Living Life To The Full

Originally posted on 2/13/09

Besides the usual ministry, God is really teaching me about Him. I'm realizing I don't really know what it looks like to rely fully on Him and as I've been praying about it He has been giving me opportunities to practice it. Don't you hate that? Not only has He begun to teach me about that but He gave me a huge wake-up call. Tomorrow isn't guaranteed. The rest of today isn't even guaranteed. Honestly, we don't deserve it. It's a blessing from God and an opportunity to bring Him glory. It's not for any other reason than His glory. Am I making the most of every opportunity? Are you? I think it's a question we all need to be asking ourselves daily, sometimes even moment by moment. We're not here for our glory, needs, desires, any of that. We simply exist to bring glory to God. How are we doing that? If something happened today would you look back, even just on the day, and see God's glory and His kingdom here on this earth or would you look back and see another "normal" day gone by.

"The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life and have it to the full." – John 10:10

I don't know if you realize it but it's something God has made clear to me, this is happening ALL around us. The thief is stealing, killing, and destroying. And instead of having life to the full, we have allowed Satan to continue doing these things as we consider it "normal" life. Satan has stolen joy, killed our passion, and is destroying lives, families, communities, and nations! When do we really begin to take this verse to heart and run with it? When do we begin living out Isaiah 61?

"The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners... to comfort all who mourn, and provide for those who grieve in Zion- to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair."
Verses 1-3

God calls us to live life to the full and gives us an applicable way to do that, it's Isaiah 61:1-3. He has warned us of the things that Satan will try to do but promises life in Him. That "full" life is going to look differently for everyone but I fully believe that those few verses should be a huge part of it. However, living life to the full doesn't exempt us from harm, by any means. It's actually quite the opposite: "If you suffer for doing good and you endure it, this is commendable before God. To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps" 1 Peter 2:20-21. We are going to suffer; it doesn't say if you suffer. It says if you suffer and endure. The suffering will come, the test is the endurance. I'm beginning to believe that if we can't trace any sort of suffering (physically, emotionally, mentally, relationally, etc.) to our lives than there is a problem. Suffering is an attack from Satan because He knows the power that lies within us that at the mere mention of Christ's name demons shudder. Satan attacks us when he knows we are progressing the Kingdom.

I'm continuing to seek out what this "full" life looks like and God is slowly revealing to me different aspects of it. I'm being shown repeatedly that full doesn't equal easy. But I've found hope in Deuteronomy 31:6 which says, "Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified because of them, for the Lord your God does with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you." There will always be "them" in our lives. There will always be something that we can choose to live in fear about but God promises that He is with us and will not leave our side. He gives us a reason to live outside of that fear, and that reason is Him. I hope that this week you will cling to these verses the way God is teaching me to. Find hope in His promises, which is where the "rejoicing in suffering" Paul talks about in Romans comes to exist. It's not necessarily in rejoicing that you are suffering but rejoicing that in Christ there is hope and victory through the suffering.

"But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ."
-1 Corinithians 15:57