Hunger is the answer!

When we were very young, my mum would hire someone to babysit us and do all the house chores. Mum preferred that this lady; who people refer to by different titles such as; the house keeper, house maid, Auntie etc.; be in-house. My sisters and I would run around without a care in the world knowing that everything would be taken care of even when mum and Dad were at work. We’d play outside until we were called in for lunch, snacks or were told it was time to have our bath. We’d even leave our beds unmade, and our room in a state suggesting that something had blown up in there, but find it spic and span at the end of the day. Boarding school however gave my elder sister and I a rude shock at ages 10 and 11&1/2, even though we had a relative in class eight who offered to do our laundry. Over the Christmas holiday, our parents would take us upcountry to my grand mums’ (dad’s mum) house, where all other cousins were deposited too. In my grandmas’ house, the ball game was different, there was no hired help. You see, my dad and his siblings are 13 in number (same mother and father), and with that my grandma had become the commander in chief of her army while granddad was out working; and with this many grandchildren deposited at her house, she had to be tough to maintain order (Granddad passed on when most of us were pretty young to remember much about him).

At grandmas, everyone was to be awake by as early as 7am although we’d sometimes just stay in bed (we were on holiday for crying out loud). Whenever we decided to sleep in, grandma would walk by the bedrooms singing in Kikuyu of how lazy people will die of poverty (hinting at our sleeping in as laziness). She would then  assemble us, and put us to task; didn’t matter how young you were, she’d find something for you. Some (older ones- 12yrs and above) were dispatched to the shamba (garden), while others like me were sent to fetch water, do some house chores and/or take care of the very young ones. She never wanted to see anyone idle for one minute whenever she was around, she always found something for you to do even passing her a cup that was an arms’ length away from her. We totally enjoyed ourselves playing ‘police and robbers’, the days she decided to go on a trip to visit some relatives (which happened rarely).

Oh how we missed our house help who had a magic wand for every chore!!!! But the fun we had as cousins was seriously amazing that we sometimes forgot the lots we had to do in a day! Going back home, you’d think we’d have a fresh appreciation for the house help. We’d help around the first few days back then forget and go back to our carefree selves; until mum was no longer hiring a fulltime someone and we had to do most chores ourselves. That was when we understood what Craig David meant when he sang “you don’t miss your water ‘til the well runs dry”.  

Grandma went to be with the Lord in September 2011. The other day we had a cousins meeting and we reminisced on the military camp that was her house, appreciating the part she played in molding us into the responsible people we are today.

Am sure we are not the only ones who took our house help for granted. Some of you still do! (Shame)

In many cases people not only take anyone who works under/for them for granted, but also parents, siblings, spouses, friends, co-workers, their own children, waiters, security guards etc. We get too familiar with what they do (that holds our lives together) that we begin to walk around like we earned it. We forget that if they stopped doing what they do, part of our lives would crumble badly. That is why we are warned that ‘Familiarity breeds contempt.’ We should live in constant appreciation of what they do.

But today I’d like to emphasize more on the part where we get too familiar with God.

God’s plan is for us to grow from glory to greater glory, but sometimes we get caught up in a moment of His glory that we miss out on advancement.  

Say God has endowed on you the gift of prophecy, and every word you give is accurate to the minutest detail that you could even do it in your sleep or even the gift of working miracles such that whenever you walk into any place, people begin to get healed.  You then become too familiar with these gifts that you begin feeling like you have arrived; to a point you’re no longer pursuing more of God. You forget that if it wasn’t for God, and what he intends to accomplish through you, you’d have nothing!

Bill Johnson puts it this way “You begin living under the illusion of spiritual abundance and wealth when in fact there’s poverty of the heart, because a hunger for God has not be sustained. A hunger for the things of God is what sustains humility.”

I also believe that it is this hunger that keeps you focused on Him as opposed to the gifts, and the attention they bring you.

This is how, many people who did/do great things for God, fell/end up falling, and you could be one of them if you’re not careful.

Like with my sisters in our earlier ages, you begin walking around like God is your house help. It is out of His Mercy for His people - the people you are ministering to; that He’ll allow the gifts to operate, as He tries to get your attention back to Him, but after a while the well runs dry. It is at this point that some people will consult witch doctors and familiar spirits in order to keep the illusion that they still move in God’s power, because they know getting back on track with God means going through a process they’re not willing to endure. Others choose to remain by the empty wells talking ‘bout the good ‘ol days when God moved through them, not realizing that they could regain that and even more if only they hungrily pursued God.

We should remain hungry to the things of God. Remaining hungry means: that we consciously live in a constant need for God’s outpouring. All He has endowed on us thus far is just a small portion of His fullness. God is too supreme for us to fathom all of Him even if it took us a thousand lifetimes. Our pursuit in life should be to have more of Him. This can only be achieved if we build an intimate relationship with Him. 

When married, you keep discovering new things about your spouse, brought out by the time you’ve spent together and the many experiences you go through together on a daily basis. The same goes with God, we keep discovering Him as we spend time with Him and by remaining hungry. God loves us all the same but He releases His attributes on us, based on our hunger for Him. That is why other people are more favoured by Him than others.

Yesterday I was listening to Banning Liebscher teaching on 2 Kings 4:1-6, about the widow that cried out to Elisha for help as she was in a bad state financially. Elisha asked her what she had, and she mentioned that she had nothing but a small jar of oil. Elisha asked her to borrow as many empty vessels as possible from her neighbors and pour out in them from the jar she had. Verse 6 tells us that the oil ceased when she run out of empty vessels.

Banning then referred to the oil as the Holy Spirit saying, as long as we remain empty (hungry), there’ll remain a constant fresh outpouring of His presence in us. The outpouring ceases when we’re no longer moved by a hunger for Him- when there are no more empty vessels. He also said that whatever answer we’re looking for in life, lies in the outpouring of God’s presence. God answered the cry of the woman with an outpouring; God always answers us with an outpouring of Himself.

That is why Jesus advised His disciples in Acts 1, not to go anywhere until the Holy Spirit had been poured out on them. 

We are then to be like a watering can so that God can use us to pour out on others whatever is poured out on us. Read the book of Acts and see how the disciples became watering cans from the place of intimacy with God. Don’t be stingy, otherwise there’ll be no more empty vessels for the fresh outpouring.

We should also like Jeremy Camp in his song 'Empty me', ask God to empty us of all rubbish - anything that is not of Him, so that we can receive more of His outpouring.

If like me, you desire to go deeper in God, then you know what to do. Don’t let the oil cease.