Continuing from previous posts of Max Lucado’s * He Restores My Soul II (The first post of this series. . . * He Restores My Soul)
From a previous post . . . to use David’s words, “He restores my soul.”
Our Shepherd majors in restoring hope to the soul. Whether you are a lamb lost on a craggy ledge or a city slicker lost in a deep jungle, everything changes when your rescuer appears. Your loneliness diminishes, because
you have fellowship. Your desire decreases, because you have vision. Your confusion begins to lift because you have direction. (Now continuing. . .)
Please note: you haven’t left the jungle. The trees still eclipse the sky, the thorns still cut the skin. Animals lurk and rodents scurry, The jungle is still the jungle. It hasn’t changed but you have. You have changed because you have hope. And you have hope because you have met someone who can lead you out.
Your shepherd knows that you were not made for this place. So he has come to guide you out. He has come to restore your soul. He is the perfect one to do so. He has the right vision. He reminds you that “you are like foreigners and strangers in this world” (1 Peter 2:11). And he urges you to lift your eyes from the jungle around you to the heaven above you. “Don’t shuffle along, eyes to the ground, absorbed with the things right in front of you. Look up, and be alert to what is going on around Christ. . . . see things from His perspective” (Collisions 3:2 MSG)
David said it this way, “I lift up my eyes to the hills—where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth. He will not let your foot slip—he who watches over you will not slumber. . . .The Lord watches over you . . . the sun will not harm you by day, nor the moon by night. The Lord will keep you from all harm—he will watch over your life” (Psalms 121:1-7 NIV).
God, your rescuer, has the right vision. He also has the right direction. He made the boldest claim in the history of man when he declared, “I am the way” (John 14:6). People wondered if the claim was accurate. He answered their question by cutting a path through the underbrush of sin and death . . . and escaping alive. He’s the only One who ever did. And he is the only One who can help you and me do the same.
He has the right vision: he has seen the homeland. He has the right directions. But most of all, he is the right person, for he is God. Who knows the jungle better than the one who made it? And who knows the pitfalls of the path better than the one who has walked it? ~Max Lucado, Traveling Light (Nashville, Tennessee: Thomas Nelson 1987, 9188, 1991). 57-58
