Full & Starving

Matthew 5:6 NKJV

6 Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, For they shall be filled.

Being Empty

2 Kings 4:1–4 NKJV

1 A certain woman of the wives of the sons of the prophets cried out to Elisha, saying, “Your servant my husband is dead, and you know that your servant feared the Lord. And the creditor is coming to take my two sons to be his slaves.” 2 So Elisha said to her, “What shall I do for you? Tell me, what do you have in the house?” And she said, “Your maidservant has nothing in the house but a jar of oil.” 3 Then he said, “Go, borrow vessels from everywhere, from all your neighbors—empty vessels; do not gather just a few. 4 And when you have come in, you shall shut the door behind you and your sons; then pour it into all those vessels, and set aside the full ones.”

Empty - H7386 - empty; fig. worthless

When we feel empty & when we ARE empty and worthless, God wants to supernaturally pour great value into us.

The value of the vessel does not determine value of its contents

e.g. Is your vehicle more valuable than the lives you transport in it?

The contents make the vessel valuable also. - What do you have inside?

No one is so worthless that God won’t fill them and use them gloriously.

Righteousness (working def.) - a position of right-standing & right-relationship with God that is freely given solely through Jesus’s perfect payment for our short-comings and failures.

When we are hungry & thirsty for righteousness God will fill us!

Full & Empty

Have you ever seen or watched the show called “My 600lb Life”?

***This is not at all about fat shaming. I want to share with you something that I learned that was completely counter-intuitive to me & something that has the potential to change our spiritual life and interactions***

This show focuses on the journey and the struggles of people who are close to or over 600 pounds in weight & need a fairly immediate lifestyle change in order to extend their life.

Here’s what I learned that was so counter-intuitive to me:

Many of the people who are the subject of this show are actually malnourished.

We can be consuming a lot & dying from malnourishment at the same time.

University of Florida Division of Cardiovascular Medicine in an August 2020 article quoted:

In fact, a large burden of malnutrition exists in the overweight and obese population because of inadequate micronutrient consumption and poor food quality. The World Health Organization states that worldwide, there are almost 2 billion people who are overweight or obese and 462 million people who are underweight, all of whom are considered malnourished(2).

https://cardiology.medicine.ufl.edu/2020/08/13/malnutrition-in-the-obese-commonly-overlooked-but-with-serious-consequences/

Matthew 5:6 NKJV

6 Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, For they shall be filled.

The blessing isn’t the thirst for righteousness, the blessing is being filled by righteousness.

It’s difficult to be filled with what God wants to pour out when we are already full of something else.

John 4:7–20 NKJV

7 A woman of Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give Me a drink.” 8 For His disciples had gone away into the city to buy food. 9 Then the woman of Samaria said to Him, “How is it that You, being a Jew, ask a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?” For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans. 10 Jesus answered and said to her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, ‘Give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water.” 11 The woman said to Him, “Sir, You have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. Where then do You get that living water? 12 Are You greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well, and drank from it himself, as well as his sons and his livestock?” 13 Jesus answered and said to her, “Whoever drinks of this water will thirst again, 14 but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.” 15 The woman said to Him, “Sir, give me this water, that I may not thirst, nor come here to draw.” 16 Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come here.” 17 The woman answered and said, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You have well said, ‘I have no husband,’ 18 for you have had five husbands, and the one whom you now have is not your husband; in that you spoke truly.” 19 The woman said to Him, “Sir, I perceive that You are a prophet. 20 Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, and you Jews say that in Jerusalem is the place where one ought to worship.”

Sometimes finding empty vessels (causes the oil to continue to pour from our life-vessel) means we have to look past what the vessel is already filled with and see their need.

The woman at the well was full of relationships and still thirsting for & empty of what she really needed.

We don’t need another relationship, another job, another toy, another vacation, etc. to fill us - We need a deep, personal, consistent relationship with Jesus Christ!

Just One Thing:

Feed on and be filled with the right thing.

We can be full of the most decadent things in life and still be empty of the very thing that actually gives us what we need to live.

Discussion Questions:

What’s the creepiest tech out there?

What did you get from hearing about the relationship between the vessel and the contents & how can you apply that to your interactions with people?

Please read Matthew 5:6 & Matthew 13:44 and share how these verses might connect in your mind and what these verses “say” to you.

If you are willing, please share: What are some things that you find yourself being filled with that aren’t the things that bring you the greatest value and life?