Weekly Word Archives

Devotional Series

Fill Me Up Lord!

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Do you ever try to fill your life up with things, yet feel a sense of emptiness in the end? The goal is to maintain a sense of fulfillment and satisfaction over the long-term, and I believe this can be done. How? By being more aware of or sensitive to God.

Think about it for a moment. God tells us in Psalm 139: 17-18 that His precious thoughts for us outnumber the grains of sand. If God’s thoughts for us are more in number than the sand, why are we not aware of them? Why do we view God as distant or uncaring if His thoughts are so abundant, and He is so intimately acquainted with all our ways? Why do we see God involved in everyone else’s life but not our own if He is so caring? Maybe, just maybe, the error is on our end. Maybe, all this time God’s Word really is true, and we’ve failed to experience it due to our lack of awareness to God’s continual, unceasingly precious thoughts toward us.

It’s kind of like the movie, “Love Overboard,” starring Kurt Russell and Goldie Hawn. There is a scene showing Kurt returning home late one night from work. As Kurt steps through the front door, he becomes aware of his surroundings and suddenly realizes how well kept the house is. Goldie Hawn has been showing Kurt her precious thoughts through housekeeping, meal preparation, childcare and so on. Kurt, not previously being sensitive to what was before him, had missed a lot of abundance that had been apparent for a long time. Once he became aware, everything about him changed. He was transformed. Hollywood mirrors real life. How often do we inadvertently distance ourselves and not experience abundance with our loved ones because we are unaware?

If awareness of God makes for a more fulfilling, satisfying life, and God is always extending precious thoughts for us, thoughts that guide, instruct, teach, reveal His love, and comfort, just to name a few, how do we become aware enough to realize it? Romans 1: 20 tells us that God has given man awareness of Himself through creation. So, when the first of the week hits, do we look at Monday as just another day, or do we become alert, sensitive, attentive, and allow Monday to speak to us God’s precious thoughts through His creation of that day and all that day may hold? God gives us awareness of Himself through His Word, Scripture, which became flesh, Jesus. Are we just hearing and reading Sunday sermons filled with words and praying prayers to fill time, or are we alert, attentive, and aware of God communicating to us His precious thoughts? Jesus gives us awareness of Himself through other people. For example, Matthew 25 explains Jesus saying, “When I was hungry, thirsty, and naked, you took care of me.” The question was asked, “How did we take care of you?” Jesus answers, “To the extent that you did it to one of these brothers of Mine, you did it to me.” Are we attentive and aware of God’s precious thoughts toward us when a friend, co-worker, spouse or stranger extends a kindness and we see this as coming form God, or do we think that person as just being nice?

Years ago, a friend handed me a card with a note in it, thanking me for bearing fruit where God had planted me. This was my first experience of awareness of God personally thanking me through an individual. My heart was so immensely touched by God’s precious thoughts for me, that it is my desire to increasingly have that awareness of God as much as possible. The awareness is continually life transforming. My part, of course, is by faith to believe God when He tells me He loves me so much that He is unceasingly thinking about me.

This awareness, communion, or walk with God is like fine art. A person’s first exposure to fine art normally leaves the individual confused, not understanding, and unappreciative of what is before him. The novice’s untrained eyes, ears, and heart are not receptive to what is being communicated through the art; therefore, everything being said is unheard. However, with time, persistence and exposure the foreign becomes life transforming, creating a heart of gratitude and appreciation for the very creator. So it is with our walk with God. It takes time, persistence, and exposure.