The Restore Point

There's a feature built into most computers called a System Restore Point — a snapshot of your machine taken at a moment when everything was running well. When a virus corrupts your files, or a bad software update sends everything into chaos, you don't have to start over from scratch. You navigate to that restore point, and the system returns to its clean, functional state. The damage is undone. The corruption is reversed.

This is redemption.

The theologian's word for it is apolytrosis — a buying back, a restoration to original condition. When sin entered the human story, it was like a corrupting code spreading through every file, touching every system. Nothing ran the way it was designed. Relationships broke down. Conscience malfunctioned. The image of God in us became obscured.

But God did not wipe the drive and start over. He came Himself, in Christ, to restore the original design. The cross is the restore point built into the fabric of creation before time began. When you come to Jesus in repentance, you aren't just patched or given a workaround. You are restored — not to a lesser version of yourself, but to the person God intended when He first formed you.

Whatever corruption has accumulated in your story, there is a restore point waiting. His name is Jesus, and His work is complete.