Psalm 85

Psalm 85

Revive Us!

I.                    God is always faithful to revive His children who seek after Him, but we must continually remember His salvation (Vv. 1-3)

a.       Our psalm starts on a high note, by remembering God’s favor on His people, and praising Him for demonstrating His favor by restoring His people. But the psalmist isn’t just praising God for the results of His restoration, he’s praising God for the method of His restoration and what that reveals about the conditions which led to God’s disfavor of His people. The people needed to be restored because their sinful disobedience had led to God’s discipline. Thus they were restored through God’s greatest display of mercy, grace, and love, His forgiveness. The psalmist beautifully proclaims praise for God’s atonement for their sins, and His turning away of His wrath, or propitiation. The psalmist is remembering God’s unmatched nature and character, humanity’s desperately sinful state which results in our desperate need for the forgiveness which restores us and revives us, and which can only come from God. The psalmist is remembering what God has already done as the first step to seeking God to do it again. We must also remember God’s atonement through Christ, and how Jesus satisfied God’s just wrath against our us in our sin, making us new in Him, and turning away God’s anger for eternity. But we’re still required to walk obediently in God’s commands for our lives, and the result of not doing so drives a wedge in our relationship with God. If we aren’t continually remembering that God has forgiven us, covered us, favored us, restored us, and turned away His just anger, we’ll easily forget, not take seriously, drift off course, and ultimately forfeit joy in a renewed life. Revival begins with taking sin seriously and rejoicing in His forgiveness! (Vv. 1-3; John 3:16-21, 36; Rom. 3:21-27; 5:6-10; 6:21-23; 2 Cor. 5:17, 21; 13:5; Eph. 2:1-9; Phil. 2:12-13; 1 John 3:1-9) 

II.                 God is always faithful to revive His children who seek after Him, but we must continually turn to Him and trust in His nature and character (Vv. 4-7)

a.       By remembering God’s salvation, the psalmist has become aware of the people’s disobedience and need for restoration and renewal. Their hardship revealed their disobedience, but no amount of success in their return to their land would have fulfilled them if God weren’t at the center of their lives. It was God alone who restored them and revived them to new life, and it is God alone who can do it again. God’s quietness in their lives didn’t indicate His absence or lack of desire to restore them, it was God’s call on their hearts to turn to Him, trust in who He is, and seek His forgiveness and restoration. Once we belong to God in Christ, we are never any less His children, but all children fall in error and require discipline. Loving parents always discipline their children, but are never angry forever. We must continually turn to God in Christ, seeking His restoration by turning our hearts towards Him so the we might be continually revived in the new life we have in Him. Because of whom He is, God takes sin very seriously, but His love and compassion are unfailing, and His great pleasure is restoring the sinner to Himself and renewing them to a full life in Him through life’s peaks and the valleys. (Vv. 4-7; Exod. 34:6-7; Ps. 103:17-19; Ezek. 18:20-23; 33:10-11; 37:11-14; Joel 2:25-26; Hag. 2:1-9; Zech. 4:6; Mal. 3:6-12; John 13:10; 15:1-5; Rom. 6:4-18; 7:21-25; Col. 3:1-4; 1 Tim. 1:15-19; Heb. 12:4-11)

III.              God is always faithful to revive His children who seek after Him, but we must continually seek His restoration and revival on His terms and not our own (Vv. 8-13)

Dwelling on God’s salvation, and seeking His restoration and renewal, also means waiting to hear from God. Waiting to hear from God means we’ll be faced with choices, but if we truly believe Him, are in awe of who He is, and trust in who He is, we’ll know that His answer is the only path to true peace and truly revived life. There is simply no peace in life without peace with God, and lovingkindness, truth, righteousness, and peace all met and came together exclusively on the cross through the perfect sinless and willful sacrifice of Jesus on our behalf. By continually remembering our salvation and rejoicing in it, realizing the sinful decay inevitable in our earthly lives, and praying continually for God to restore us and revive us, we can hear clearly what His will is for us in our restoration and revival. When we diligently seek Him on His terms, and humbly submit to Him in His grace, mercy, and love, His truth and righteousness is revealed on earth, and we experience lives in His goodness which follow His path, sustaining us in His abundance until He renews all things. (2 Chron. 7:13-14;      Ps. 37:4-5; Hab. 2:1-4; Matt. 5:3-9; 7:7-8; John 8:30-36; Rom. 1:16-17; 5:1-5; 8:1-39; Gal. 5:1, 13; Heb. 10:35-38; Jas. 1:17-18, 21; 1 Pet. 2:16-25; Rev. 3:19-22)