From Overwhelming to Overflowing

(No Audio - did not record)

Mother's Day Celebration

"From Overwhelming to Overflowing"

Pastor Jerry

Psalm 23

 

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In the past year we have been living in the midst of governmental mandates issued as a result of a Global Pandemic that has forced the confinement of countless numbers of people behind locked doors; and those who did come out were forced into the wearing of masks (which hid their facial expressions of pain and love); and for those who did get their expressions of emotions communicated, still, the mandatory social distancing caused the loss of physical contact that’s so important with friends and family. This past year has had a disastrous impact on the well-being of so many people throughout the world. With the closing down of businesses and schools, all this has caused a growing mental health epidemic that is at a crisis level in our society. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), depression is now the number one leading cause of disability worldwide. The WHO projects that by 2030, the amount of disability and life lost from depression will surpass all of those combined from war, accidents, cancer, stroke, and heart disease. Heartbreaking! Being a mother in 2021 is like no other time in our history. Being a parent is like no other time we have seen before. And yet, there are signs on the horizon that perhaps, we are on the brink of returning to some normalcy. We have reason to begin to be hopeful! However, there is a concern than we are not just fighting the damage from last year’s pandemic. With this crazy past year of isolation, it has made many people feel like they have missed out. There’s a feeling of desperation to catch up. And in a desire to catch up people are overbooking their calendars, overspending their money, overdrawing their credit, overloading their emotions, overworking their bodies, overcrowding their days, and overvaluing the approval of other people. As a result, many people are feeling overstressed, overanxious, and overwhelmed. Now, why are we doing this? It's the fear of missing out. We don't want to feel like we are inadequate or unloved or left out. And all this has left us feeling overwhelmed! So today, I want us to look at the subject of moving from being overwhelmed to overflowing. This message is for mothers (but it is for all of us). I want to share with you an important message that really could change your life for the future if you'll apply the points. I want to begin by explaining two different fundamentally different approaches to life. You can approach life with a shortage mindset, or you can approach life with a surplus mindset. Big, big difference!  

1. A SHORTAGE mindset means: I never have enough and I never will.

That's going to leave you feeling overwhelmed. I don't have enough time. I don't have enough money. I don't have enough energy. I don't have enough opportunities, or whatever. It's the feeling that you always come up short. That causes you to feel overwhelmed by life. In the Bible, words like lacking, wanting, needing are used for this lifestyle, this shortage mindset. A good example is in the Bible. It was a famine in Israel, and Elisha had a discussion with his servant about this. 2 Kings 4:42-44 says, "A man brought Elisha, the prophet, some loaves of bread." Now, remember, this is a famine going on in the land. "Elisha said, 'Give it to the people so they can eat.' Elisha's servant said, 'There's not enough here for this many people.'" Not enough. That's a shortage mindset. "'Just give it to them,' Elisha said. 'The Lord has promised that there will be more than enough.'" That's a surplus mindset. "So the servant gave the bread to the people." And sure enough, it says "They ate until full and still had some left over, just as God had promised." Shortage lifestyle: I'm never going to have enough. Surplus lifestyle: I've got more than enough. The result of a shortage mindset is I focus on my limited resources. I look at all the things that I'm lacking: I don't have enough money, I don't have enough time, I don't have enough energy. The result of a shortage mindset is an overwhelmed life. When you have a shortage lifestyle, you think that life is like a pie. If somebody takes a bigger piece, that means a smaller piece for you. That there's a limited number of resources, and if they get more, then you're going to get resentful, or you're going to get worried, or you're going to get anxious because there's only so much of the pie to go around. That's a shortage mentality. That there's not enough to go around, and you are missing out on life. Now, instead, God wants you to have this other kind of lifestyle, which is the surplus mentality:    2. A SURPLUS mindset means: God has more than I'll ever need… And God will never run out. God doesn't give us just one piece of the pie. There will always be more pieces and more pies because God will keep creating them. In the Bible, we have words like abundance and plentiful and abounding and blessings. God has more than enough to meet all your needs and everybody else's needs at the same time. Now, the result of the focus of a surplus mindset is instead of focusing on my limited resources, I focus on God's limitless resources. And the result is an overflowing life. In Psalm 23 David says, "You fill my cup to overflowing." Meaning "You give me more than I can hold." He's talking about the overflowing life rather than the overwhelmed life. In verse one David says, "The Lord is my shepherd, I have everything I need." He gives me everything I need; I shall not want. In verse five he says, "My cup runs over." God gives me more than I need. Now, this is crucial to understand: what's your cup? What’s my cup? Your cup is your life! My cup is my life. When David says, "My cup runs over," he's saying: my life is overflowing. I'm not overwhelmed because I don't have enough time, energy, or whatever, but instead, I'm overflowing. My cup overflows. My life overflows with God’s provisions. Did you know that God wants your life to be overflowing? Here's the fundamental problem. God says, "If you would just do what I tell you to do, you'd succeed in life." But we don’t listen! Anytime God says, "Do it this way," and we go, "Well, I think I know what will make me happy, we are in trouble. In fact, anytime you think that way, you are making a fatal mistake; because God knows what'll make you happy more than you do. When I think I know I'm going to make myself happy by doing something different than God says to do, it causes all kinds of problems in my life: stress and burdens and anxiety, and it  all becomes overwhelming. How can you experience an overflowing life? It’s letting God be God! It’s realizing that nothing is impossible with God.  It’s built on the supply mindset that says, "It's not my weakness, it's not my shortage, it's God's strength that's going to get me through." Now how do I experience an overflowing life? Let me give you four daily habits. If you'll do these, they will change your life. Here's the first habit for living an overflowing life and stop living an overwhelmed life. Mothers, this is for you (and for the rest of us too) Number one:

