More Than A Full Basket… How The Empty Tomb Leads to Fullness of Life

/0 Comments/in /by

This is a guest post by one of our team members – Marcia Hartman. We love her insights into what Easter means.

The students in an ESL class that I teach have been learning opposite word pairs:  short and tall, hot and cold, empty and full. We decided that given the choice, we’d all choose full over empty, especially when it comes to our wallets and gas tanks!

As opposites, it’s rare for “full” and “empty” to converge, except in Christ. Colossians 2:9 declares that all the fullness of God was literally embodied in Christ, yet it was in the emptying of Himself, the giving up of divine privilege, that this fullness was made manifest.  As the very lifeblood was emptied from that human vessel of divinity, Jesus poured out full forgiveness, full salvation, full access to God, and life to the full for all who choose it.

There will be full baskets this Easter. There will be overflow seating in churches, lawns full of eggs to hunt, and dinner tables filled with food and family. But eventually all of those things will empty, and they may even lead to emptiness.

In contrast, the true celebration of Easter comes from the fulfillment of the promised resurrection evidenced in the empty tomb. Because of what Christ has done for us, God is able to “fill until full” the empty places in our lives that we give to Him. Easter celebrates the choice of full over empty, and it’s a choice that we’ve all been given.

This Easter, take a moment to consider this awe-inspiring choice we were given. How can remembering the connection between the full and the empty change the way you live?

“Let us give thanks to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! Because of his great mercy he gave us new life by raising Jesus Christ from death. This fills us with a living hope, and so we look forward to possessing the rich blessings that God keeps for his people. He keeps them for you in heaven, where they cannot decay or spoil or fade away.”

1 Peter 1:3-4 Good News Translation (GNT)

 

 

If you’d like to read more about the fullness of life in Christ, one of these CLC Publications may be the life-changing resource that you’re looking: 

 

The Calvary Road:  “Roy Hession teaches that through brokenness, humility, and confession, we can prepare our hearts to receive the fullness God wants for us.”

 

 

Victory in Christ Charles Trumbull

 

Victory in Christ:  Charles Trumbull “reveals insights into the full reality of our victory in Christ, who has achieved by the power of His work on the cross, the freedom that every believer desires.”

 

 

The Two Covenants

 

The Two Covenants:  “In a series of eighteen meditations contrasting the Old Covenant with the New Covenant, Andrew Murray shows us the blessings God has given us, along with the conditions necessary for the full and continual experiences of those blessings.”

 

 

 

The Seven Wounds of Christ 9781619582583

 

The Seven Wounds of Christ:  “Fred Hartley shares how Christ’s wounds on the cross represent the fullness of His atonement and how, individually, each wound corresponds to distinct healing for us.”

FREE Jesus Storybook Printout!

/0 Comments/in /by

In Matthew 19:14, Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.”

 

Over and over again, we see in Scripture the importance of childlike faith. A faith that comes from understanding the stories in their simplest form, and trusting that what we don’t know, God does.

So how do we gain back our childlike faith? By keeping our eyes on Jesus. Peter learned this lesson the hard way when he tried walking on water with Jesus. How many of us would be willing to get out on the water in a storm? Probably not many adults, but most children would jump at the chance to do something so extraordinary! Like a child, Peter eagerly left the safety of the boat to head towards his Savior, but as soon as he let his childlike excitement be replaced by very adult fears, he began to sink.

 

But just like Jesus does to all of us, as soon as Peter cried out asking Jesus for help, he received it. What a blessing to know our Savior is ready to reach out and save us!

 

This Easter season, we invite you to take advantage of a FREE printout of the story of Jesus walking on water to share with the children and adults in your life. Use it as a jumping off point to share your own moments of asking for help and how Jesus responded in your time of need. Allow God to take a simple story and childlike faith to do something extraordinary in your life.

 

Excerpt taken from The Jesus Storybook which presents the Bible in easy-to-understand, comic-style illustrations, highlighting what Jesus said, what He did, who He was and why He had to come to earth.

