Restore to me the joy of your salvation,
Psalm 51:12
and uphold me with a willing spirit.
A little over a week ago, I came downstairs for my devotional time and coffee with Jesus, and I found an old black and white photograph of a toddler sitting for a picture many years ago; it was place strategically on my book. The little boy’s eyes smile while he looks off the page at someone (obviously prompting him), and he laughs. His countenance is so full of joy, and it is as if he was looking into the future with such reckless abandon, ready for anything.
“J” had placed that picture where she knew I would see it at O’Dark-Thirty. I think she misses that little boy she married and followed as he jumped into ministry prompted by the PROMPTER.
That little boy still exists within me. Yes, over five decades of life and two decades of ministry piled upon his story. Still, that little boy shows his face when he gets up to preach on a Sunday morning for the ONE who prompts him from just out of sight or when he brings the hope and love of the resurrection at funerals and gravesides. He finds it when he teaches and in the eyes of the other kids sitting with him when he opens the treasure chest to improv a children’s sermon!
In those moments, the PROMPTER restores the joy of my salvation and upholds my willing spirit! Yes, LORD, I am still willing!
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