May God, the source of hope, fill you with all joy and peace by means of your faith in him, so that your hope will continue to grow by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Romans 15:13
Dearly Beloved,
Greetings in the Name of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ!
What, or who, fills you?
What occupies your live? What drives you? What gives you meaning, or the impulse, to live the way you do, to strive for the things you strive for?
As a church last weekend, we experienced being filled in many ways.
Praise the Lord! We saw our church filled with people during an evangelistic rally. From all walks of life, and across the ages, there were people filling our Sanctuary and our lower level fellowship hall. Throughout the event, we prayed that we would all be filled with the gospel of Jesus Christ.
And we praise God too, as we had our lives filled with fellowship and food during our annual Church picnic the following Sunday morning.
To God be the glory!
As human beings, and as a community, we are designed with the inherent desire to be filled.
Now, in of itself, it is really a good thing; however, it is only as good as that which fills us.
If we long for the worldly, we will be filled with the worldly; along with all the accouterments of attaining the worldly – greed, envy, lust, and the like.
As Christians, we know to stay away from such ‘worldliness’, for even the words of Christ rings in our hearts to ‘store up for yourself treasures in heaven’ (Matthew 6:19).
So, as Christian, we divert our attention to all things ‘godly’.
Our noble idea is that if we long for the ‘godly’, we will be filled with the ‘godly’; along with all the accouterments of attaining the godly – discipline, restraint, positivity, and the like.
However, is ‘godliness’ enough?
Here, we have to be very careful, least we pursue the ideals of godliness apart from God.
Godliness – of this form – is pretentious, and is rooted in worldliness; for the intent is self-serving, and motivated by success that is separate from the purposes of God.
Jesus speaks to the evil of such ‘godly’ pretenses - which is really ‘worldliness’ that leads to death and wickedness - in Matthew 23:27, "Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of the bones of the dead and everything unclean.”
Here’s the deal - because of our inherent brokenness and sinfulness, whatever and whenever we fill ourselves, we fill ourselves with ‘bones of the dead and everything unclean’
From emptiness can come only more emptiness.
From brokenness can come only more brokenness.
From death can come only more death.
It is never about what we can fill ourselves with; it is really a question of who fills us.
What we need is life, and only from the very source of life may we attain that which we truly need.
And it is to this Christ speaks to us.
“Everyone who drinks some of this water will be thirsty again. But whoever drinks some of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again, but the water that I will give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up to eternal life.” (John 4:13-14)
Christ must fill us. And He will – He promises to, if only we let Him.
The Apostle Paul cuts through all the riff-raff of the insatiable and inconsequential human desire to be ‘filled’ in this exhortation,
“May God, the source of hope, fill you with all joy and peace…”
In our quest to be filled, do we long to be filled by God? Or do we fill ourselves?
After a while, it becomes clear that all efforts to fill ourselves are futile and fruitless.
Only when we are filled by God, would we begin experience any semblance of life as it was meant to be – full (John 10:10).
Has God filled your heart lately?
Does God fill your mind? Does God fill your spirit?
Do you give yourself much need reprieve and respite from life, to allow God to fill you?
Do you complain of your lack of energy or zeal for life? Are you mindless in your life’s sojourn or disillusioned with life itself?
Stop trying to fill yourself.
May God, the source of hope, fill you.
Shalom.
Let us pray.
Our dear heavenly Father,
Hallowed be Your Name. Your Kingdom come, on earth, as it is in heaven.
Forgive us for giving into the notion and fallacy of self-fulfillment.
Forgive us for believing that apart from You, we can accomplish life itself.
We acknowledge that apart from You, we can do nothing, and we are certainly, nothing.
We reject the worldly that we have strived so hard to achieve in recognizing that all that we have attained is inconsequential and superfluous – in the reality of the eternal life that is given to us through Your Son, Jesus Christ.
Only You can fill us, for only You can bestow upon us our daily bread.
Today, we resolve to only store up for ourselves things of heaven. And in that, we now know that only You can bless us with that heavenly gift.
May we drink deeply from the water that only Jesus can give, and allowing the Holy Spirit to become in us a fountain of water springing up to eternal life.
On our own, our efforts to fill ourselves are vain and futile; and we live in emptiness, brokenness and death. But with Your infilling, we become filled with the source of all life.
And we fully believe, that You, our God - our source of hope - will fill us with all joy and peace by means of our faith in You, so that our hope will continue to grow by the power of the Holy Spirit.
