Being Filled with God

THIS WEEK was the last week of my junior year of high school! Wow! I know God has been guiding me on this school year for sure. There's no way I could have endured a year of Physics class every day without Him making it possible (He also showed me in books like "The Case for a Creator" by Lee Strobel that physics is very interesting, even if it isn't my thing). I'm grateful for a break.
The same day that the school year ended I left for Texas, and that's where I'm blogging from. It's wonderful here. I've seen a few of God's particularly beautiful sunsets, and I spent yesterday afternoon in a pretty place in the country called Segno. I had so much joy walking into the house there and being surrounded by my loved ones that I hadn't seen for almost a year. I miss the people back in Florida, and I miss my parens who just arrived in Seattle a little while ago to celebrate their 20th anniversary. But I'm having a wonderful time, and I have alot of really cool things to tell you this week.
Have you heard the song "Empty Me" by Chris Sligh? This song was stuck in my head for a while earlier this week, and thus it was for a while my theme song. Look here for the lyrics real quick: http://www.uulyrics.com/music/chris-sligh/song-empty-me/
This week I was working on Chapter Eleven in The Purple Book by Rice Broocks and Steve Murrell (I'm almost finished with the book, which has twelve chapters). This chapter is called "Evangelism & World Missions" and it reminded me of the necessity of a disciple's applying the goals of true discipleship to his life. I like this quote, "If we are Christ's body - His presence in the world today - then Jesus' mission is our mission." This means that as followers of Jesus, the Redeemed of God, we have been given a responsibility alongside our joy of salvation. It is our job to keep His commandments. That's what it means to follow Him.
His commandments include things like loving your neighbor, forgiving people as we would like to be forgiven, seeking and loving God first and foremost, sharing with other people both through our words and actions. I've realized that these commandments are only done when we love God enough to obey. Jesus said in John 14:14-15, "[14] If you ask anything in My name, I will do it. [15] If you love me, keep My commandments." When we love God and obey God then people see Him in us because Jesus is in us. You understand that's not just poetic: it doesn't mean Jesus has influenced our mindsets. It's also not physical: there isn't another whole body of the person of Jesus stored inside our own bodies. It is spiritual: the Spirit of God actually fills us up and empowers us to advance His Kingdom. That's how people see Jesus in us. It's not something that depends on us and how we feel. The only thing it has to do with us is our willingness to obey.
Remember that Chris Sligh song? I suggest you go find it. I've been hearing it on 88.1 (The Promise). "(Chorus) Empty me of the selfishness inside, every vain ambition and the poison of my pride, and any foolish thing my heart holds to. Lord, empty me of me so I can be filled with You!" It makes it hard for people to see Jesus in us when we refuse to submit to His will. This means that we agree to lay down every part of our lives and let it belong to Him. It means we let Him sit "on the throne of our hearts." It means that God is not only our first priority, but He directs all of our priorities.
I've heard it compared to being "transparent," like a window. If we cling to things God doesn't like, the window gets spotted and dirty. I made a 'stained glass' (sort of) art piece this past December which stood for a while in front of a dirty window in the art room at school for several months. So I understand the effects of having a bad window. The light didn't come through well enough to show the picture in an aesthetically pleasing way. The yellow was too dark and the whole thing looked discolored and dirty. Now this piece stays in my house in front of a clean window and I really like how it looks. It's not that the piece is badly painted, it's just that it depends on the quality of light. That's how it is with Jesus. How are people supposed to see His loving, humble, forgiving nature through me if I have an idol or a bad habit stuck to me like dry paint on a window, keeping me from imitating Him?
It is not always an appealing thought to think of clearing oneself of such flaws, just because it seems hard to "empty me of me." But it's very worthwhile if it means I get to be filled with God instead. To be emptied of oneself is what it means in the New Testament when we are instructed to "die to the world." In 1 Corinthians 15:31 Paul writes "I affirm, by the boasting in you which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord, I die daily." It's also what it means when Jesus says to "seek first the kingdom of God" (Matthew 6:33) and to "love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind," (Matthew 22) which He says is the most important commandment of all. All of this means to make yourself willing to lay aside anything, no matter how important, even family, even your job, even the things you look forward to or rely on, for the sake of doing what God want you to do. This does not mean you have to walk down the street with only the clothes on your back and leave everything behind to become a missionary leader in the Middle East. It means that God is so important to you that, like another song says, you can say "all my delight is in You Lord, all of my hope, all of my strength." He is the source of your satisfaction, the love of your life, the very most important thing. Your eyes are set upon him to see what He'll do and what He wants. You desire with all your heart, soul, and mind to please Him and to make sure what you do glorifies Him. You conform all of your ways to what He has said is right. And this is reasonable because, as He's been helping me this week to understand, nobody else could ever love us back and bless us back and make our efforts worthwhile the way He can. Everything God does, He does the way only He can. He can make anything work out, even when it seems overwhelming and impossible. It's our job, as His people, to put our faith and trust in Him, especially in the hard times. That's the kind of person I want to be. Nobody becomes that way in an instant, but He gives us that desire from the moment we give Him control and confess our weakness, our lack of self-sufficency, and accept His gift of salvation through the sacrifice He made in His Son Jesus. That desire for God increases over time: it's a lifelong journey toward spiritual maturity in which our flaws and weaknesses are resolved and mended over time by the Spirit. Jenny White once explained it this way: the Spirit never ridicules us for our flaws, but He points them out to us as a friend points out a smudge on a friend's face. God might call us to quit this or start this, and when we make the decisions, whether small and easy or large and difficult, to obey Him, He will strengthen us and bless us as a reward for our trusting Him that He knows what is best.
