Empty Vessels

by Pastor CW Mayberry

⁶  But godliness with contentment is great gain. ⁷ For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out. ⁸ And having food and raiment let us be therewith content.

1 Timothy 6:6-8

The chief thing to be gained in this world is the intimate knowledge of Yeshua. The purpose of this life is to come to know Him and be prepared to meet Him.

²⁶ If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. ²⁵ For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it. ²⁶ For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul? ²⁷ For the Son of man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and then he shall reward every man according to his works. ²⁸ Verily I say unto you, there be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom.

Matthew 16:24-28

If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me.

What will He require of you? It isn’t a negotiation. He asks more of some than He does of others just as He empowers some more than others. To whom much is given much is required. No matter what He asks, the fact is the reward for obedience exceeds the commitment.

 then he shall reward every man according to his works.

Works? That’s a concept that has been utterly rejected by “Christianity”. Unfortunately, the New Testament is filled with such statements affirming the concept of labor among the faithful. Not that our efforts “save” us but that the cause is so great that we willingly join in offering our lives as a living sacrifice.

The author of your salvation fully expects that you will model your life and service after His. The majority of us will not die such a brutal death but many in the last forty-two months of the reign of man over man will enter the kingdom by mingling their blood with that of the Messiah.

In light of these truths, how should we be ordering our lives? We have children to raise, jobs to work, and bills to pay. These things don’t go away – or do they?

If we are approaching the last seven years that will terminate with the second coming of Jesus Christ to rule and reign in the earth, then you can be assured that the job will come to an end. The house payments will come to an end. You may find that you have been declared a nonperson, unable to buy or to sell – unable to pay the taxes on your home. At that point my friend, it is going to be more important by far that you really know Yeshua. There won’t be time to build that relationship at that point. You have to be running in order to jump onto a moving train.

So, when does the attitude change towards things and status take place? It would be best if it took place today. If you have got to have the best, the newest, the biggest, you are going to be faced with an emotional wall too high for you to climb. If you have already begun to empty your closet of secular aspirations, you will be far better off. The season will strip you of all those things, and the system will come to sift you, to sort out what is and is not for Yehovah God.

We will be emptied of everything that is not like our Messiah, or we will reject him preferring those things we’ve lost.

It is a process. All who have gone before you have passed through it knowing one degree of severity or another.

¹¹ for I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content. ¹² — I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound: everywhere and in all things, I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need. ¹³ I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.

Philippians 4:11-13

In my opinion, those are the words of the greatest Apostle other than the Lord himself. He lived to serve. He gave his all. He understood that this life is a brief all-out sprint toward the feet of the master. All the gain you get will be left behind. Only those things done for the goal of prospering the Kingdom will endure.

We really must look at life through that lens. I have suffered loss at the hands of God. He has taken away what I desired and replaced it with what I did not desire. I’ve been angry about it, I protested his choice and complained that it just wasn’t fair.

In time I have come to understand that I have a destiny. My God is ordering my life with that sure end in mind. What I loved was poison and what I would have rejected brought me strength. What was despised became wisdom, what pierced through my soul caused compassion to flow like a spring breaking through a parched desert land.

Give yourself to His will. Stop resisting. He is trying to make you an instrument of deliverance. He is bringing you true liberty and making you the agent of liberty. It doesn’t come easy, and it doesn’t come to many.

Be the empty vessel that He needs so that He can use you.

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