There is hope. There is
light. There is a way to satisfy that longing.
Yesterday I said that you are a spirit, you have a soul (mind,
will, emotions), and that you live in a body. If you want to
learn more about that, check out my book Live & Walk in
the Spirit: Trichotomy (link)
for further explanation. But the ultimate conclusion we came to
is that we can't satisfy just our body or satiate just our soul.
We have to take care of who we really are - we have
to take care of our spirit. But there's a problem:
We can't do it alone
As much as we want to do it ourselves,
as much as we try and try and try, we can't do it alone. We
can't "complete" or satisfy our spirit all alone. When we make
that attempt, it either doesn't last long or fails outright.
Why? Because it's completely foreign to us. We're stuck in this
body on this planet and our soul is so easily influenced by so
many things in this material world. So how we do we finally
become whole? Where do we find hope? Where do we find light to
bring us out of the darkness?
Friend, you may have tried all kinds of things. You may have
tried them in different ways over and over and over again. "I've
finally got it!" you think... but then it slips through
your fingers. It wavers. It comes and goes. It fails completely.
When we look to those "things" or when we look to other people
or when we look to ourselves, we're going to get let down. And
we're going to get let down for as long as we
continue to look down - for as long as we're looking
to this world and the things in it. Some of you may not want to
hear it and some of you may want to reject it outright, but it's
the truth. I don't care how corny it sounds.
We have to look up.
There is hope. There is
light. There is a way to satisfy that longing.
Jesus is our hope (1 Timothy 1:1,
Colossians 1:27). Biblical hope isn't wishing. It's not some
abstract thing. Biblical hope - by definition of the original
Greek text (Strong's Greek 1680) - is confident expectation. It
is expectation of what is sure. Jesus is our hope (expectation)
of God's glory (God's manifested works). God is not a man that
He should lie (Numbers 23:19). What He has said, He will do
(Isaiah 46:11). All of His promises are "yes" and they will be
done in Jesus (2 Corinthians 1:20). We can count on God to
fulfill His Word and His promises through Jesus. We can always
look to Jesus, expecting Him to fulfill God's promises to
us. But we have to know what those promises are.
Jesus is our light - He is the light (John 8:12). In
Him is life and that life is our light
(Psalm 27:1, John 1:4). Without Jesus, all we have is
darkness. Sure - we catch glimpses of light every once in
a while. But that's Him showing us His goodness through other
people. That's Jesus showing us a pathway to Him. We have to be
brave enough to to take that step - to walk in His direction. We
have to be confident enough to follow Him to stay in His light.
We have to be trusting enough to accept Him as Lord so that His
life - that His light - would live inside of us.
Only Jesus can fill that "missing piece," because He is the One
Who fills all in all (Ephesians 1:23). You were created in God's
own image (Genesis 1:26-27). God is spirit (John 4:24). And if He
made you in His image as a spirit being, the
who else could you possible turn to for help? Where else could
you possibly go to find that missing piece? What else could even
remotely have a chance at filling that void inside of you? I'm
telling you now. There is no one else. There is no
where else to look. There is nothing else
that can complete you.
Maybe you've accepted Jesus as Lord. But maybe you still have that longing inside of you. Maybe you still feel like something's missing. Be honest with yourself. Have you made Jesus your all in all? Have you turned to Him for everything? Do you trust Him in all things?
Whether you've accepted Jesus as Lord or not, I would challenge you to get to know Him more. I would challenge you to trust Him like never before. Ultimately, I would challenge you to allow Him to complete you. I triple-dog-dare you.