Overflow

Written on 07/22/2021
Christian Dunn

Verse: 1 Thessalonians 1:3
We remember before our God and Father your work produced by faith, your labor prompted by love, and your endurance inspired by hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.

Devotion
This morning I'm thinking about overflow. When you watch a movie you LOVE, what do you do? You overflow about it - you tell others, recommend it, and talk about how great it was. When you eat an amazing meal, same thing! When your favorite team is in the playoffs, so easy to just talk about! We overflow the things we are excited about, full of, and passionate for.

Paul tells us in another place that "these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love." (1 Corinthians 13:13). When faith, hope and love overflow in your life, you get work, labor, and endurance.

Look at the verse above. Work, labor, and endurance are three different Greek words in the original text. Work is basically what you'd expect: work. Action that produces results. Labor is more strenuous. It is more difficult and even painful. Endurance is steadfastness, not giving up, pushing forward.

Our faith, hope and love inspire in us an overflow of action that produces results and doesn't give up even when it's difficult. Think about that. Our faith, hope and love is not just for us. It's not just a feeling, or a personal experience, or "between God and me." When it is fully alive, it is overflowing to produce tangible results in the world around us.

I pray that this could be a reflection point for you and me this morning. Are we allowing our faith to turn into action? Are we pushing through in following God, even when it gets difficult? Are we allowing the Holy Spirit to inspire us with passion for others?

Prayer
I pray that you would give me the strength and the courage to allow my faith to overflow into action!