Fullness in All

1. God recently drawing my attention to the subject of “fullness”.

2. Relates to the purpose of creation in the image of God; ““Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over it” (Gen 1:28); it is therefore relevant to all we so.

3. “What” are we to fill the earth with?

4. Start from the fact that Adam and Eve were always going to be send out of the garden into the wider world. This implies a sending in God, as humans can only (truly) correspond to their origin in God.

5. “When you send forth your Spirit, they are created, and you renew the face of the ground.” (Ps 104:30) “He sends out his command to the earth; his word runs swiftly.” (Ps 147:15). Word and Spirit are working to fill all things with the glory of God (Hab 2:14) because everything was created by them and for them.

6. The sending of God climaxes in the sending of Jesus “For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.” (John 3:17), and his Spirit, “the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name” (John 14:26).

7. Word and Spirit are still sent to fill all things with the love, praise, honour, glory etc. of God viz. with a sense of God’s own worthiness.

8. Since this sending is essential to the nature of God, it is essential to renewed human nature.

9. To be in a relation to the Word and the Spirit is not to be in relation to a concept or an experience respectively but to be actively involved in an outward movement which is the kingdom of God. [Union of Word and Spirit in the work of God = kingdom of God two hands of God, in mutual effective power.]

10. To be filled with the Spirit/Word is always an action directed outwards cf. prophets e.g. “I am filled with power, with the Spirit of the Lord, and with justice and might, to declare to Jacob his transgression and to Israel his sin.” ( Mic 3:8 cf. Jer 20:9), the Jesus preaching of the kingdom after his baptism.

11. It is impossible to be filled with self and to be filled with God = filled with Spirit and Word. The former is introspective, the latter expressive of a reality other than ourselves.

12. Everything, e.g. prayer, becomes self-consciously a work of God, and “of ministry” (Eph 4:12) in the kingdom of God.

13. The healing ministry must necessarily be constituted by this outward centred movement of God himself, the essential divine passion to fill all things with his presence. We sense everything, including ourselves, is moving to the “fullness of time” (Eph 1:10) when God will be “all in all” (1 Cor 15:28).

14. In relation to the work of P A this must be the frame of reference for ministry in a truly God-centred way.

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