Overflowing

If you've ever seen the movie "Office Space" you might remember the bit about flair. This waitress' boss was always getting on her to put on more "pieces of flair" -- junk she had to pin on to her outfit to look, well, I don't know, nuts? She met the boss' requirement, 15 pieces. Randomly chosen. She didn't like the flair and she didn't care what things she pinned on. Then there was the other waiter who went way above the requirement. He looked like a pin trader table at Disneyland. The boss really didn't like that the waitress only did the bare minimum and really loved that the other dude went all out.

What's this have to do with anything?

Replace the boss with God, the waiters with us, and flair with our works.

Bare minimum doesn't come from the heart. Its working hard enough not to get fired. Its banging out the paper and tweaking the font size so it fills the five pages. Its being on the field/court but not really in the game. Its also showing up late to church, mouthing words to the songs, texting during the message, and speed reading the Bible just to get the "Christian life" checkboxes checked off. That's crap, and it doesn't honor God.

Let's take a look at some good stuff in God's word that is the opposite of "bare minimum" -- overflowing!

Check out Exodus 35 and 36 where the offerings were brought in to build the tabernacle. Peoples hearts were moved so greatly, and they brought so much stuff, that Moses had to tell them to stop bringing stuff! Pastors use that a lot to make a point about generous giving, saying that it was the first time and the last time people gave too much. That's overflowing!

Check out 2 Samuel 9. That's where I'm at in going through the Bible right now and what prompted this post actually. Back in 1 Samuel 20 David made a promise to Jonathan to not cut off kindness from his family. Jonathan was Saul's kid -- the Saul who kept trying to kill David. Then David later became king. What did kings in the ancient world do? Wipe out the others who would be a threat. David could bare-minimum-fulfilled his promise to Jonathan just by not seeking out descendants of Saul and allowing them to live. But what does he do? He actively seeks out descendants of Saul and finds Mephibosheth, restores lands to him, orders Saul's previous servants to work the land and provide for him, and allows him access to the royal palace -- inviting him always to his table.

Mose and the Israelites, cool. David, cool. But dude, let's talk about Jesus! How about Mark 6, feeding the five thousand? Jesus just didn't give these guys a PB&J and squeeze box OJ so they were still hungry. At the end of the account it says the disciples picked up 12 baskets full of leftovers. That's a lot of leftovers, and it means the people there were stuffed! They got more than enough to eat.

But that's not where God's giving stops. You want to talk about overflowing? What does God do? Sends his son Jesus to pay the price for our sins. We don't deserve that. We didn't earn that. We can't ever repay that. But that's not all. When we follow Jesus, he gives us the kingdom. What?! I'm not a smart man and into all the nuances of Revelation, but I can read at the end of chapter 3 where it says "To him who overcomes, I will give the right to sit with me on my throne, just as I overcame and sat down with my Father on his throne." This is the creator of the universe talking here, and he's going to let his people sit on his throne? Woah. That's pretty freaking awesome. We don't think so sometimes because we're thick headed and just don't GET it, especially me!

Oh, and just before that bit about the throne, Jesus was talking about spitting out the lukewarm deed doers from Laodicea out of his mouth. Those "bare minimum" dudes.

Yeah, we don't want bare minimum. We want overflowing. When we sing. When we learn. When we teach. When we serve. Whatever we do in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, make it excellent, and make it overflow. It pays back a thousand fold. So, if we don't have overflowing joy, then I must ask -- do we have overflowing actions that returns joy? We should!

Grace and Peace friends