Why are you holding back? Really, why are you withholding thinking you can’t give the very best of you? You’re not allowing yourself to go all in right here and now, because for some reason you’re convinced you’re going to run out if you give it your all.
I get it. I used to do it too. It showed up in my commitment. I wouldn’t commit to anything long term, because I feared not having what it would require of me in the future. If I give everything I have within me now, obviously there won’t be anything left for later. I mean that makes sense, right? I continually found myself in this awkward limbo of not wanting to give too much, and not wanting to commit to having to continue in the future.
And maybe that’s you. You’re showing up, but you’re not all-in showing up. You’re trying, but you’re not wholeheartedly trying. You’re working, but at the same time you’re withholding. You’re trying to save some of this for later thinking what you have is all you will ever have.
But, Sis, when you’re working from the flow of God’s Spirit, YOU’RE WORKING IN THE OVERFLOW! You simply won’t run out.
You’ll give it all today, then tomorrow there will be even more of you to give. You’ll do your best today, then your best gets even better tomorrow. You’ll do everything you can now, then miraculously you’ll find you’ve been equipped to do even greater next. The ideas keep flowing. The strength keeps coming. The next move keeps showing up. The doors keep opening. The path keeps going.
When God showed up in the living room of our tiny beach cottage in Southern California in 2012, and asked this girl right here to start hosting a devotional call every morning, I straight up told him he had the wrong girl. I didn’t know any scriptures. I couldn’t pray without crying. I don’t have the voice for this. And honestly, I didn’t even know what a devotional was supposed to look or sound like. God, I am NOT your girl.
But that day, he was relentless in his reminders, so I made a 1 week commitment. God, I will host these devotionals calls every morning for 1 week, and at the end of that week you will see I don’t know what I’m doing, I’m not qualified for this, I’m going to look like a fool and no one will listen. So, I set out to prove someone would be way better at this than me.
And y’all know the story, for that first week, I straight up plagiarized off good ol’ Joyce Meyer and basically read a page from her daily devotional book and cried my way through each prayer with 10 people listening live on a conference call. That first Friday came, and I took a deep breath and said, “whew, that’s over and I’m never doing it again!”
And that’s when God said, “That was great. Now write your own.” I thought I MIGHT have 5 devotionals in me, and even that would be a stretch. So, I committed for 1 more week, gave out the conference call number once again, and shared my own words in the most scattered, disjointed devotionals you’ve likely ever heard, but I was trying my best. I quoted every scripture that made sense to me. I told every Bible story I knew. And I was certain that was it. Mission accomplished.
But, here I am, 11 years later, still showing up writing new devotionals, because I learned I’m not giving from a limited source. My source of power, my source of inspiration, my source of creativity, and my source of energy, simply doesn’t run out. I work from the flow of God’s Spirit, and that means I’m working in the overflow.
Here, in the overflow, there is MORE than enough. I don’t have to hold back. I don’t have to worry about there not being enough. I don’t have to give less today to save for tomorrow. No, there will always be more than enough, overflowing into my life and through my life.
Where have you been holding back? Where have you been giving less than your best in an effort to conserve for a tomorrow where you may not have enough?
If God gives you energy today, and you think you’re going to save it for next Tuesday when you really need it, you simply waste what he gave you today. If God gives you strength for right now, but you try to tuck that strength away to use on a day you will feel like using it, poof … it’s gone. Not only will today’s strength not be available on another day, my wild guess is you’re never going to feel like being strong any way.
I think of it much like the Israelites being miraculously fed in the wilderness. Every morning they would wake up to manna on the ground. This manna was a gooey bread like substance given to them by God to eat. But God instructed them to eat what he had given them each day and not gather more to try and save it for the next day. If they tried to save it for any day other than the Sabbath, it would rot and spoil.
The lesson, use everything given to you on this day, trusting God to provide more for the next day.
God has been giving you strength and energy, but you’ve been thinking you will just save it for another more fitting day. Welp, today’s strength and energy spoiled because you didn’t use it when you were supposed to.
God has given you creative ideas and inspiration, but you don’t want to use it all up at once, so you tuck it away thinking you’ll do something with it later. Later rolls around and it’s rotted. Why? Because you didn’t use it when God gave it to you.
