Most Christians I know want more of God active and living in their lives. Many times you hear people begging for more of God, saying things like “I want more, I want more.” God appreciates and responds to our hunger, but we get the best results if we start by accepting the word and not asking for things He has already given. What is the scriptural way to go after an increase of the presence and realty of God in our lives? What do we find in the New Testament prayer examples? MORE ON NEW TESTAMENT PRAYERS
You find places in the New Testament where people express a desire for more knowledge of God or a greater understanding but not of people praying for more of God. He has already given us all of Himself. To beg for what He has already given is inaccurate prayer and though God at times “translates” our meaning and answers our hunger, we will get far greater results if we understand the Word and what He has done and already given and pray accordingly.
We don’t all walk in all of God He has given. We are to increase in the knowledge of God. To increase in the true knowledge of God is to increase in the presence of God. I am not talking of head knowledge but of heart to heart knowing God through His word and through His Spirit.
Colossians 1:10 (Amplified) -That you may walk (live and conduct yourselves) in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to Him and desiring to please Him in all things, bearing fruit in every good work and steadily growing and increasing in and by the knowledge of God [with fuller, deeper, and clearer insight, acquaintance, and recognition].
God wants us to be so full of Him that we are filled unto all our being with the fullness of God and have the richest measure of the divine Presence, and become a body wholly filled and flooded with God Himself! This is what God wants. How do we get to this place?
Ephesians 3:19 (Amplified) – [That you may really come] to know [practically, through experience for yourselves] the love of Christ, which far surpasses mere knowledge [without experience]; that you may be filled [through all your being] unto all the fullness of God [may have the richest measure of the divine Presence, and become a body wholly filled and flooded with God Himself]!
Here is a place that speaks of being filled with the fullness of God, and the prayer above this verse tells how to get there. (Ephesians 3:16-20 Amplified)
May God our Father grant you out of the rich treasury of His glory to be strengthened and reinforced with mighty power in the inner man by the Holy Spirit Himself indwelling your innermost being and personality. (Yes Lord I want you to fill the innermost parts of my being as well as flow out of the center of my being to the world around me.)
May Christ through our faith (actually) dwell (settle down, abide, make His permanent home) in your heart. (I put my faith in Him who is in me and He settles down and makes His permanent home in my heart. So I become more filled with Him through faith that He is already in me. this has been called practicing His presence.) MORE ON THIS
May you be rooted deep in love and founded securely on love and may you have power and be strong to apprehend and grasp the breadth and length and height and depth of His love and that you may come to know through experience for yourself the love of Christ.
That you may be filled through all your being unto the fullness of God and have the richest measure of the divine presence.
May you become a body wholly filled and flooded with God Himself.
I can’t be filled with Him to a greater degree that I actually know His love. I can’t be filled with Him greater than I know Him personally.
Ephesians 3:20 – Now to Him Who, by (in consequence of) the [action of His] power that is at work within us, is able to [carry out His purpose and] do superabundantly, far over and above all that we [dare] ask or think [infinitely beyond our highest prayers, desires, thoughts, hopes, or dreams]—
This verse is connected to being filled with the fullness of God. He is able to do exceeding abundantly far above all we ask or think in filling us with Himself. But there is a limitation here; it is according to the power that is actively at work within us.
He is able to do all of the outstanding and wonderful things in the above prayer but He is limited to the power at work within me. The power at work within me is proportion to how much of God I am filled with. The power at work within me corresponds to my personal knowledge of God. It is according to how much of my daily life is filled with God, the Word of God, the thoughts of God, the ways of God. MORE ON THE FULLNESS OF GOD
Any believer can be filled with God in all of the parts of their live He can get into. A person can be filled with the Spirit to overflowing on the day they are born again. But the believer that is filled with the fullness of God is one who is not only full of the Spirit of God to overflowing but one who is filled with the knowledge of God, one who has let God into their thinking and actions.
I had the below picture given to me in 1987 and have been working with the Lord since that point to fill my inner life with God. This is also called renewing the mind. God is limited in our lives by our thoughts. He can only work in and through us to the degree our minds are renewed to think and act like God.
Both vessels are filled to overflowing with the Holy Spirit, but one has more of Him. We don’t need to be filled more up with the Holy Spirit but to filled more down. We need to let Him in to clean up and uproot all the old ways down in our lives so we can be filled to the top and through and through. Just being filled to the top and overflowing is not enough. We also have to apply the Word and work with the Spirit to uproot and demolish the strongholds in our lives. Then when we are filled we are truly filled. We can only filled to the degree our minds our renewed and we think like God.
