Made for More

A Made for More Moment

I want to share a story with you. Everyone was standing during worship, but there was a young woman, maybe 23, sitting on the carpet at the front of the church. Out of nowhere, she started singing the chorus to The Blessing:

"May his favor be upon you, and a thousand generations, and your family, and their children, and their children's children."

Her rhythm wasn't perfect, but it was enough for people to join in. A few looked around, unsure what was happening, then began whispering and joining her. I asked the worship pastor, "Do you know her?" He said no. It felt like a risk, but I got off the stage, found her, and amplified her voice with a microphone. Suddenly the whole church got on board.

Fast forward five minutes — people were stamping like it was a football match, crying out that same blessing over and over. It built into a beautiful, arcing moment. I turned to the band and said, "Find the key of the song and join in," and it went to another level. It was incredible.

At the end of the night, a young pastor came up to me with tears in his eyes and said, "You have no idea about her." He texted me her story with her permission:

"A young woman came to our church and reached out for pastoral care. She had become a Christian a few months earlier. She was the only person in her family who followed Jesus. A lot of her family was deep into the dark stuff. Her whole life from childhood had been witchcraft, blood rituals, the occult, Ouija boards, tarot cards — you name it, she lived it. We were meeting with her for prayer ministry, healing and deliverance. She was rough around the edges, experiencing the very early stages of liberation in Jesus, but also the pain of the past clinging on. She was always desperate to come to church because she said that's where her inner pain became quiet."

And then there was a gap, and one last line: she ended up leading us all in a breakthrough moment of worship.

Why This Matters

Why is that story important? Because when we talk about being made for more, it's because we've had situations in our lives that have forced us to settle for less. Why was she singing about God's favor being on her family and generations? Because God wants to reverse the curse for so many of us — we've lived and agreed with a lie that says, "God, you can go this far but you can't go here." He wants to go further. He loves us enough that he doesn't want to leave us as we are.

It was a heavenly interruption. As the theologian Bonhoeffer said:

"We must be ready to allow ourselves to be interrupted by God."

When we gather as church, let's be ready to be interrupted by him. We see made-for-more moments all through Scripture — Moses at the burning bush, Samuel hearing the audible voice of God, Paul on the Damascus road. Each one: you're not designed to do that, you're designed to do this.

The Story of Nathanael

Let's look at John 1:43-51 (NIV), the story of Nathanael.

The next day Jesus decided to leave for Galilee. Finding Philip, he said to him, "Follow me." Philip, like Andrew and Peter, was from the town of Bethsaida. Philip found Nathanael and told him, "We have found the one Moses wrote about in the Law, and about whom the prophets also wrote—Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph."

"Nazareth! Can anything good come from there?" Nathanael asked.

"Come and see," said Philip.

When Jesus saw Nathanael approaching, he said of him, "Here truly is an Israelite in whom there is no deceit."

"How do you know me?" Nathanael asked.

Jesus answered, "I saw you while you were still under the fig tree before Philip called you."

Then Nathanael declared, "Rabbi, you are the Son of God; you are the king of Israel."

Jesus said, "You believe because I told you I saw you under the fig tree. You will see greater things than that." He then added, "Very truly I tell you, you will see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man."

I love this story because it gives us a glimpse of God's grace — he meets us where we are, and he moves us toward more.

Here's my tongue-twister summary: Nathanael foregoes the figs and follows Philip to find the one to follow, only to find he's been found and free to firmly follow forever.

Under the Fig Tree

What do we know? Nathanael is from Cana, a rival town to Nazareth — maybe that explains his disdain. We know he's sitting under a fig tree. We don't know why, or what he's thinking.

But here's something interesting: throughout the Bible, God has a habit of meeting people under trees.

• Abraham (Genesis 18) sat under the oaks of Mamre, where the Lord reminded him of a great promise — the place of God's promise.
• Elijah (1 Kings), fleeing Jezebel, sat under a juniper tree and encountered God's provision.
• Jonah, running from his call to Nineveh, sat under a tree God caused to grow — the place of God's proclamation.

Sitting under a tree is neither here nor there. It's not home, and it's not work — it's a space apart, a liminal space. That's a bit like what we're doing here at church. We come in with all our questions and our mess, saying, "God, come and meet with me here before I go back to work." If you feel like you're in the middle and the muddle and the mess of life, you are in exactly the right place. And if you know a friend in that place, invite them — who knows what God could do?