Yip, that’s what happened to all those great ideas you had. They rotted because you didn’t use them when God gave them to you. I have to believe God is looking for the girl who will use what he gives them when he gives it to them. When he finds that girl, then he just keeps giving more and more.
Go ahead and use up all your patience and goodness today. Go ahead and be all of the ridiculously kind you can possibly be. Give all that you have to give, the very best of you all poured out. Put yourself out there, and hold nothing back. Then, just watch what happens. YOU WON’T RUN OUT!
Psalm 23:5 “My cup overflows.”
Meaning, my cup is filled by God, then he just keeps giving. It doesn’t run out. I’m filled to overflowing with more than enough. I can give and live in abundance knowing God will keep pouring into a vessel that allows his overflow!
Are you a vessel that allows his overflow? Or have you been trying to hold back and save up? Have you been receiving, then clinching your fists to hold on tight to what you have been given, thinking that’s all there is?
My mentor taught me such a valuable lesson. He taught me how he would take a young employee with absolutely no experience, and he would train her up to become the best, even send her to school to get her degree, then after investing years into this individual within his company, he would bless her as she moved on to a greater opportunity somewhere else. He lived in the overflow. He wasn’t fearful of what was flowing out, because he knew who controlled the flow in.
Remember the story of the widow with the oil? 2 Kings 4: 1-7, “The wife of a man from the company of the prophets cried out to Elisha, “Your servant my husband is dead, and you know that he revered the Lord. But now his creditor is coming to take my two boys as his slaves.”
Elisha replied to her, “How can I help you? Tell me, what do you have in your house?”
“Your servant has nothing there at all,” she said, “except a small jar of olive oil.”
Elisha said, “Go around and ask all your neighbors for empty jars. Don’t ask for just a few. Then go inside and shut the door behind you and your sons. Pour oil into all the jars, and as each is filled, put it to one side.”
She left him and shut the door behind her and her sons. They brought the jars to her and she kept pouring. When all the jars were full, she said to her son, “Bring me another one.”
But he replied, “There is not a jar left.” Then the oil stopped flowing.
She went and told the man of God, and he said, “Go, sell the oil and pay your debts. You and your sons can live on what is left.”
This woman had nothing but a small jar of olive oil. That was it. She didn’t have a car to sell. No clothes to sell on Poshmark for quick cash. Not even a side hustle on Etsy to bring in a little money. Just this little jar of olive oil. But when she started pouring out the oil in faith, it overflowed. It was more than enough. More than enough to pay her debts. More than enough to get her out of trouble. More than enough to survive the day. The oil never stopped flowing until every jar was full.
And God says, my girl, what you need will never stop flowing from me until every day of your life is fulfilled. The strength you need to raise those kids will overflow until they are raised. The energy you need to do your job and do it ridiculously well, will overflow until your final day there. The new ideas and creativity you need to walk in your purpose will overflow until I take you to the final step on that final day.
So give. Let it flow. Stop holding back. Live in the overflow.
Jesus said in John 10:10 that he came to give you life. But not just live, an abundant, full life. The Amplified version of the bible says it like this, “I came that they may have life, and have it in abundance [to the full, till it overflows].”
How in the world am I here today, recording episode #1399 when I wouldn’t commit to anything more than a week because I knew I couldn’t do this more than 5 times? OVERFLOW. I’m simply living in the overflow. And every day when I ask God to keep pouring out his Spirit on me, he fills me up to spill me out.
You too have been filled to be spilled. You don’t have to hold back. You don’t have to tuck all your goodness away, saving up for your rainy day. You don’t have to give less than your best today in an effort to have something to still show up with tomorrow.
Nope, let it pour girlfriend. Let it flow. Open up your hands, open up your life, live freely in the expansive abundance of God, knowing he’s going to keep filling as long as you keep pouring!
Overflow is actually my word for 2023. I’ve created a mantra which I repeat daily as a guide. Perhaps it would be a good guide for you as well. It goes like this:
“Today is a divine invitation to abundant resources. Energy, joy and ridiculous blessings are aligned for me to receive and give. This girl has been filled to be spilled. It’s all available and it’s all been made possible, so heck yeah I’m going for it. My BIG Life cannot be contained, it will wildly and outrageously overflow.”
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