts for a Call to Worship, and was thinking about friends and loved ones who might hear about the joy of salvation, and not resonate with that. I know plenty of people who are deep in grief and sorrow, wrestling with questions about God’s goodness, faithfulness, and protection. But what I would want for them in a season like that, more than anything, is for them to remember the deep love that sent Jesus to the cross for them. Maybe the joy of salvation looks more like clinging to hope for a time.

To simply remember that Jesus reconciled us back to God through his own suffering.

Not just in spite of someone’s circumstances, but amidst them, I would hope and pray that even there, in the Valley of the Shadow of Death, they would be able to experience the joy of salvation because if there’s anyone in this world who could understand the depths of their own suffering, it’s Jesus.

I waited patiently for the LORD; 

He inclined to me and heard my cry.

He lifted me up from the pit of despair, 

out of the miry clay; 

He set my feet upon a rock, 

and made my footsteps firm.

He put a new song in my mouth, 

a hymn of praise to our God.

This is where we find the joy of our salvation in Jesus – by living in communion with our Father in Heaven all the days of our lives and allowing Him to remind us who He is, who we are, and what Jesus did for us on the cross.

The gift of eternal life doesn’t start when we die; it begins the moment we put our trust in God.

May we come to God for our daily bread, with expectation that he’ll restore our hope and joy in the process. May we live with deep, grateful love for Jesus, remembering that because of what he’s done for us, nothing can separate us from the love of God.

We don’t have to spend our days away from God any longer; we can come to Him at all times, in every way. This is a miracle. This is the good news. This is the joy of our salvation: being with God forever.

May we live wide awake to the wonder and beauty of the cross Jesus bore for us.

May we remember him, keeping the miracle of Jesus’ birth, life, death and resurrection at the forefront of our minds.

May our daily waking prayer be this: Lord, restore the joy of my salvation. Help me to live this gifted life with gratitude and awe, knowing the price Jesus paid so that I could.