God Can Restore Your Lost Years

A few weeks ago, I was about 75% done with a sermon manuscript, when I decided to step away for a lunch break. Having worked on this sermon for several hours, my brain was in a fog. I had several word documents open and I started closing them out. I can’t even explain now why or how this happened, but by accident I closed out the sermon I was working on without saving it! I even looked at the warning message that said, “Are you want to close without saving?” and for some stupid reason I clicked, “Don’t Save.”

The panic and anger that came over me was intense and immediate. Have you ever seen Star Trek II: The Wrath of Kahn where Captain Kirk finally realizes the depths of his mortal enemy’s treachery and yells out, “KAHHHHHHN!” (click here)Yeah, it was that bad. NOOOOOOOOO! I was mad enough to eat bees. Here I had worked all morning on this message and poof it was gone!

I started thinking, “There’s got to be a way I can recover it?” So, I went to Google and I searched “document recovery.” Sure enough, I pulled up a tutorial and within a few minutes I had figured out a way to wave a magic wand and make that deleted document reappear. I once was lost, but now I’m found. I breathed a sigh of relief and I exclaimed, “Thank you God!” as this time I was quick to click the “Save” button.

Wouldn’t it be amazing if God had a program like that for our mistakes and regrets in life? Unfortunately, we are trapped on the steadily moving conveyor belt of time and we can’t go back. However, there is a wonderful promise that God spoke through the prophet Joel:

“I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten, the hopper, the destroyer, and the cutter, my great army, which I sent among you.” (2:25)

In context, the Lord is talking about a swarm of locusts that he sent as judgment upon his rebellious people. The locusts devoured the nation’s crops, which devastated them agriculturally and economically. Yet, in the midst of this calamity, God issued a promise of grace, restoration and hope. A day was coming when God would make up Israel’s losses.  

This is the promise of the Gospel as well—in His timing, all things lost will be recovered. We may not see it all come to pass in this life, but in eternity the promise “to make all things new” is just as steady. So how exactly can God carry out this “operation restoration” in our lives right now?

Well, God can restore lost years by multiplying your fruitfulness. After the locust plague, the Lord blessed the people’s land by giving them bumper crops over the next years. This surplus helped make up the difference. The Lord can do this in your life as well. Ask Him to help you be intentional with the time you have left and make the latter years more productive than the ones wasted in sin and selfish folly. -DM