Filling the Void

Last night I listened to half of “A soul running on empty”. This morning I finished it.

It’s hitting home hard.

When the sermon finished I sat listening to the emptiness of my headphones, unable to disconnect as even in the silence I could feel the words as they emanated from the ear buds and streamed like electricity into my veins and through my body.

The word of our Lord informs, performs, and transforms.

How simple the message is… we need Christ. We /need/ him. Not a flippant need, but one that defines us. I NEED CHRIST (ok, all caps probably isn’t necessary, but that’s how loudly my heart is screaming it right now). Saying that aloud is like putting my finger on the deepest desire of my heart and identifying the depth of the dissatisfaction in my life until I come to fully understand that need. And not just for me, but for society too as the droning rhythm of our daily lives groans for something more- for something to satisfy. I more fully understand my need for Christ as I more fully understand how we were created, as I more fully understand the law, and as I more fully understand the ways I break that law.

My soul has been running on empty. The tears in my eyes right now will attest to that. Tears not because I better understand how to be fully freed from my addictions, but because of how great AND deep AND wide the Father’s grace is for us. How true and pure His is love for us.

God, only you can satisfy, and only you can free us from a coveting heart. I will stop coveting when I start turning to you for everything, when I admit that I can do nothing alone, but that you can do everything. When I turn to you because you deserve all the glory, honor, and praise. When I “step out of the false center that I think I am, and into the infinite center of life”- which is you.

I turn to you because I admit that I am broken, and you are the only one who can save me. I turn to you, Yeshua, because you are the one who saves. This morning all I desire is to be loved, and this morning you are telling me how much you love me.

I give up and I give in. I am not going to fight this. I surrender to you.

Part of me thinks that Caleb Clemenents listened to this sermon before he wrote “Only You Can Satisfy”, but the other part of me knows that this is a universal message of creation and Christ and therefore Darrell isn’t the only one to stumble upon it’s meaning.

“In all of my life Iʼm searching
For what can be only found in You
Only You can satisfy
Iʼve seen what the world can offer
In all that can sway me I have found
Only You can satisfy, only you can satisfy
To live for Christ, I first must die
To all the rivals in my life
Only You can satisfy
Only You can satisfy
In everything I have in You
I find, You satisfy
In all that now lies forsaken
Nothing can match Your love for me
Only You can satisfy
Forever my heart awakened
To worship the One who sets me free
Only You can satisfy, only You can satisfy
To live for Christ, I first must die
To all the rivals in my life”

To live for Christ, we first must die.

John 12: 23-26
“The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds. The man who loves his life will lose it, while the man who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. Whoever serves me must follow me; and where I am, my servant also will be. My Father will honor the one who serves me.” (not because we are being honored, but because our actions are finally honoring the Father, inviting His honor to fill us, and therefore the real thing is inside of us).

Christ died to defeat the powers once and for all. Today I ask for death so that God may be my “all consuming passion” and defeat the “overcharged desires” within my heart.