He Restores My Soul: What Does That Really Mean?

After our Leadership Summit this May, when our team chose He Restores My Soul as the theme for our 2027 retreat, I came home and began praying slowly through Psalm 23. I found myself reading it over and over again, lingering on familiar words that I’ve known for years, and asking the Lord to help me see them with fresh eyes. As I did, I kept coming back to one simple question.

What does it actually mean that He restores my soul?

If I’m honest, there have been seasons in my own grief when those words felt almost impossible to reconcile with my reality, because my circumstances hadn’t been restored. Paige was still gone. The nursery we had dreamed about never became what we imagined it would be. Year after year her birthday came and went, and I still found myself wondering what she would look like, what her laugh would sound like, what kind of big sister she would have been, and what our family would look like today if she had lived. The older I become, the older she should be too, and there are still moments when the ache of all that never was catches me completely off guard.

Maybe you’ve felt that tension too. When you’ve buried your baby, the word restore can almost feel confusing. We know this side of heaven our babies aren’t coming back. We know there are parts of our story that won’t be made whole until Christ returns and makes all things new. We know there are empty places that will remain empty for a little while longer. So when David writes, “He restores my soul,” what exactly is he inviting us to believe?

The more I’ve sat with Psalm 23, the more I’ve become convinced that David isn’t saying God restores every circumstance. Instead, he’s pointing us to something even more beautiful. Our Good Shepherd faithfully restores us. He doesn’t ask us to forget our babies. He doesn’t remove every question or wipe away every tear, and He doesn’t pretend the valley isn’t real. Instead, He walks into the valley with us, and little by little, day by day, year after year, He begins restoring the places in our hearts that grief has worn thin.

As I look back over the last sixteen years, I can see His gentle work in ways I couldn’t have recognized while I was in the middle of those early days of grief. He didn’t make me the woman I was before Paige died. That woman no longer exists. Grief changed me. Becoming Paige’s mom changed me. Following Jesus through unimaginable sorrow has changed me. But somewhere along the way, I began to notice that while He hadn’t restored my old life, He was faithfully restoring my heart.

He restored hope when sorrow had nearly drained it away. He restored trust after loss shook everything I thought I knew about God and about the way life was supposed to unfold. He restored strength when I was exhausted from carrying what no mother should ever have to carry. He restored peace when fear and anxiety threatened to become louder than His promises. He restored joy too, not the carefree joy I knew before grief, but a deeper joy rooted in His unchanging character instead of my changing circumstances. But perhaps what has surprised me most is the way He has slowly restored my vision.

Grief has a way of fixing our eyes on what we’ve lost. How could it not? We miss our babies. We miss the birthdays that never happened, the bedtime stories we never got to read, the family pictures that will always have someone missing. Loss naturally draws our eyes backward toward everything we long for. And Jesus, in His gentleness, doesn’t shame us for looking there. Instead, He patiently lifts our eyes again and again toward what can never be taken away. He reminds us of His presence when we feel alone, of His faithfulness when our hearts are afraid, of His promises when our circumstances tempt us to despair, and most of all, He reminds us of Himself.

I think that’s why I love the wording David chooses in Psalm 23. He doesn’t write, “He restored my soul,” as though restoration were a single event that happened once and was finished forever. The picture David paints is of a Shepherd who continually cares for His sheep. He continually leads, provides, comforts, and restores. The Shepherd never grows weary of caring for the sheep He loves and that gives me so much hope because, if I’m honest, I still need Him to restore my soul. I need Him today, I’ll need Him tomorrow, I’ll need Him next year, and I imagine you do too.

That is one of the reasons I am so excited about our 2027 Hope Mommies Retreat. For one weekend, we’re going to slow down together and linger in Psalm 23. We’ll remember our babies because their lives matter, we’ll make space for lament because the valley is real, we’ll worship because our Shepherd is worthy, and together we’ll keep lifting our eyes to the One who has faithfully cared for us every step of the way, and who is still, even now, restoring weary souls.

My prayer isn’t simply that every woman leaves encouraged, although I certainly hope she does. My prayer is that every woman leaves knowing Jesus more deeply than when she arrived. I pray she’ll return home more convinced than ever that He has never abandoned her, never forgotten her precious child, and never stopped His gentle work of restoring her weary soul.

Interested in joining us the 2027 Retreat?  Learn More and Register Here

Jennie is the Executive Director for Hope Mommies. She and her husband Brian live in Oregon and have four children together— Trenton, Paige who has been in Heaven with Jesus since 2010, Mason, and Cora. If you were to knock on her front door today, you’d find her in something comfortable drinking a hot cup of tea, while trying to figure out how to balance all the things that make up a life. She enjoys spending time in God’s word, fresh flowers, board games with her kids, cooking, and evening walks in her neighborhood. She adores being a new creation in Christ and prays she reflects Him well on this earth.