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Shine on us

Week 1 · Sunday · Psalm 80: Restore Us, Let Your Face Shine

Advent begins with a prayer from a people who felt far from God. Three times they ask him to restore them and let his face shine, and you can ask it too, as simply as they did.

verse 1Hear us, O Shepherd of Israel, who leads Joseph like a flock; You who sit enthroned between the cherubim, shine forth verse 2before Ephraim, Benjamin, and Manasseh. Rally Your mighty power and come to save us. verse 3Restore us, O God, and cause Your face to shine upon us, that we may be saved.
Psalm 80:1–3BSB
Restore us, O LORD God of Hosts; cause Your face to shine upon us, that we may be saved.
Psalm 80:19BSB

How this psalm points to Jesus

A theme the whole Bible completes in Christ · verse 17

The psalm prays for the one at God's right hand, the son of man God raised up for himself. Christians hear that prayer answered in Jesus, who called himself the Son of Man, and in whose face the light of God's glory shines.

“I am,” said Jesus, “and you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of Power and coming with the clouds of heaven.”
Mark 14:62BSB
For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” made His light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
2 Corinthians 4:6BSB

Optional. Kept only on this device, and never counted.

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