I heard a man on the radio (still The Promise) say it this way: He comes and fills us up when we confess our weakness, our inability to save ourselves or make ourselves perfect. God has always wanted us to humble ourselves before Him. After all, much of the Old Testament tells about the anger He feels toward those who lift themselves up and trust in flimsy things instead of humbling themselves and trusting Him. He rewards us for our decision to trust Him instead of ourselves by giving us strength and direction so we can improve. I pray to improve continually all my life. I know enough to know that I don't know nearly everything and I can never will, no matter how many books I read.
In 2 Corinthians 12:8-10 Paul writes something which I think everyone needs to hear, “[8] Concerning this thing I pleaded with the Lord three times that it might depart from me. [9] And He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. [10] Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in needs, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ’s sake. For when I am weak, then I am strong.” He promises to be the source of strength to those who lack it. You see how much joy Paul had after Jesus spoke to him? He had enough joy to face anything, confident that it did not matter what happened to him because he had a source of strength which nobody could take from him.
When I was in Segno yesterday, a beautiful, quiet place with grass and trees and houses built by my family’s hands, I watched my Aunt Jennifer try to help her baby son Elijah understand the best way to fill a toy bucket with water. Elijah had been given a tub of water and things to play with in the water. He stood in the grass with a little blue bucket in his left hand, and he tried to fill it with water by dunking his right hand into the tub and dripping the water into the bucket! You can imagine this was not very effective, but Eli didn’t notice. Aunt Jen took a spongy toy, filled it with water, and used it to fill up the bucket much more quickly. That way makes more sense, right? Elijah watched her and did not complain, but he still wasn’t willing to try it her way. He tried a little more to use the drip technique, and whenever she filled it he just dumped it out – oops! Gravity. He did have fun sucking on the sponge, though.
To me this looks like the way people try to be sufficient for themselves. God’s way is always the best way. Elijah’s attempt to fill the bucket by dripping water into it with his fingers looks like the way we just can’t satisfy ourselves on our own. With absolutely anything you can find in this world, satisfaction is temporary and partial. We always need more, better, smarter, easier, faster, and we can never get enough. Our buckets are never full. When we accept that we are weak and that only God can fill us, we stop dripping water into our buckets. We stop seeking satisfaction in the world. And we let Him fill us up instead so that we’ll be fully satisfied. God has the sponge. It works a lot better than anything this world can offer, and it doesn’t cost money. It costs our decision not to try to do by ourselves what is only possible with God.
One last thing I want to share with you is a poem which my Pre-Calculus instructor James Harper suggested to me. It was written by Admiral Jeremiah Denton, a prisoner of war in North Vietnam who underwent terrible torture and despair but emerged clinging for dear life to his faith in God. It is called "La Pieta," and I found this at http://ironacresnow.blogspot.com/2009/04/he-is-risen.html
"The soldiers stare, then drift away,
Young John finds nothing to say,
The veil is rent; the deed is done;
And Mary holds her only son.
His limbs grow stiff, the night grows cold,
But naught can lose that mother’s hold,
Her gentle, anguished eyes seem blind,
Who knows what thoughts run through her mind?
Perhaps she thinks of last week’s palms,
With cheering thousands off’ring alms
Or dreams of Cana on the day
She nagged him till she got her way.
Her face shows grief but not despair,
Her head though bowed has faith to spare,
For even now she could suppose
His thorns might somehow yield a rose.
Her life with Him was full of signs
That God writes straight with crooked lines.
Dark clouds can hide the rising sun,
And all seem lost, when all be won!"
The last four lines are particularly important. This is what God did for us: He came to the humblest position, though He belongs in the place of highest glory. He was beaten when He ought to have been praised. He was treated as a criminal when He had done nothing wrong. He underwent what we deserve to undergo. He can turn loss into amazing victory, and He can turn chaos into order. He's been doing that since the beginning of the universe, and He is doing it now.