1. Stay connected to Jesus every day.

In John chapter 15:5, Jesus says: "I am the vine, and you are the branches…you can't do anything without me!" If you try to go through life on your own power, you're going to be overwhelmed. But if you're connected to Jesus, you're going to have power. How do you stay connected to Jesus on a daily basis? You spend some time with him every day. You read the Bible each day. Let God talk to you. You talk to God – that's called prayer. You listen. You be quiet. You spend some time. If you want to have a relationship with anybody, you got to spend time with them. The way you stay connected is to have a daily time alone with God. Now let me give you a 2nd habit. Mothers, here's the second key to overflowing. (Each gets harder) The first is: stay connected on a daily basis to God, to Jesus. Here’s number two:

2. Stop complaining and start being grateful.

Stop griping, stop grumbling, and start being grateful. Complaining is a very unhealthy emotion. It harms your body. You want to be healthy? Learn gratitude. When you are grateful, it is good for your body. Philippians 2:14 says: "In everything you do, stay away from complaining and arguing." Let me ask you, what do you complain about? Do you complain about the way you look? Or is it money you don’t have? Or is it the way you feel? 1 Thess. 5:18, "No matter what happens, always be thankful, for this is God's will for you who belong to Christ Jesus." Well, this is God's will for you: that in everything, you give thanks. Are you being grateful in everything? Even during the hard times! If I want to be living an overflowing life rather than an overwhelmed life, First stay connected to Jesus. Then number two: Stop complaining, and be grateful. All right Mothers, here's the third thing the Bible says to do if you want to live an overflowing life:

3. Stop comparing, and start being content.

Stop comparing yourself to other people. When you compare, you get envious, you get resentful. Now there's two problems with comparing yourself to others. One, you'll always find somebody in life who's doing a better job than you, and you're going to get full of discouragement. They got more money. They've got more talent. They're better looking. Number two, you can always find somebody you're doing a better job than they are, and you get full of pride. When you're full of pride, or ego, or when you're full of discouragement or resentment because of somebody else, you lose. Now, the Bible says stop comparing, and start being more contented, and you'll live an overflowing life. Everything you've got is a gift of God's goodness. The air you're breathing right now, the heart that is beating right now, is a gift of God's goodness.  Proverbs 14:30 says, "It's healthy to be content, but envy will eat you up." In the New Testament, Paul says, "I've learned to be content." It has to be learned. You see, by nature, I'm not a naturally contented person. And neither are you. But if you listen and do what God says, you learn to be content, that's a good thing. You see, all those negative things that stress you out: worry, jealousy, resentment, anger, fear, insecurity, feeling unloved, feeling unworthy, feeling ashamed, feeling guilty, all those different things, guess what? They're all learned. Now, anything you can learn, you can unlearn. The stuff you need to learn, like learn to be content, is what life's all about. Learn to be unselfish. Learn to be grateful. Learn to connect to God every day of your life. He said that's going to help you learn contentment. Get your eyes off other people. The wealthiest person in the world is not the one with the most money. The wealthiest person in the world is the one who's most contented with what they've got. Mothers, be connected to Jesus; don’t complain but be grateful; stop comparing and start being contented. Then there's one more habit, and Mothers, this one's the hardest of all:

4. Stop being stingy and start being generous.

If you want to move from being overwhelmed all the time to being overflowing all the time, you must move from being stingy to being generous. I'm not just talking about money, I'm talking about your time, generous with your energy, generous with your compliments. Stinginess is evidence of a shortage mindset. I only have enough, and if I give it away, I'm not going to have enough for me. That's a shortage mentality. It means you don't trust the goodness of God. When you say, "I can't afford to give money away to other people. I need it all for me," you don't understand God. Because God said this: the more you give away, the more you're going to get. He said that because he wants you to become like him. God is a giver. Everything we have is the gift of God's generosity. God wants you to learn to be like him. Now you can give without loving, but you cannot love without giving. This really upsets some people. When you hit the stingy nerve in them, it just irritates them because they don't understand the more generous I am, the more God is going to bless me. In every single area of life, you're going to overflow. God doesn't need my money. God doesn't need your money. He's the source of all supply. He wants what it represents: your heart. He wants us to trust him.? Today, many mothers, many people are feeling overstressed, overanxious, and overwhelmed. It's the fear of missing out. As your pastor, I want you to move from being overwhelmed to overflowing. A SHORTAGE mindset will leave you feeling overwhelmed.  It’s a feeling that you will never have enough and never will. A SURPLUS mindset will leave you feeling overflowing. It’s a feeling that God will give you more than you'll ever need. Focus today on God's limitless resources. And the result will be to experience an overflowing life. Jesus wants to fill your cup to overflowing." Jesus wants "to give you more than you can hold." Turn your eyes upon Jesus. Let Him fill you up today.