John 14:6 Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.
Living as a believer means taking up your cross. Your cross is the burden of living your life in such a way as to bring glory to the Father. It means forsaking the ways of the world and that can be sometimes frightening and exhilarating all at the same time. There will be days when there is a longing in your spirit to get more of the Holy Spirit and there will be days when it’s more than you can bear. It’s a complexity that is hard to describe and this is why, for the most part, religion sells you on the peace and the joy and forgets to mention the suffering. Let me tell you there will be suffering. But living your life in Christ is worth it.
When I started this series of blogs my point was to show that we were all cracked when left to our own devices. We had areas of our lives that needed to be fixed and patched up. That fix can only come from allowing ourselves to be broken by God Himself. You see, to live a kingdom life, a life set apart, you must be crucified for there to be a resurrection. Oh! How I wish I could tell you that it’s easy but I can’t. How I wish I could tell you that it won’t hurt but it does. It will never be as bad as what Christ went through, but I’m telling you that it will be as bad as Christ went through to our hearts and minds. For to live this kingdom life means we have to let go of everything we’ve been taught and learn a new way. A love way and exposing ourselves to love means great gain and great pain. I wish it weren’t so but anyone whose been hurt in love catches a small glimpse into what I am talking about.
A cracked vessel can hold no water. In the bible water represents the Holy Spirit and Jesus was clear that if we believed in him that out of our hearts would flow rivers of living water.
John 7:38 He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.” 39 But this He spoke concerning the Spirit, whom those believing in Him would receive; for the Holy Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.
What a blessing we have to live in these days beyond the cross to have a far greater reward of the Holy Spirit indwelling daily. Yet, we get to the end of this series and we see that although our teachers had tried, Jesus had tried, our cracked vessels could not contain the Holy Spirit for any length of time to be effective on the earth. So the abundant life that has been promised hasn’t yet manifested because we could not contain it in our current condition. YET being the key word to hang onto.
Choose life today and choose to allow the breaking of your thought process to bring you to a higher level of consciousness than you could have ever thought possible. It will be in that process that you will find abundant life. Did you know that the mind is at least as powerful as medicine? Yes, if you can change your mind to speak health, you will see it manifest itself in your life. As a man thinks in heart so is he. Proverbs 23:7. If you can get with like-minded thinkers/believers you can be even more powerful. It’s called the power of agreement and it works both for good and for evil so watch your associations.
Abundant life means life the way God would have you live it. It may mean that you trade in that corner office and the BMW for a missionary post in a third world country but I promise you that if that was your original purpose you will be beyond happy.
Choose life today. Allow the potter to remake the vessel so that it can contain so much of the Holy Spirit that it changes every single thing in your life and the lives of those you come in contact with.
Pastor Susan 