Setting Our Gaze

Dear Writer,

Today, I want to talk to you about restoration. There are times we reach in our lives as writers when we feel at worst God must be angry with us, or at best like we’ve been abandoned. Times when we feel desperate. Times when we cry out like the psalmist…

Psalm 74:1 – O God, why do you cast us off forever?
    Why does your anger smoke against the sheep of your pasture?

2Remember your congregation, which you have purchased of old,
    which you have redeemed to be the tribe of your heritage!
    Remember Mount Zion, where you have dwelt.
³ Direct your steps to the perpetual ruins;
    the enemy has destroyed everything in the sanctuary!

Sometimes, our life has been so overwhelmed it can feel like we’ve lost our way to God. Our way to connect with His heart. 

⁴Your foes have roared in the midst of your meeting place;
    they set up their own signs for signs.
⁵ They were like those who swing axes
    in a forest of trees.
⁶ And all its carved wood
    they broke down with hatchets and hammers.
⁷ They set your sanctuary on fire;
    they profaned the dwelling place of your name,
    bringing it down to the ground.
⁸ They said to themselves, “We will utterly subdue them”;
    they burned all the meeting places of God in the land.

It can seem like the vision He gave us has vanished beyond recovery….

9 We do not see our signs;
    there is no longer any prophet,
    and there is none among us who knows how long.

We may even feel a little angry.

¹⁰How long, O God, is the foe to scoff?
    Is the enemy to revile your name forever?
¹¹ Why do you hold back your hand, your right hand?
    Take it from the fold of your garment and destroy them!

Perhaps you feel like it’s too late or as if the enemy has thoroughly overrun the space where the Lord used to meet with you, where you used to pour out your heart together. But I have good news for you, writer.  The King who commissioned your story—your work—is still King over every space.

¹²Yet God my King is from of old,
    working salvation in the midst of the earth.
¹³ You divided the sea by your might;
    you broke the heads of the sea monsters on the waters.
¹⁴ You crushed the heads of Leviathan;
    you gave him as food for the creatures of the wilderness.
¹⁵ You split open springs and brooks;
    you dried up ever-flowing streams.

Yours is the day, yours also the night;
    you have established the heavenly lights and the sun.
¹⁷ You have fixed all the boundaries of the earth;
    you have made summer and winter.

And here the psalmist remembers and asks the Lord to remember an interesting thing.

¹⁸Remember this, O Lord, how the enemy scoffs,
    and a foolish people reviles your name.
¹⁹ Do not deliver the soul of your dove to the wild beasts;
    do not forget the life of your poor forever.

²⁰ Have regard for the covenant,
    for the dark places of the land are full of the habitations of violence.
²¹ Let not the downtrodden turn back in shame;
    let the poor and needy praise your name.

²² Arise, O God, defend your cause;
    remember how the foolish scoff at you all the day!
²³ Do not forget the clamor of your foes,
    the uproar of those who rise against you, which goes up continually!

The psalmist remembers and reminds His King that He is a covenant-keeping God. A King who never fails to fulfill a promise. And so, the psalmist cannot believe he has been utterly abandoned. And neither should you, writer.

Yes, writer, in the middle of his deepest distress, the psalmist looks up. Sometimes, writer, when life is overwhelming, our next best step is to look up. We can’t gain the perspective we need from where we are. We need to go higher. And our King is always ready to take us there. Even if you feel you are in exile, the King who called you can and will restore you.

Jeremiah 6:16 – Thus says the Lord: “Stand by the roads, and look,
    and ask for the ancient paths,
where the good way is; and walk in it,
    and find rest for your souls.
But they said, ‘We will not walk in it.’

So today I encourage you, writer, if you feel you’ve lost your way: look up! Ask your King to rescue you. To restore your vision. To return you to the path He’s ordained you to walk in. Because here’s the thing, writer, your King has a book He’s written for YOU. A workmanship He’s prepared for you before the foundation of the world.

Ephesians 2:10 – For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

And there’s nothing more He delights in doing than in seeing us fulfill those works. Take some time today to step back and look up.

#writing #restoration #vision #everywriterwriting