Fill My Cup, Lord

I’m sure you’ve heard the saying that goes something like this: you can’t give from an empty cup. Usually it’s applied to moms. The ones who constantly give and don’t make time to take care of themselves. Can I give you a new twist on this old adage? We can’t give from an overfilled cup too well either.

I love the sound of pouring my coffee into my mug. Depending on my mug of choice for the morning, I often pour too close to the brim. I don’t want to leave a drop in the carafe, so I try to fit in every last drop. It’s good to the last drop, right? Why would I want to miss that? Then of course I have to add my sugar, creamer, and my powdered protein. Yup, now I have to slowly lift the cup to my lips to take a few sips before I spill it. Sometimes I can’t even lift it. I have to bend down to the counter and sip ever so carefully.

There are people that are like an overfilled cup of coffee, you know. The ones who work super hard at everything they are asked to do, the ones that can’t say no in the first place when they are asked to do something. The ones with a tender heart that always want to help, and therefore, they feel bad saying no to anyone. So they say yes. And yes, and yes again. Oh, they are saying yes to lots of good things, mind you. They are active, and helping, and serving, and doing God’s work. But when we fill our lives with too many good things and we can’t handle it all, we risk spilling. Staining a surface. Taking time to clean up a mess.

So how do we avoid this risk of overfilling our cup? It’s an easy answer, but we often forget to do it. Let God fill our cup. He knows our capacity. He knows when to say “when.” Let Him guide our choices, because it’s ok to say no sometimes. The good thing may not always be the best thing for us.

May our daily prayer be, “Fill my cup, Lord, for I spill way too easily.”