We thank you and pray all these in the Name of our Lord and Sole Provider, Jesus Christ. Amen.
Romans 15:13
Dearly Beloved,
Greetings in the Name of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ!
What, or who, fills you?
What occupies your live? What drives you? What gives you meaning, or the impulse, to live the way you do, to strive for the things you strive for?
As a church last weekend, we experienced being filled in many ways.
Praise the Lord! We saw our church filled with people during an evangelistic rally. From all walks of life, and across the ages, there were people filling our Sanctuary and our lower level fellowship hall. Throughout the event, we prayed that we would all be filled with the gospel of Jesus Christ.
And we praise God too, as we had our lives filled with fellowship and food during our annual Church picnic the following Sunday morning.
To God be the glory!
As human beings, and as a community, we are designed with the inherent desire to be filled.
Now, in of itself, it is really a good thing; however, it is only as good as that which fills us.
If we long for the worldly, we will be filled with the worldly; along with all the accouterments of attaining the worldly – greed, envy, lust, and the like.
As Christians, we know to stay away from such ‘worldliness’, for even the words of Christ rings in our hearts to ‘store up for yourself treasures in heaven’ (Matthew 6:19).
So, as Christian, we divert our attention to all things ‘godly’.
Our noble idea is that if we long for the ‘godly’, we will be filled with the ‘godly’; along with all the accouterments of attaining the godly – discipline, restraint, positivity, and the like.
However, is ‘godliness’ enough?
Here, we have to be very careful, least we pursue the ideals of godliness apart from God.
Godliness – of this form – is pretentious, and is rooted in worldliness; for the intent is self-serving, and motivated by success that is separate from the purposes of God.
Jesus speaks to the evil of such ‘godly’ pretenses - which is really ‘worldliness’ that leads to death and wickedness - in Matthew 23:27, "Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of the bones of the dead and everything unclean.”
Here’s the deal - because of our inherent brokenness and sinfulness, whatever and whenever we fill ourselves, we fill ourselves with ‘bones of the dead and everything unclean’
From emptiness can come only more emptiness.
From brokenness can come only more brokenness.
From death can come only more death.
It is never about what we can fill ourselves with; it is really a question of who fills us.
What we need is life, and only from the very source of life may we attain that which we truly need.
And it is to this Christ speaks to us.
“Everyone who drinks some of this water will be thirsty again. But whoever drinks some of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again, but the water that I will give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up to eternal life.” (John 4:13-14)
Christ must fill us. And He will – He promises to, if only we let Him.
The Apostle Paul cuts through all the riff-raff of the insatiable and inconsequential human desire to be ‘filled’ in this exhortation,
“May God, the source of hope, fill you with all joy and peace…”
In our quest to be filled, do we long to be filled by God? Or do we fill ourselves?
After a while, it becomes clear that all efforts to fill ourselves are futile and fruitless.
Only when we are filled by God, would we begin experience any semblance of life as it was meant to be – full (John 10:10).
Has God filled your heart lately?
Does God fill your mind? Does God fill your spirit?
Do you give yourself much need reprieve and respite from life, to allow God to fill you?
Do you complain of your lack of energy or zeal for life? Are you mindless in your life’s sojourn or disillusioned with life itself?
Stop trying to fill yourself.
May God, the source of hope, fill you.
Shalom.
Let us pray.
Our dear heavenly Father,
Hallowed be Your Name. Your Kingdom come, on earth, as it is in heaven.
Forgive us for giving into the notion and fallacy of self-fulfillment.
Forgive us for believing that apart from You, we can accomplish life itself.
We acknowledge that apart from You, we can do nothing, and we are certainly, nothing.
We reject the worldly that we have strived so hard to achieve in recognizing that all that we have attained is inconsequential and superfluous – in the reality of the eternal life that is given to us through Your Son, Jesus Christ.
Only You can fill us, for only You can bestow upon us our daily bread.
Today, we resolve to only store up for ourselves things of heaven. And in that, we now know that only You can bless us with that heavenly gift.
May we drink deeply from the water that only Jesus can give, and allowing the Holy Spirit to become in us a fountain of water springing up to eternal life.
On our own, our efforts to fill ourselves are vain and futile; and we live in emptiness, brokenness and death. But with Your infilling, we become filled with the source of all life.
And we fully believe, that You, our God - our source of hope - will fill us with all joy and peace by means of our faith in You, so that our hope will continue to grow by the power of the Holy Spirit.
We thank you and pray all these in the Name of our Lord and Sole Provider, Jesus Christ. Amen.