renew

As Christians we often look back at the moment when we finally understood we were sinners, and that we required God’s Son’s sacrifice on the cross to restore our relationship with God as the moment when our spirits were restored.  And while that is true, we often neglect to realize that the restoration of our souls, the renewal of them, is a lifelong process.  When our hearts grow weary and our spirits waver in doing good, we wonder what is wrong?  Have we failed to do something right so God has left us?  Have we just gone down the wrong path and are no longer doing the will of God?  Doubts, anger, fears – they all begin to swell within our hearts and we become despondent.  Consider what Spurgeon said of Psalm 51:10: “No man can be renewed without as real and true a manifestation of the Holy Spirit’s energy as he felt at first [when he was first saved], because the work is as great, and flesh and blood are as much in the way now as they ever were.”  Our need for God’s active work in our hearts and souls now are needed now just as they were at the moment of salvation.  But the difference is now we have the Holy Spirit actively working in us, giving us the strength to call out for God to “renew a right spirit in me”!  Spurgeon goes on to say “Let [your] personal weakness, O Christian, be an argument to make [you] pray earnestly to God for help.”  How often do we forget that!  We think “I’m saved, so what is wrong with me – why am I sinning yet again”.  When in reality the call for us to pray, to earnestly pray, for God to work in our hearts is as much of a need now as it was at the moment of salvation.  Our sanctification is not done till when we arrive in the presence of God in heaven – why do we become so despondent when we haven’t reached perfection here on earth.  Take heart, dear Believer, call out to God as David – the man after God’s own heart – did for God to refocus your heart from worldly affairs to the things of God – to renew a right spirit in you.