EXpire
To die, to come to an end, to no longer be valid. All of these things come to mind with the word expire. Rarely do we think of exhaling, the alternate definition. Even further from our minds is creation and life. Our response to the great commission begins with being INspired. The living Word of God is taken into our hearts like a deep breath, fanning the sparks in our hearts to where we are stirred to action.
Just as an exhale follows an inhale, after we are inspired, we EXpire. While we don't die or come to an end, our old self does. “Even so consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus” Romans 6:11. Sin is that which turns us away from or separates us from running after God and His callings for us with all our hearts, souls, minds, and strengths. It's letting that fear get in the way of doing more. It's lack of belief in how much God truly loves you or just how BIG His plans for you may be. It's all of the weaknesses and shortcomings we know about ourselves that we let disqualify us. When we let these things die, or expire, we become truly alive. We breathe life out on the world around us.
“By the word of the LORD the heavens were made, and by the breath of His mouth all their host” Psalm 33:6. This creative breath speaks things into existence that were not there before. That gift of breath is a gift He shared with us, that we may to continue “breathing” on His creation and stewarding the earth. In Ezekiel 37, God asks man to speak His word to dry bones so that they would live again. Dry bones represent something completely devoid of life and hope. As Ezekiel speaks in faith, exhaling the creative words of God, the impossible happens and LIFE comes. We have this same calling. We are charged to bring His word to the driest places so that it would restore life beyond our wildest hopes of restoration. Think right now of a place in your own life or in the world that is a dry valley that seems beyond restoration. Commit to pray about how God is calling you to expire. See what happens when you come alive in Christ Jesus and begin to breathe that same hope you were inspired by on the world around you.