What is your position now?

A theme statement is basically the main point.  I read something over and over and over and pray about it to get this.  I definitely encourage you try this for any chapter or book in the bible for astonishing clarity.

My theme statement for psalm 1:

A believer is someone who meditates on being nourished by Christ and bears fruit in due season, while the wicked are not firmly planted but destroyed from lack of a life giving source. 

Nourish me Lord, please.

I really don't feel like doing anything, I feel like crap.  I feel unable to organize my thoughts, mad at myself for falling short of pleasing You.  I feel tired, my eyes burn and I have a heady feeling like a headache and frustration mixed together waiting to feel terribly overwhelmed.

I don't feel motivated Lord, but I want to be nourished.  Please help me get up spiritually.  

Please help me get up spiritually. 

Feed me your life giving river of living waters! 

“Master,” Simon replied, “we’ve worked hard all night long and caught nothing! But at Your word, I’ll let down the nets.” (In other words, I've worked this out and I know what will happen, but if You say so I'll do it anyway....!!) 

When Simon Peter saw this(all the fish they caught that even their boat began capsizing!), he fell at Jesus’ knees and said, “Go away from me, because I’m a sinful man, Lord! ”  (yes, yes you are and that's NORMAL, not exclusive to just Peter.  We are all sinful, but yet I know for me I often think I can work things out in my head and I place confidence in the outcome or in the expectations I have, and these are what lead my actions.  God is saying one thing, and I'm thinking...no I've been here and that won't work, BUT what if I was like Peter and said, "But at Your word, I'll let down the nets" despite what I know.  What would that look like?  Could I trust God's word enough to let go of my understanding?  From the smallest thing to the bigger things? 

(Luke 5:5, 8 HCSB)

For he and all those with him were amazed at the catch of fish they took, (Luke 5:9 HCSB)

I want to be amazed, and being amazed has a lot to do with being surprised.  Being surprised has everything to do with knowing nothing...and that is what we have.  Nothing.  

Friends, I pray you and I use nothing to obey God.  Not our intellect, not our money, not our understanding, and definitely not ourselves to be amazed by God today. 

But use that nothing as the prayer to be filled with Him who is everything. 

What does that look like?  I don't know, it could look like crying or it could look like going about your normal day just dialoguing with God to help you see what that looks like.  We start with nothing, and our nothing then has a need.  That need might be painful (a need for comfort, for love, for help, for strength, for whatever) but it is a need that comes with having nothing.  

Let your nothing open up before God.

Let that need soak in your spirit.

John 15:5

I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.

Apart from our needed vine, us branches can do nothing! 

I know I've got nothing, and yet I start to think that with my nothing I can get something...but that makes no sense.  You have to have something in order to get anything.  So first we have to find a resource to get something from, and this is often where I rely on the resource of my thinking or my abilities or my resources...which is nothing!  Although they  appear to be something, because of how I feel from them ...

I feel good when people like me or when I get a good grade in theology like I'm really doing this God stuff right, or a raise/promotion at work or when I write something enlightening, or when I have a nice good cry during prayer or when I help other people with something or when my Instagram photo gets a lot of likes!  It feels goood--the feeling is strong and its palpable in my mind...

but they always lead back to nothing and a need because eventually I'll fall and the feeling of falling sucks.  

So then it is a blessing to fall only because it reveals to me my need again, from my nothing.  Apart from the vine I can do nothing (but temporary feelings of good that die out eventually) 

But as in psalm 1, the tree planted (or positioned) firmly by the stream never withers.  And the branch that abides in the vine never stops producing fruit because of its source.

A need requires a source.

Nothing needs something.

Two nothings make nothing! 

Nothing plus Jesus = something

Word.

Go to the Word, with nothing.  

Go to prayer, with nothing.

Embrace your nothingness, haha, and then your need will embrace God. 

Jesus says:

“So I say to you, keep asking, and it will be given to you. Keep searching, and you will find. Keep knocking, and the door will be opened to you. (Luke 11:9 HCSB)

Oh and He said this too: 

Don’t be afraid, little flock(that's us! Sheep who have nothing and need a shepherd), because your Father delights to give you the kingdom.

(Luke 12:32 HCSB)

We all need Jesus.  Every single one of us is nothing without Jesus.  If you find at some point that you are nothing and what you have or feel is nothing...take that and come out of hiding with it...and let your nothing need Jesus, because in Him you will never be nothing, but you get something...and what you get I cannot describe.  Because it is amazing and surprises me every time!  

What is your position?  Ask God right now.  Are you secure in your thoughts and your configurations and plans? Or are you resting (or maybe scared) in the fact that you have nothing and need the source to be anything.  And then be in Christ.  He said "Don’t be afraid, little flock, because your Father delights to give you the kingdom." (Luke 12:32 HCSB)

I am reading and digesting the entire book of Luke via audio (I have the youversion bible app on my phone) and it is amazing.  Haha.  I woke up with a headache and a really uneasy heart, but I'm like so rested now.  Just resting in God, the Creator of the universe, of time, of epic waterfalls and canyons, of lightening bolt kisses and even the minds and hands that brew delicious coffee.  All of that...was made by God.  I'm just resting with Him.  

Jmegrey