 

DOWNLOAD THE ENGLISH VERSION

 

DOWNLOAD THE SPANISH VERSION

 

 

BUY THE JESUS STORYBOOK TODAY!

 

Three Truths About Bitter Circumstances That Will Help You Through Them

/0 Comments/in /by

No matter who we are or what stage of life we’re in, life is always a little different than what we expect it to be. People disappoint, circumstances change, and we’re left wondering what God is up to during this time. But we do have hope, even in the darkest moments, because we can trust that God will always be up to something.

Here are three truths from Bishop Milton C. Grannum’s new book, Bitter Water to Fine Wine, that will help you navigate through your bitter waters and get inspired by what God is doing in the background.

  1. Bitter waters in our lives are often used by God to push us out of our comfort zone and into a better place.

Bishop Grannum shares: “I was pushed out of my home because of my commitment to a church that was perceived to have no meaningful future for me. The pain of that event eventually helped me make some significant decisions and discoveries about life.

After a number of years, efforts, and experiences, I discovered that the true meaning and magic of life does not emerge while one lives in the active pursuit of comfort. Many people spend their best years in the confines of dwindling comfort zones. Our culture wires us for safety and limitations, and away from productive decision-making and risk-taking. False security and social approval have become the objects of the natural drive of many individuals. I chose not to be satisfied with the option of tiptoeing through life.

Pain rightly handled can produce both power and peace. Of course, I always had the option of reacting and wallowing in self-pity. I chose instead to put my faith in God and allow Him to direct my path.

 

  1. Every setback is a potential setup. God uses our worst experiences to help us grow.

As I look back on my life, I went through may bitter waters. I was beaten by my own family members for the ‘crime’ of attending church. I was ridiculed by other students at school for doing chores for my pastor as a “tithe” to the church. Shortly after arriving in Philadelphia, I was arrested without cause, spent a night in a dirty, smelly jail cell, and released without apology by a judge who told me, ‘Go home and behave yourself.’

We can go through life reflecting and thinking of all the pain, the challenges, the disappointments, the let-downs and the trauma of our journey, or we can believe that turning bitter water into wine is possible, and trust God for the miracles.

As an example, who walks into a donut shop and complains about the holes? No, we buy donuts, knowing that every donut has a hole. The same is true with every experience in life. To focus all our attention on the challenging and painful holes that come our way is to rob ourselves of the personal strength and power of the total experience. Over the decades, my wife and I have sought to stay focused on the donuts, lest we get distracted and overwhelmed by the holes.

 

  1. Bitter waters point out both areas of need and the subsequent areas for growth.

The shortage of wine was a massive faux pas that did not impact Jesus intimately, but it produced a need that became Jesus’s project. Likewise, meaningful projects and new paths emerge when pressing needs are discovered, regardless of where the needs occur or who they impact.

When bitter waters reveal needs around us, we are forced to make a decision to either address the need or ignore it. We are either pushed forward in growth or backward and downward. We are given the choice which way we move. And oftentimes, our choices impact other people as well as our own future.

For Jesus, the first miracle led to further ministry opportunities and revealed who He was. In our own lives, we sometimes miss the fact that God may very well be the one stirring the waters to push us forward to something miraculous.

Take a moment now and look back at your life. Focus on the faithfulness of God to you, in spite of you, and realize that it was God stirring up the waters, irritating your spirit, creating a change, moving people to push you when all the while you were blaming and rebuking Satan. Satan hates faith. He knows the awesome power of faith. Move forward in faith to change your water into wine. Do it now!”

 

 

Still not convinced? Bishop Grannum’s new book, Bitter Water to Fine Wine, further dives into his experiences that prove God is not absent during these times, but instead, is working in the background to do great miracles. Bishop Grannum shows how Christ can change the bitterest setbacks of life into sweet setups for victory and growth—but only if we let go and give Him full control. BUY NOW