June 16--Where To Find A Fuller Life

At this time of year, the lure of a fuller life calls from every friend's exotic vacation story. Because who doesn't want a bigger, better life?  And one lived in another place can sure sound enticing.  But you can have a fuller life without leaving your hometown.  Today's passages tell how:  1 Kings 16-17, Acts 10:23-48, Psalm 134, Proverbs 17:9.

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Eve reads her Bible journal aloud on this episode.

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Transcript

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June 16 Where to Find a Fuller Life? I won't be reading the scripture references. For those, please check the written post. My college friends were gathering here for a few days together. I'd been getting ready all week and I was eager to see them. This is the group that usually vacations together at the beach, but because of this, that and the other, they were coming here instead. I was overjoyed, that is, until my insecurities multiplied like fruit flies, as I contemplated opening up my home and everything I owned to the scrutiny of six dearly loved friends of more than forty years. I began to regret the hospitality I'd sincerely extended just a few months before. Seeing my home through their eyes, I began noticing that everything looked shabby. How had it happened that what was fine just last week began to yell at me from the walls, floors, and windows? Did I even like this artwork in the guest room? Would this plant cover the worn spot on the table? Were the bedding and towels nice enough? The air filters needed replacing, the windows needed washing. I spent half a day just replacing light bulbs. To check everything off my to do list would have taken me more time than I had to be ready, which was when I realized I had no food to speak of. Looking to myself and my surroundings to make me feel okay about who I am had never worked before, and it certainly wasn't working then. All I could see was what was missing, what needed fixing, what was substandard and below average. I was tempted to call off the whole darn thing. But if I did, I'd have missed the wonder of our gathering, the exchange of love and joy between us, the easy way we connect regardless of place, time or distance. The full life I want with these friends would have to be found at the expense of my pride to appear more together than I really was, and I was struggling to pay it. When I read these passages, they mercifully spoke to me right where I was.

1 Kings 16-17

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The Old Testament chapters are first Kings sixteen to seventeen. Fearing for his life, Elijah needed a quick exit out of town after telling King Ahab that a drought was coming because of his idolatry. God said for Elijah to high tail at east to hide in a ravine, because Ahab and Jezebel, the king and queen of Israel, had a habit of killing bad news bearers. God fed Elijah in the back country where he fled by sending ravens with food, and he drank water from a brook. When the brook dried up, God sent him to Zarephath to a poor widow who would feed him. The woman who took him in was destitute when he got there, with barely enough food to scrape together one last meal before she and her son died. But Elijah told her that the flour and oil she had wouldn't run out before God sent rain and ended the drought, and sure enough they didn't. Her son eventually died while Elijah was living there. Desolate with grief, she asked why he'd come in the first place, quote, barging in and exposing my sins and killing my son, Elijah was silent as he carried the boy upstairs to his room, and Elijah stretched himself over him three times, praying, quote, with all his might, end quote, for God to give him life. And when he did, Elijah took him to his mother, who said that now she knew who Elijah was, a holy man who spoke God's true words. Somehow she missed the clue about Elijah's credentials in the inexhaustible oil and flour. These two stories are set alongside each other in these two chapters, and maybe it's for a reason. While Elijah was terse with Ahab, he was tender with the widow. I'm taking hostessing notes. To Ahab who'd sinned and angered God more than all the kings of Israel put together, Elijah spoke a message of judgment. He didn't mince words when he met with him, and he didn't linger afterwards. As soon as he'd finished delivering God's missive, he scrammed as God commanded him. But to the widow and her son who were planning to eat their last biscuit, Elijah brought life. He provided food that wouldn't run out, and then a full blown resurrection from the dead, and Elijah lived with her rather than hid himself as he did from Ahab. Surely there was something special about this widow to deserve what he gave her, so I look back in my Bible. But she was not extraordinary. When she met Elijah she'd already given up on living. She was ready to eat one last meal and then starve to death with her son. God didn't choose her to feed his prophet because she was wonderfully supplied with food or hospitality or faith for him. She had none. She was hopeless. She was empty. She was needy. Elijah asked her to give to him out of her poverty, even though her poverty was extreme. But this is the person God fills up and uses, the one without resources of her own, so that his glory in supplying her is unmistakably obvious. God's ways aren't our ways. He's not stingy or exacting. He doesn't add up our good and weigh it against our bad and reward us accordingly. He doesn't tiss when it's been a while since he's seen us when we finally come to him. And in the case of feeding this prophet who's on the run for his life, God didn't choose the amply supplied person to do it. He asked the one who literally had nothing. But he took her nothing and filled it up with hope and help and healing. When Elijah asked her to feed him first, she took a step of faith to do what he asked of her, and she was rewarded with more than enough for Elijah, her son, and herself. The key to Elijah's provisioned hideaway in Zarephath wasn't this woman of great faith with a posh Airbnb and a stocked pantry. The key was the God who bountifully supplied her, and he promised to supply her even before she believed it. God gives me what I need when I depend on his word, but he gives me what I need when I don't depend on it too. Like the widow I don't have to believe God perfectly or have just the right attitude for him to bless me. God is often lavish and generous beyond my ability to believe him. Sure, he blesses those who trust him, but he blesses those who struggle too. He even blesses those who hopelessly accuse him, like the widow of Zarephath, like you and I do, because this is the kind of God that he is, and these are the kinds of people he has to work with. When her son died, the widow blamed Elijah and the God who sent him, but her blaming didn't stop God from bringing her son back to life. The key to a faithful, abundant life isn't in me or you to shape up and fly right. The key is our mighty God who is present and forgiving and faithful. Now I'm thinking that nobody will notice the air filters or dirty windows or imperfect furniture if my welcome is warm from a heart that trusts God to be the most essential thing we need, or maybe just from a heart that wants to trust God to be the most essential thing, but doesn't quite yet. Believing that this house party is not all on me leaves me at peace and praising, which is such a better place than where I was when I started today, to find a fuller life, bring your empty knee to God and ask him to fill you. The New Testament

