December 30 Devotion - Our God of Restoration

 

Some of us, or all of us, have had some or many disappointments in 2020 and cannot wait for this year to end. Personally, I lost my brother Rafick to Covid-19 in 2020. Many of us are dreading that the coming year or a portion of it will be a continuation of the troubles of 2020 due to the continuation of the pandemic and its destructive effects. We may be dwelling on the past and living in anger, grief, fear, and defeat. We can choose in this coming New Year 2021 to focus on God’s promises to us, because God wants to restore everything that's broken in our lives for He said:

I will repay you for the years the locusts have eaten—

واعوض لكم عن السنين التي اكلها الجراد

Joel 2:25

He wants to restore our connection with Him, our joy, our peace, our health, our relationships and our finances. There is however a key to receiving God’s blessings, each one of us has to believe (visualize with clarity receiving the blessings) for God said:

I am telling you, whatever things you ask for in prayer [in accordance with God’s will], believe [with confident trust] that you have received them, and they will be given to you.

لِذلِكَ أَقُولُ لَكُمْ: كُلُّ مَا تَطْلُبُونَهُ حِينَمَا تُصَلُّونَ، فَآمِنُوا أَنْ تَنَالُوهُ، فَيَكُونَ لَكُمْ.

And each one of us must:

be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.

بل تغيّروا عن شكلكم بتجديد اذهانكم لتختبروا ما هي ارادة الله الصالحة المرضية الكاملة.

Romans 12:1-2

Today, let us choose to focus on the future and release past hurts, let us believe in confident trust that we have received God’s answer to our prayers, let us be transformed by the renewing of our minds. Let us proclaim that we are children of a loving God, a God of restoration.

I invite you to repeat the following prayer for yourself:

Abba Father, thank You for choosing to restore my life. Thank You for Your good, pleasing and perfect will for my life. Thank You for the promises and truth of Your Word that set me free. Lord please strengthen me with power through Your Spirit in my inner being, so that I can renew my mind today and visualize with clarity receiving all the blessings I desire which are in accordance with Your will for my life. Father, all I need You have already provided for, please let me experience Your blessings and restore all the lost years which the locusts have eaten. Thank You God for loving me with a deep, unfailing and everlasting love, thank You for Your abundant blessings in my life, and for the riches of Your grace upon my life. Father God I praise You, glorify You, revere You, worship You, I stand in awe of You, and I lift You up on high. Father I pray to You in the name of Your only begotten Son, my Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. To Jesus be the majesty, authority, power, glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen.

Jesus loves you,

In Him,

Wagdi Henein