What is the difference between erase and restore on Disk Utilily Mac?

Got a bit of vocabulary confusion. I want to re-format an external hard drive. But I'm not sure what the difference is between restore or erase. Does erase, removes all files. or not. I don't want to lose the files. But I'm in a position that can't allow me to back up the entire Volume, for lack of storage. SSDs are on the way, ETA 1 week. I found this answer online but can't be sure of its correctness. https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3111247?answerId=32268374022#32268374022 What I generally do to re-activate a hard drive that could be stuck on a task. Is the following on terminal:

aux | grep fsck

kill -9 [task number]

but this solution does not format. or enable journaling. And, it limits the result by removing the drive's capability to re-write. Forcing me to apply: **Disk Utility>First Aid** (so far, sometimes it takes long, others *very long*). I feel like I'm asking many questions here. **But I simply wish to know if erase or restore will enable journaling without losing all your data** (if **Disk Utility** can do this from their GUI would be a lifesaver). But I'm willing to learn other solutions in the terminal as to how I found out:

aux | grep fsck

Thanks in advance