the Fourth Week after Easter
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Daily Devotionals
Our Daily Homily - Volume 2
Psalms 80:3—Turn us again, O God!
Three times we have this cry repeated in this psalm. Again and again, and each time with some additional thought, the soul pleads for Restoration (R.V., marg.).
The Master said to Peter: When thou art converted (i.e., turned again) strengthen thy brethren. But Peter did not realize that the Master Himself would need to turn him. He turned his back on his Lord and denied Him; but Jesus turned him back, by that look, that message from his grave mouth, that interview in the garden and on the lake-shore. He turned him facewards to Himself, and caused his face to shine, and Peter was saved.
We can be regenerated only once, but we can be converted many times. The new life is implanted once for all, and it is everlasting, inextinguishable, and permanent; but those who have been born from above, and are undoubtedly children of God, may, beneath the power of some strong fascination, turn aside, may wander in forbidden paths, may get into such a maze as to be walking in the contrary direction to that on which they started. There may even be times when our desire for God is slackened, our appetite for the Bible is lost, our soul is bound and tied with the cords of sin; at such times, let us bemoan ourselves, our folly and impotence, and cry, "Turn us again, O God, and we shall be turned; for Thou art the Lord our God." He who at first called us to Himself must call us back: He who regenerated, must renew: He who reconciled us to God by his death, must save us by his life. When most dark, and dead, and estranged, cry with Ephraim: "Turn Thou me, and I shall be turned; for Thou art the Lord my God" (Jeremiah 31:18).