The Classic Double Jesus

Jesus sees Nathanael under the tree and gives him two words of knowledge:

1. "I know you." "Here truly is an Israelite in whom there is no deceit." He knows what makes Nathanael tick.
2. "I see you." He saw him under the fig tree.

Today, he knows you. He sees you. He sees the agreements we've made to settle for less — it's not news to him. He's simply waiting, because his desire is that we would experience more. He sees the pain beneath a shiny exterior, and the gap between who we want to be in Christ and where we actually spend our lives.

Stepping Out in Words of Knowledge

I want to tell you about one of the first times I stepped out in the gift of words of knowledge. It was at a gathering of about 50 people, years ago, in a church in London. The speaker said, "Look around the room and see if God is saying anything to anyone — even something as faint as the fluttering of a butterfly's wings. Then go and share it."

I looked around, and a phrase came to mind about a tall man across the room: "Go and tell him he's a real prince." I said, "No, Lord, I'm not doing that." But then I wrestled with it — if I want to grow, I have to risk. If you want to be made for more, you've got to risk.

So I went up to him and said, "You don't know me, but I sense God wants to say to you: you're a real prince." He drew me close and said, "Who told you?" I said, "Jesus." He replied, "I've just moved to London from another country. I'm the prince of that country, and I haven't told anyone because I don't want to be judged differently." I said, "Well, God knows you and sees you." He said it was such an affirmation to know that God knew him.// A word makes all the difference.

Where are you at with that? Are you still stepping out and seeking God for the prophetic? Or has it become, "That was a nice party trick when I first became a Christian, but I'm not sure where I'm at with it now"?

You Will See Greater Things

Jesus tells Nathanael, "You believe because of the word of knowledge — that's the entry point. But you'll see greater things than that... you will see heaven open, the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man."

This references Jacob's ladder in Genesis — Jacob's dream of angels ascending and descending, an open heaven. He woke and named the place Bethel, meaning "house of God."　Jesus is saying: if you stick with me, if you follow me, it will be as if heaven is upon earth right here — heaven here in Fulham, as we gather in his presence.

That's why worship matters so much. It's not just a warm-up before the preach. We gather around Jesus because where he is, heaven and earth meet — and I need to be there, because I spend far more of my time in an earthly dimension than a heavenly one.

This is a story about an initial encounter leading to a lifetime of encounters — Nathanael following Jesus and seeing demons cast out, people healed, lives turned around, families restored, amazing miracles.

Opening Ourselves Up Again

Where are you right now? Do you still carry that expectation? It's okay if you don't — that's what church is for, to remind and help each other on the journey. Here are some pointers I've found useful for opening ourselves up again to the power of the Holy Spirit.

1. You're here on your own terms. Engage at any level you want. Whether you're ready to swing from the chandeliers or you're deconstructing what you believe about the Spirit, it's okay — you're here. The aim isn't to have someone else's experience of God; it's to have your experience with God. Be honest with him.

2. Err on the side of freedom, not caution. Stretch yourself by 20% when you come to worship or pray. Don't just do what you've always done. If your heart says to kneel, kneel. If there's a time of ministry, don't hold back — let's make an agreement that ministry is never awkward again. We all need to wake up and say, "Lord, help me become a Christian again. I need you. I can't do this on my own."

3. Figure out what type of stuck you are. There are three kinds:

• Nostalgia — looking back to a season when God moved powerfully (like the Toronto Blessing). Thank God for the past, but say, "Lord, show me what's happening now."
• Stuck in the mud — shame, sin, unhelpful practices. The remedy: confess, repent, repeat. Bring it to the Lord again and again.
• Stuck in a minefield of distractions — the answer is to stick with it more than you think you should. Give it more than 20 seconds. Stay in it.

4. Let things surface instead of suppressing them. If pain, joy, or tears rise up, let them come. Suppressing what God is doing builds a history of spiritual suppression that makes it harder to be free in his presence. Follow the feeling — if he's doing it, let him do it.

5. Don't despise what God is doing. We can feel a whole range of things about the mystery of God — maybe others are being healed and we're not, others seem anointed and we're not. Try to see God as part of the solution, not the problem. If we see him as the problem, we have to deal with that first. But if we see him as the solution, we can say, "I don't understand all this, but I believe you are good, you're for me, you love me — so I'm going to open myself and go with this."

6. Choose to bless what he's doing.

Closing

You and I were made for more. This is all about learning to let in God's love — more and more and more — that we would truly know we are valued by the King of kings. He loves us as we are, but he wants to move us into a place of more. Amen.