God does promise to restore the fruits of our wasted  years by our repentance and His magnanimous grace. The locusts did NOT eat our years, the locusts ate the fruit of our years. “I will restore to you the years that the locust hath eaten.” Joel 2:25. May this truth not be a stranger to those who are filled with regret.  The years we waste on selfish pleasures can never be restored. The clock keeps ticking, we work, age, and die and the time alotted to us; once passed is gone forever.  A rain cloud once emptied, does not refill. The river that rushed onward to the sea cannot roll back to whence it came.  Our years  once gone can never be restored to us, but the trumpet has not sounded yet, and fresh fruit is just one season ahead. May the seed of greater grace bloom in every willing heart.

Our good, good Father  promises to restore the potential fruit yet to bloom. God earnestly desires to restore the lost blessings of  the unripened fruit of His Spirit.  Our regrets can instantly MORF from  mourning to rejoicing. Our wasted years may yet be restored by our humble repentance. It is a pity that they were locust-eaten by our folly and negligence, but be not hopeless concerning them. All things are possible to him that believeth in God at His Word. Have faith in His power which is beyond all things as He can work great marvels with those who yield. No man can make the locust restore what it devoured. No artificial intellect can recover what has been utterly destroyed. God alone can do what seems impossible. The promise of His grace is poured out upon His repentant people. 

God can produce a larger harvest than a neglected land could naturally yield.   He is the Promise Keeper that gives us greater grace in our present trials. Whatever has been painfully festering can be healed, blessed and useful to His praise and glory. It is a great mystery but Jehovah is a God of wonders and in the kingdom of His grace miracles are common things. To the empty soul who has done nothing for God, the prospect of recovering the wreckage of a wasted life, bursts with hope.   An unrepentant heart is mostly full of self sufficiency and unbelief.  Yet the King holds out His sceptor of grace to all.  All are quickly restored by a humble cry for help direct to His mercy seat. The truth is that without Christ in us, a soul remains empty and unfulfilled.  Regardless of how many years passed in the horrible state of pride or selfishness, there is hope. God persistently pursues the discontented, the hoarders of things, the wretched, distracted, the self deceived. He is slow to anger and most gracious with all of us. All Hope is found in the resurrecting blood of Jesus. Even if our number of selfish years reached 20, 30, 40, or 50 — we still can be useful to God’s kingdom. Our many grace empty years can be changed by our Waymaking, Miracle working Father. Our Father looks upon us with compassion as He waits for our happy surrender.  Being a slave to the many lusts of the flesh, many have hard worked, ploughed, sowed and watched their crops pile up and rot. Their years of toil and striving yielding zip lasting contentment.  For the yoke of the world is NOT easy and its burden is NOT light.

In the end, we look back and weep as nothing everlasting comes of our own efforts.  Bitterness grinds away any fleeting joy. One does not mind working where there is good reward for it but to plough and sow and then to reap nothing is misery. The wage sweetens the toil but when the wage is death the toil is horrible. The way of unregenerate souls is to spend years in rebelling and resisting any help from God. Under the pressure to compete, a strong desire to do more weakens as the dream perishes. Many labor in vain as their toil leaves them utterly disappointed. Easily charmed by the father of all lies, the prospect of contentment is never reached. 

A little more but the heart remains discontent. The student must know a little more. The ambitious must climb a little higher upon the ladder of honour. After reaching fame, it fades rapidly and the ease is still as distant as ever. The world’s cups are insatiable as craving more continues. A striving after the wind with a million in bank at death. All accumulated but  made no everlasting use of it whatsoever. The ungodly have zero faith in Christ. They will hoard all kinds of treasures and trash and hide them in a hole. The misers, what can be the difference between a 1,000 dollars or a 1,000 doo dads, since they use neither? Alas, many have the power to get but do not have the faculty to use what they have gotten wisely. Any fruit is eaten by the pesty locust. Souls travel to and fro, globe trotting for treasures on earth.  Like clouds without rain, wells without water, created by God, but vacant and wanting more.   Respectable, quiet souls that soak in much like a sponge get squeezed by the harshness of daily life. Dry spiritual bones ache for purpose.  Without the water of the Holy Spirit souls harden and break.  God is not glorified by unsealed,  broken hearts. Holy mercy is never extended. What an awful legacy for a soul to have lived to be 65 all for self glorification.  God does not spare a fruitless tree which year after year has brought forth nothing. God’s verdict to cut it down by a swift blow of the axe, is just because we trusted Him not.

Respond to God’s grace and confess your sin. Submit your whole body, mind, soul to God and He will restore the years which the locusts have eaten.  Hear His call, His faithful, marvelous promise.  God’s Word encourages us to live a life on earth that blesses others. We are to enjoy pleasures, both in the context of earthly enjoyment and spiritual fulfillment. To enjoy a balance of both the JOYS and GIFTS, our Father warns us about being  distracted from our relationship with Him. The spiritual fulfillment that comes in our, learned glad obedience, is our double portion. Ecclesiastes 3:12-13 “I know that there is nothing better for people than to be HAPPY and to do GOOD while they live. That each of them may eat and drink, and find lasting SATISFACTION in all their toil—this is the GIFT of God.” Psalm 104:14-15: “HE makes grass grow for the cattle, and plants for people to cultivate—bringing forth FOOD from the earth: WINE that gladdens human hearts, OIL to make their faces shine, and BREAD that sustains their hearts.”

Proverbs 5:18-19: “May your fountain be blessed, and may you rejoice in the wife of your youth. A loving doe, a graceful deer.” Song of Solomon, is a book that celebrates love and desire in a poetic form, emphasizing the beauty and joy found in marriage intimacy. John 10:10: “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.”

Psalm 16:11: “You make known to me the path of life; YOU will fill me with joy in YOUR presence, with eternal pleasures at YOUR right hand.” Philippians 4:4: “Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!”

Psalm 37:4: “Take delight in the LORD, and HE will give you the desires of your heart.” ❤️ A NORMAL DAY of followers edifying one another. Acts 2:46-47: “Every day they continued to MEET TOGETHER in the temple courts. They broke BREAD in their HOMES and ate together with GLAD and sincere hearts, PRAISING God and enjoying the FAVOR of all the people.”

God also provides warnings about the dangers of excessive indulgence and the pursuit of pleasures that lead away from God.  Proverbs 21:17: “Whoever loves pleasure will become poor; whoever loves wine and olive oil will never be rich.” 1 John 2:15-17: “Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, love for the Father is not in them.”

Based on a sermon dated May the 30, 1886, by C. H. Spurgeon.