REALLIFE STUDY GROUP
"Fill Up!"
ICEBREAKER: How many cavity fillings do you have
and what is your favorite snack to fill up on?
INTRODUCTION: I
believe God longs to fill us up with the best thing He has to offer us,
Himself. God desires to not only rest upon us
but to actually live within us or, in other words, to fill us up. The problem is that we are already so full of so many other
things. We are full of stress, fear, anxiety, bitterness, pride, uncontrolled
passion and many other toxins. Let's face it, so often we are just full of
ourselves. So God must empty us first of all this emptiness in order to fill us
with His fullness. To be filled with God is to be filled with something or
someone bigger, greater, richer, stronger, better, healthier and the list goes
on and on. The Bible says in the
presence of the Lord is fullness of joy. So
get ready to be filled up with God. Let's give Him our limitations, let the
healing begin and watch what happens when we truly let God completely fill us
up!
CONFESSION: I
believe and decree that...
·
God
is filling up the void
·
God
is filling in the blanks
·
God
is filling in the answers
·
God
is filling out the forms
·
God
is filling me up with His promises
·
God
is filling the whole earth with his glory as the waters cover the sea
·
God
is filling me up with the good of the land if I am willing and obedient
·
God
is filling the empty vessels in order to pour out the best He has saved for
last
·
God
is filling the cavities in the mouths of my soul formed by the garbage we have
been eating from Hollywood
·
God
is filling the church with a new sound, a sound of a rushing mighty wind, a
sound like a still small voice, and a sound like the sound of many waters
·
God
is filling and refilling me again and again and again
·
God
is not only filling me with the bread of life but with a righteous, holy hunger
for more
·
God
is filling us up for the purpose of emptying out our emptiness
·
God
is filling me up with His fullness...his omnipresent, ubiquitous, omniscient,
eternal, omnipotence.
DEFINITION:
Fill up: means to be
satisfied or content, to be totally and completely consumed, to be absolutely
at peace, to be filled to the brim or to our capacity with all of God's
fullness
OUTLINE: 6 Things that limit God from filling us up.
We Are:
1. Wounded: Hole in our soul, instead of being
whole in our soul. We are hemorrhaging rather than overflowing.
2. Preoccupied: Filled with something else,
distracted by other passions, disappointments, and aspirations
3. Defiled: Discolored and tainted by wrong
influences & affections
4. Satisfied: Only filled half way, and we settle
for less
5. Stunted: Our capacity is much too small. We
see ourselves
much smaller than God sees us
6. Proud: Vessel versus the Content;
Sometimes we think the
vessel is more important than the contents of the vessel.
TEXT: 2 Kings 4:1-3; Ephesians 5:16-20;
John 2:1-11
STUDY GROUP QUESTIONS:
1.
How
does Ephesians 5:16-20 tell us what not to be filled with and how to stay
filled with God's Spirit?
2.
In
Acts 2, the disciples got fed up, filled up and fired up! Name one thing they
might have been fed up with in our society today.
3.
Identify
one thing God had to empty out of you, or people in general, to make room for
his fullness.
4.
In
2 kings 4 a widow must borrow vessels to fill up with oil. What could you use a
little more of?
5.
Also
in Acts 2, the first thing that happened as a result of getting filled up with
the spirit was that their language changed. Besides praying in the Spirit, how
has or how should your language change since you accepted Christ?
a.
More
positive
b.
More
encouraging
c.
More
stable
d.
More
praying
e.
More
consistent
f.
No
more cursing
g.
No
more lying
h.
No
more gossiping
i.
No
more nasty talk
j.
No
more quarreling
k.
No
more complaining
l.
No
more murmuring
m. No more accusing
n.
No
more shaming
o.
No
more out of control raging
p.
No
more belittling (demeaning)
q.
No
more division
r.
____________________________________________________
6.
Which
of the things that limit God from filling us up do you need to work on?
PRAISE REPORTS & PRAYER REQUESTS:
ACTION POINT: This week I will spend some time
evaluating what I really need to fill my time and my life with. Maybe I need to
empty my garage, my garbage, my basement, my attic, my closets, my trunk or
even my mind of all the clutter so God can give me something fresh and new.