365. Restore the Years
Joel 2:25 And I will restore the years that the locust hath eaten, the cankerworm, and the caterpiller, and the palmerworm, my great army which I sent among you.
The locust, the cankerworm, the caterpillar, and the palmerworm has eaten many years and taken away life, health and wealth from the people. What a wonderful promise this is for all of us who have wasted years of life, lost valuable time, messed up so many things, made costly mistakes, and generally eaten up the years. The Lord promises to restore what was lost, wasted, eaten up, and destroyed. No one can say they lived a perfect life and messed up nothing.
The Lord will fix up what was broken, find what was lost, write straight on our crooked lines, and put back together what was scattered. And then the Lord’s salvation does much more than simply restore things to the state they were before: He will make it all better than it was. The New Jerusalem surpasses the Garden of Eden.
The Lord calls these life destroyers a great army that He sent among us. God sent them to us and caused them to destroy when He cursed the earth. These are the “thorns and thistles, sweat and dust” of the Curse of our Fall into Sin. In other words, the “locusts” are our own fault. My Sin is the cause. God may have sent them, but I brought the curse about; It may be His army that messes up my life, but I am the one who invited them in. But, for Adam and Eve and all their descendants the Lord gave promises of restoration, forgiveness, and new life.
We all have some regrets and things we wish we could have a chance at a do-over; however, we recognize that we would probably make the mistakes again and surely just make some new ones. But God fixes. Yes, the “locust” will always be around, but so also will the God who restores. And that’s a promise.