Why Can Life Feel Empty When It Is Full?
Our Lives Can Start To Feel Empty When We Try To Find What We Can Only Get From God, Instead Of The Things Of This World. We Can Be Tempted By All The Flashy And Pretty Things That Our Society Tries To Make Us Believe Will Fill Our Souls. It can be anything from the latest beauty product that will make us look ten years younger, having the newest model of a certain car, making more money, or even that certain person who we think will meet every need that we have. It may work in the short term, but after a bit, the newness and excitement start to wear off. The satisfaction does not last long, and we are right back where we started again. Looking for that certain thing that will fill us again, and we can repeat it over and over many times, fooling ourselves that the next thing surely should make a difference. Then it doesn’t, and we are left unsatisfied with the same hole that was in our soul before.
We don’t need to look hard to find an example of this in the Bible. King Solomon was one of the wealthiest and most well-known kings that we read about in the Old Testament. He started out well, asking the Lord for wisdom and even being known for finishing the temple. As we continued learning about him, things eventually went downhill for him. He accumulated a lot of wealth, which never was enough. He did get married, but that also was out of control; he ended up having 700 wives and 300 concubines. His wives lead him away from God, and he ended up worshipping idols. He had all of this, and yet it was not enough. The book of Ecclesiastes shows some of his thoughts on the matter. In Chapter 2:11, Solomon says:
“Yet when I surveyed all that, my hands had done and what I had toiled to achieve, everything was meaningless, a chasing after the wind; nothing was gained under the sun.”
He did not deny himself anything and still felt empty. His life is the perfect example of this. We will never be totally satisfied with what this world gives us.
What Are We Meant For?
We were made to have a relationship with God. Our complete purpose will only come from him. The hole in our souls will only be filled by him. Everything that we do in this life and all that we acquire comes from him. He will never let us get complete satisfaction from the things that he gives us. We are meant to walk with him every day and do life with him. In all of our humanness, there is a void in our lives that only God can fill, money can't do it, drugs, alcohol, sex, pornography, gambling, titles, as the list goes on. That void is there for a reason and God reminds us that only He and He alone can fill it.
Another purpose we have on this earth is to glorify our creator and point others toward him. We were made in his image, and we are meant to reflect him. That is such a high calling, whether we realize it or not. We get the honor of pointing people to Jesus. It might not be done perfectly, but that is when we need to rely on him to help us live it out. I am to reflect my creator to those around me. This has given me more purpose than anything else. I want to choose to live for Jesus each day of my life.
Formless and Void From the Start
There is a phrase I want to share with you because it adds such dimension to the story the Bible tells, beginning with the first sentence in the Bible. And besides, it’s kind of fun to say. Ready? Here it is: Tohu wabohu (תהו ובהו).
It’s there, in the opening sentences of the Bible. Our English Bible reads, “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep” (Gen.1:1-2) The Bible begins by saying that God created the heavens and the earth and that it was, in Hebrew, tohu wabohu. It was “without form and void” or “formless and empty” (NIV). Tohu means “unformed, chaotic wilderness,” and bohu means “empty.” So, Genesis 1:2 tells us that when God created the heavens and the earth, it was initially an uninhabitable wasteland, a barren wilderness. There was no shape or form to it. No life could live in it.
I suppose I’ve always thought that when God created the earth, he spoke it into existence as it is. But evidently what God spoke into being was initially a mass of unformed matter in which nothing and no one could live. It was the raw materials to which God would give shape and form. In fact, there were three significant problems with the earth as God initially created it, according to Genesis 1:2. It was formless, empty, and dark. But it was not without hope. Why? Because “the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters” (Gen. 1:2).
God sees the emptiness in your life as his greatest opportunity.
The Spirit of God was there hovering—or fluttering—over the deep darkness of the unformed earth like a hen hovering over an unhatched cosmos.1 Something was about to happen. God, by his Spirit, through his Word, was about to illumine and order and fill his creation.
What God Does with Empty
What Can We Do When Life Feels Empty?
At some point, even if things are going well for us, it will feel like something is still missing. It is so easy for us as humans to try and find satisfaction in the things of this world. We search and we search, forgetting the one who has given us everything, we are mistakenly trying to get our satisfaction from. So, what do we do when life does start to feel empty?
Ultimately, we need to change our perspective. We can ask the Lord to remind us of how much he alone satisfies us, and of how much we need him. He wants us to enjoy the blessings and the gifts he gives us, but again we need to remember that they are things that were never meant to fulfill us.
To keep the right mindset, we can learn to have the Lord as our primary motivation for living our lives. While we are working, we can do it for the Lord; if we are taking care of our kids, we can ask him to give us energy, or if we are enjoying something we have been blessed with, we can thank the Lord for it. It is all about keeping our focus on God, so we remember where our purpose and worth come from.
The benefit of learning to live out of the worth I have in Jesus is that I grow in my relationship with him. With him as my focus, I tend to keep him involved in my daily life. As I experience life with him, I also experience his goodness, kindness, and faithfulness. He is always with me, no matter if I acknowledge him or not. As long as I stay focused on him, my life does not feel empty. It feels full.
So right there in the first chapter of the Bible we discover that tohu wabohu is not a problem for God. As his word, “Let there be,” goes out, and as the Spirit’s creative energy hovers, what was dark was flooded with light, what was chaotic came to order, and what was empty was filled with life and beauty and purpose.
This is really good news. Because, although you may have been unfamiliar with the term tohu wabohu, the reality of it may be achingly familiar. Perhaps you sense that the deepest, most honest place inside you is tohu wabohu—a dark and brooding emptiness. Perhaps it is an emptiness brought about by loss. There was once something or someone that filled up that space in your life, but now your heart aches with longing for what once was. Now there is an empty place at the table or an empty room in the house, or you sleep in an empty bed. Instead of having plans and a sense of purpose, an empty schedule and future loom before you.
Tracing 9 themes throughout the Bible, this book reveals how God’s plan for the new heaven and the new earth, far better than restoration to Eden, is already having an impact in the world today.
Or perhaps the emptiness in your life is punctuated not by what once was but by what has never been. There has never been a ring on your finger or a child in your womb or a title by your name. The dreams you have often sought to downplay for fear that saying them out loud would somehow serve to crush them, and thereby crush you, seem to be out of range or the realm of possibility. Or perhaps you can’t pinpoint exactly why you have this sense of emptiness. You realize that in comparison to so many others around you, you have it good. Yet your soul harbors a nagging sense of disappointment and discontentment. It sometimes seems as if the lives of nearly everyone around you are full of purpose and meaning, life and love, fun times, and future, which serve to punctuate the empty place in your life.
I would encourage each one of you to really look at your lives and ask the Lord to point out areas you are trying to find your worth and identity in other than in him. The gifts and things that he gives us in this life are not bad things, but it becomes harmful when we use them for their unintended purposes. It will take self-awareness and the ability to admit when we are wrong. I have lived my life both ways, and I know what the better choice is. Choose to get your worth, identity, and purpose from Jesus. This is what we are created for. Once we realize this, our lives will feel fuller.
Sometimes your sense of emptiness haunts you as an undefined yet nagging ache. At other times it overwhelms you as an undeniable yet relentless agony. Perhaps you have come to see your emptiness as your biggest problem. I must tell you: that’s not how God sees it. God Sees The Emptiness In Your Life As His Greatest Opportunity Because God Does His Best Work With Empty As He Fills It With Himself.
Blessings
J.P. Olson
www.journeyintotheword.com
Join Journey Into The Word each Sunday morning at 5:30 AM CST & 6:30 AM EST on The Now Network http://www.theNOWnetwork.org
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