Acts 10:23-48

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passage is Acts ten twenty three to forty eight. Peter met up with Cornelius and his non Jewish friends and brought them the message that God didn't play favorites because salvation was open to anyone who wanted it, as Peter said, quote, It makes no difference who you are or where you're from. If you want God and are ready to do as he says, the door is open, end quote. Peter told them about Jesus' resurrection and how he was an eyewitness along with the rest of the disciples, who were backed by the prophets, and at that moment the Holy Spirit came on the non Jews who were listening and they believed in Jesus, so Peter baptized them. It had to be an astonishing day for Peter because up until then being one of God's people meant you stayed separate from the non Jewish Gentiles who were looked down on. To be a part of Israel, you had to be a Jew or a Jewish convert. But these folks weren't. They simply believed in Jesus when they heard about him. I'm surprised that Peter wasn't a spiritual snob. After all, he was one of the twelve original disciples. He'd spent time one on one with Jesus, but he didn't get bent out of shape that those of other races or places were being welcomed into Jesus' kingdom. He embraced what was happening, and he did it without delay. When Peter saw God's spirit moving among them, he wasn't disdainful, he rejoiced over it, and he was eager to baptize them in the name of Jesus to seal it. How could he refuse if God had already baptized them by his Holy Spirit entering them? No one is excluded from having a relationship with Jesus. No failure, no backstory, no hearsay can keep you from knowing him. The only thing that would exclude you is you not wanting him. If I really believed this, how might I live differently? How might I treat strangers, my neighbors, my enemies? To find a fuller life, extend God's welcome to every person you meet, and find yourself part of his

Psalm 134, Prayer, Proverbs 17:9

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all inclusive fellowship. From Psalm 134. Come bless God is the call of this short and sweet psalm. It's an invitation to quote all you servants of God, end quote, to come and worship, to focus on God and not on anything else. The point of worship isn't to have fellowship with others or to give service to the world or to be preoccupied with what you're wearing while you do it. There's real relief in letting go of the argument you had in the car on the way over or the trouble at the office or whether you like the person sitting in front of you. The point of worship is to give thanks and praise to God for all that He's done with all that you've got. The psalmist points out that even those who stay up all night guarding the temple were encouraged to join in and worship. You can even lay aside important church duties for the time being and get lost in the wonder of worship. God doesn't need our praise and worship. He doesn't need anything at all, come to think of it, but he knows that we need to praise and worship for our own good. God's commands always turn out to be what's best for us. You can't be praising God and thinking about your leaky plumbing, your neighbor's dreadful dog, your prodigal child. You're invited to take time off from all your troubles and bless the one who never stops blessing you. You won't believe how refreshed you'll feel for doing it. To find a fuller life, focus on worshiping God with all that you've got, and watch what He'll do for you. Prayer. God, remembering that you're the essential player, takes all the pressure off, so I can relax and enjoy my life. I'm fullest when I forget myself and focus on you. In Jesus' name, so be it. From Proverbs 17 9. Friendship only survives through forgiveness, fixating on a bottomless bucket of grievances will surely kill it. Passages from 1 Kings, Acts, Psalms, and Proverbs are selected for today in the yearly Bible. This is Eve de Bartleaban, roebuck.