Show Notes for Abide in Jesus.
You are listening to Abide in Jesus, the podcast for women who want to experience Christ’s healing touch in their lives. I’m your host author, Carolyn Rice, and in this episode, we’ll talk about a way out of the emptiness.
Why Do I feel Empty?
Having suffered severe abuse growing up, and then seeking fulfillment in relationships, I found myself abandoned and alone at 21 years old. I sat alone in my apartment, I heard a voice, “turn on the TV”.
When I turned on the TV, there was a woman on a Christian TV show, and she spoke directly to my heart. That next Sunday, I took my little two-year-old girl and we went to church.
Now, I’d been told about Jesus from my neighbor when I was six years old. But this time at 21 is when I really began walking with the Lord. It’s really when my journey of Him feeling the empty places within me began. As I said before, I tried to go to people to fill me and the people that I was drawn to were also people who were in great dysfunction, who had suffered their own traumas and hurts.
They themselves were empty and they had no way to fill me. So, in seeking them, I ended up hurt, rejected alone, and abandoned all over again. I would try to fill myself with busy-ness, keeping myself busy with things that would help me not think about the pain. I was constantly running inside, anxious, and full of fear.
I found myself empty, tired, exhausted, sometimes unable to get out of bed or not even wanting to get dressed in the morning. This emptiness, depression and fear seem to want to hold on to me forever, and I wondered why God would let me go through so much pain and so much suffering.
The Cups
Late one night, I couldn’t sleep. I got up and I turned on the television so low that no one else could hear. There was an old Kathryn Kuhlman show on TV.
She held two cups in her hands, and she poured water from one cup into the other cup, and she kept doing it again and again, and every time she poured that water, she would say something else about how these things that we have been through have shaped us. These things that we have been through have made us into who we are,
Joseph
And when I asked that question of God, why did I suffer so much pain? He reminded me of the story of Joseph. You can read about the story of Joseph in Genesis 37 through 50.
Joseph had a dream that his family would bow down to him and he told it to his brothers. His brothers were already jealous of him, and they ended up selling him as a slave. In that time of slavery, he was accused falsely falsely imprisoned. He was finally made ruler next to Pharaoh, and one day, who comes before him, but the very brothers who sold him into slavery, asking for food.
After a time. He is finally reunited with his entire family, a nd after the death of his father, his brothers come to him. In Genesis 50: 15-17 in the World English Bible, it says.
When Joseph’s brothers saw that their father was dead, they said, “it may be that Joseph will hate us and will fully pay us back for all of the evil which we did to him.” They sent a message to Joseph saying, your father commanded before he died saying, will you tell Joseph now, please forgive the disobedience of your brothers and their sin because they did evil to you. Please forgive the disobedience of the servants of the God, of your father, Joseph wept when they spoke to him.
And in verses 19 -20, we see Joseph’s response.
“Joseph said to them, don’t be afraid for, am I in the place of God? As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring to pass as it is this day to save many people alive.”
Joseph also went through so much pain in his life. God had given him a dream and a vision. And in that time of being sold by his brothers because of their jealousy, it seemed that that dream had died.
Instead of the beloved son that he was, he was made into the lowest of the low and could have never seen his family again.
But Joseph was also shaped by what he went through. He was shaped into who he was. It was not fun. It was not pretty, it was not easy. It was hard, excruciating and painful. He had to sit there in that prison, Day after day.
And can you imagine how much time he had to think on what happened to him? Can you imagine the choice he had to make to choose whether he would move forward with God or remain stuck in that place of bitterness and pain, in that prison? Joseph also knew much pain in his life and it shaped him into who he was.
But what if he hadn’t been sold? What if he hadn’t suffered those things? He would have remained the beloved son of Jacob, but that’s all he would have been. There was something much bigger, much greater than just him, but through that pain, God brought him to his destiny. He restored to him what was lost, and he ended up saving many lives in the process.
How are we filled?
So how do we, how do we go about filling that emptiness within ourselves, where people have failed us, where the pain is so deep and bitterness, anger, and sadness want to set up camp and keep us imprisoned in them? Invite God into the pain.
I know it’s easier to look to people. I know it’s easier to run. I know it’s not easy, but when you invite God into that pain and he takes it out and he helps you look at it and you feel the feelings you will get well, you will go through a process of healing.
When you’re feeling empty and unfulfilled, invite Jesus into that place of emptiness, He will lead you to places of fulfillment. He will lead you to ministries that will help you heal. He will lead you to people that will point you more directly to his healing. He will minister to you in your one-on-one time with him.
Keep on inviting him in and he will begin that healing work in you. It’s taking that first step of just inviting him in where we don’t want to face the pain.
