I’ve always loved looking at the book of Psalms. It’s filled with real, honest and at times gut-wrenching thoughts poured out of a broken heart. We all too often paint a rosy picture of followers of Jesus having it all together and not facing struggles in life. Or if we do see them struggle we assume they have some super human force that allows them to easily conquer their troubles. But what if that’s exactly what we’re supposed to think? What if we’re supposed to think that a good follower of God will be able to leap small buildings with a single jump?

One of my favorites Psalms lately is Psalm 51, especially verses 10-12. Here it is if you’re not familiar.

Create in me a clean heart, O God,
    and renew a right spirit within me.
 Cast me not away from your presence,
    and take not your Holy Spirit from me.
 Restore to me the joy of your salvation,
    and uphold me with a willing spirit.

Now that whole thing is pretty powerful but I want to just look at the second to last line. Restore to me the joy of your salvation. Look at those words one more time. Restore the joy. I always thought that the devil wanted to try to take away my salvation. I just assumed that he wanted to get me to give up on God. But after reading this part of the Psalm, I don’t think that’s the case anymore. I really don’t think he’s in the business of messing with our salvation at all, because he knows there’s nothing he can do about it.

If not, then what’s he really interested then? In a word, the devil wants your  joy. He wants to zap you of any enjoyment in life. He wants to take  away the zeal, the passion in your daily walk through life. He wants you to be ambivalent at best about everything in life. He’s not interested in making you fall. He knows he can’t mess with your salvation, because he can’t undo what Jesus did for you. But what he can do is make you not care about it anymore. When Satan starts messing with your joy he’s trying to put you in a place where life is a chore.

You see while the devil can’t mess with your salvation, he knows that if he makes you not care anymore you’ll give up on God all by yourself! Don’t believe me? Take a look at your marriage, or other relationship for a second. When you stop caring, when life is no longer happy our first inclination is to just walk away. It’s what people mean when they say we fell out of love. No you didn’t you lost the joy in your relationship. You became lukewarm in your love for each other.

God tells us in Revelation that he isn’t interested in lukewarm. Lukewarm is gross! I mean seriously – I like a tall glass of ice-cold water. I’ll even drink a nice hot beverage, but a lukewarm glass of just about anything isn’t all that appealing. Satan is trying to make you see the stuff of God as less appealing. He’s trying to lead you to a place where you just don’t care anymore, because he knows that when you stop caring you’ll give up on your own.

So our prayer today, and everyday for that matter, should be restore my joy – protect my joy – keep me alive and on fire for you. So what is it that feeds your joy in the LORD? What is it that drives your passion? What is it in life that truly gets you excited? Now pair that with the undeniable love of God for you and you become a force to be reckoned with.

For the joy of the LORD is my strength. Nehemiah 8:10