Why Overflow?

Why have another blog and podcast when there are currently over 5 million podcasts online? Because of…

1. The proliferation of impotent or superficial Christian teaching making God seem unable or unwilling to contend with life’s real, daily issues
2. Worldly distractions, often found in the news media, leading too many Christians astray
3. Electricity

So, Overflow launches to be a Kingdom force of love and truth in an increasingly crazy world and Christian experience.

Here we go.

Your home does not generate its own electricity.

Profound, I know.

But follow this and watch where we land. Fossil fuel or nuclear power plants generate electricity and then distribute it to your house. Your house receives electricity. You then use it when you turn on a light, charge a phone, or watch TV. Even if you have solar panels on your roof, those panels capture energy from the sun and convert it to electricity. But they do not generate electricity.

This blog, podcast, and, hopefully, forthcoming book are called Overflow because you, like your home, are not responsible for generating LIFE. I differentiate LIFE from life. LIFE is what Jesus promised us. Conversely, life is the best you can do on your own. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit can generate LIFE. You can generate life.  

THE difference between LIFE and life is who goes first.

In LIFE, God always goes first in all things. In life, you go first.

Notice the source and sequence of the Overflow LIFE Jesus offers in John 7:37, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scripture said, ‘From His innermost being will flow rivers of living water.’ But this He spoke of the Spirit, whom those who believed in Him were to receive; for the Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.”

• Streams of living water flowing from your innermost being = LIFE
• Those streams are generated by the Holy Spirit = received

What about in 1 John 4:19, “We love, because He first loved us.” LIFE = love received from the Triune God. And, because God goes first generating and supplying, we are empowered to use and distribute what it is we have received!

Get the sequence wrong…get LIFE wrong…get stuck with life.

All the Bible from Genesis to Revelation teaches that LIFE happens when God goes first and His people live in the Overflow. In the Old Testament, God our Father birthed the nation of Israel to demonstrate to the world what the people of a nation would look like that let God go first! They failed. They no longer needed His leadership. From the LIFE He gave them to the life with which they had their story is a downward spiral. The Apostle Paul forcefully warns Christians against Israel’s failed example in 1 Corinthians 10:1-13 basically declaring, “Let God go first in all things, always!”

Paul’s warning is still needed today. All the blessings and benefits of our faith flow freely in the Overflow of God’s presence and work in our lives. Impotence, insecurity, anxiety, fear, jealousy and other forms of negativity actively wait to pollute and corrupt our souls. Christians today must learn to live in the Overflow!

Here is an important reality that can help explain so much of what we experience in life…

The one who generates carries the pressure of generating.

If you go first in taking responsibility for generating your life, then you carry all the pressure of generating your life. You also get the fear, anxiety, pride, insecurity, uncertainty, and exhaustion that comes from carrying that load. The absolute best you will ever get is whatever you are able to produce on your own.

You cannot become who you were created to become or do what you were created to do by going first. No matter how great you can become on your own you will never know your Creator or His plan for your life, even for this day.

3 Obstacles to Overflow Living

While there are many obstacles we all deal with to living in the Overflow, I find these three to be the most common:

1. Crucifixion – The only way to live in the Overflow, where God goes first, is to be crucified, to die to yourself and your ways. Paul describes his crucified life in Galatians 2:20 and Philippians 3:1-16. Jesus teaches the necessity of personal crucifixion in Luke 9:23, “If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow Me.”

How easy is it for you to deny your wants/dreams/desires/ways DAILY so that God our Father can go first?

• Supernatural living – Overflow LIFE is lived in the Holy Spirit. It is supernatural. Again, Scripture says in John 7:38 that Jesus’s springs of living water will be generated by the Holy Spirit. Furthermore, the war raging against our LIFE is supernatural. Jesus warns us against Satan’s attempts to derail our LIFE.

How hard is supernatural living for you? How reflexively do you walk in the Holy Spirit? How regularly do you engage in spiritual warfare?

• Receiving – We will spend significant time on this issue as we progress. Overflow living requires us to constantly receive love, power, energy, wisdom, and so much more. I have yet to meet a single person who is naturally good at receiving!

How hard is it for you to receive love? How about how hard is it just for you to receive a compliment? How uncomfortable or dismissive do you get when someone says something nice to you about you? How harsh of a critic are you about yourself?

Crucifixion, supernatural living, and receiving are three MAJOR obstacles to Overflow LIFE. Which of these is hardest for you? Confess it to our Father. Ask for forgiveness. Ask for healing, teaching, courage, or whatever is needed for your breakthrough.

Our journey in the Overflow will be long – for we have much to learn and enjoy! I am doing this portion in a blog format so that you can engage with this content in the comments section. So, ask questions. Share which of the three obstacles are challenging. Disagree. The blog is here for you to engage with me and others.

We are on this journey together. Overflow LIFE is powerful and flowing and beautiful, but it is not easy.

“You will make known to me the path of life;

In your presence is fullness of joy;

In your right hand there are pleasures forever.”   

                                Psalm 16:11