And we feel like if we face it, it will consume us whole. But that is not true. That is not true. He is gentle. He is caring. He will walk with you through it. And as you walk through that ocean of pain, he will guide you. He will lead you and he will bring you out and set you in a broad place, a place that you’ve never known before, a place of health and healing, freedom from dysfunction, freedom from fear, freedom from hatred, freedom from all those things that want to imprison you and leave you empty and alone.
As you keep spending time with Jesus, you will get to know his voice. You will get to know his leading and he will lead you and guide you into the healing that you so want. So, make it a priority in your day, whatever time of day works for you, whatever amount of time works for you, spend some time with your Lord.
Every day that you choose to spend some time with Jesus is like a drop in the bucket of your healing. It will eventually fill up and it will eventually overflow and you will eventually, one day, after taking this first step, you will walk into a place of healing.
You will walk into a place of fullness. You will walk into a place of the promises of God. He will fill those empty places in you. And as you learn to listen to him in prayer and become accustomed to his leading and guidance in your heart, you will know the way he is leading.
My Story
I had been spending time with Jesus in prayer. And one day an invitation came to go deeper into a healing ministry. And as soon as I got the invitation in my email box, I knew that this was for me. I knew deep in my spirit. I just knew that I knew that I knew, I could feel it. And as I went into this time of ministry, it’s where miraculous healing came for me.
So as you spend time with him, he will lead you and guide you into what you need and what will work for you because he knows you so well.And he knows what you need before you even ask him. So, ask him, dear sister.
How Will You Spend the Time?
And I want to encourage you. The days will go by, the time will pass. What are you going to do with it? Will you choose to spend those days running from the pain, choosing to be imprisoned by that hatred, anger, fear, emptiness of soul, or will you have the courage to daily invite Jesus into that place of emptiness and ask him to fill you?
Choose Life
I remember a time that a friend had dragged me with her to a conference. I did not like to go out at that time. I was so comfy in my own house, all by myself. I just wanted to stay home all the time, but she said, “No, you need to come to this conference with me.”
And she dragged me along with her. And without her, I would not have gone. And afterward, she said, let’s go pray because the man who spoke had been praying with people. When he got to us, he prayed over me and he kept saying, “choose life, choose life.”
And at that time I was really a fairly new Christian and I didn’t know what that meant.
But later, I found this verse it’s Deuteronomy 30:19 also in the World English Bible. “I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day that I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse, therefore choose life that you may live you and your seed”
And I know now that that man was telling me to choose life, choose Jesus, Choose inviting Jesus in to work in me, even when I was afraid of the pain. I didn’t want to face the emptiness within me.
I knew that I could choose to stay in my pain and run from it, feeling the emptiness forever, which in a way was choosing death. It would be choosing not to change, to stay in the dysfunctional patterns I had learned, repeating them and passing them down to the next generation,
or ….I could choose life. I could choose Jesus and his way. I could invite him in to work in the pain of anguish and let him change me from the inside out, John 10:10 From the World English Bible says “the thief only comes to steal, kill, and destroy. And I came that they may have life and may have it abundantly.”
Prayer
Would you let me pray for you today?
Father God, I pray for my dear sister, listening to this. I pray that you would give her the courage to invite you in daily to work in her life and in her heart.I pray father, that she would know your voice so intimately. And so clearly, as she gets to know you and gets to know your word , that she would know that she knows when you are speaking. She would know that she knows when you are leading and guiding.
I pray Father, that you would lead her and guide her to the people that you have chosen that would not fill her, but they would point the way to you filling her. I pray that you would lead her to ministries or professionals or whoever you have chosen to help. I pray father, that you would bring people around her that would speak life to her, that would show her a way out of the dysfunctional and unhealthy patterns she’s learned. I pray father that you would bring her to a place of healing. I pray Lord that she would choose life. I pray father that she would come out of choosing the old ways, she would come out of running, she would come out of hiding. She would come out of the darkness, and Lord that she would know that she can be fully open before you, and you accept her and meet her and just where she is.
you father, that you would deliver her from what the devil wanted for her. And you would give her life and life more abundantly. Thank you, father that you go forth and you touch her heart. You heal the broken places within her, and you would shine your light in those dark places and bring such healing, such healing that she has never known she could have. I pray that you would bring her out of the dark places, the places where she’s wondered if you even cared, or if you knew, if you really saw her, dear sister, he sees you. He sees you and your brokenness. He sees you. He knows you. He’s calling you out. And I thank you father for calling my dear sister out and giving her the courage to take the step forward with you in Jesus’ mighty name. Amen.
Thank you for listening to Abide in Jesus. You can find show notes for this episode at Carolynsbooks.com. And if you would like to explore today’s topic further, check out my book, Lord Heal My Heart by clicking on the books tab at Carolynsbooks.com.
