Welcome to Welling, for your spiritual well-being and your ministry overflowing. Our whole world is gasping for breath, seeking oxygen. This is a horrific time on the planet. Oxygen concentrators are needed all over the world. People are willing to pay premium price, even excess, for a little bit of oxygen to keep them alive. What an oxygen concentrator does is to take in good air and remove the bad air, and pumps in the enriched oxygen into our blood so that we can have the right levels in our blood.
Oxygen pumps are needed because the lungs cannot breathe on their own, and we can’t get enough oxygen. Oxygen concentrators. The surrounding atmosphere is not all good for you. But oxygenated rich air can be pulled into the oxygen machine and pumped into you, compressed, purified, removing the nitrogen altogether, all the impurities. And you as a patient can survive.
My friend, we need spiritual oxygen. The lung conditions that we face spiritually cannot keep us alive. That’s the declaration of the Apostle Paul in Galatians chapter 2 verse 19, “Through the law I died to the law.” The law doesn’t keep me alive. “But in order that I might live to God,” he gives us the secret. That, “I have been crucified with Christ. And it is no longer I who live.” That’s the prideful egotistical I the old lung conditions cannot be maintained.
The law cannot give you oxygen. But Christ lives in me. He is the oxygen pump in me. He is the oxygen pump in me. Let me repeat that. He is the oxygen pump in me. And He goes through me with this spiritual oxygen. And why does He qualify? Because He loved me and gave Himself up for me. I now live, the rest of my life, I live by faith in the Son of God.
He loved me and gave Himself up for me. It’s the same phrase used in Romans 8. It talks about, “We’re more than conquerors through Him who loved us.” In Galatians 1 he says, “He gave himself up for our sins.” The Son of God talks about God’s very own Son. But it also talks about His Son, because that’s how He could relate to us. He was delivered for us all. He voluntarily gave Himself up. In this beautiful union of God and man here’s the mystery that parallels your union of an ordinary man with Christ.
That’s the secret of the pump, the oxygen pump. Because He loved me and gave Himself up for me. Some time ago, I read the story of a little boy, Clyde, who was born with alagille syndrome, a genetic disorder which affects the liver. Was 11 years old, and the doctors did not give him much time yet. An officer in the police force heard about Clyde. And she decided that if it was a match, she would give her liver, a part of her liver so that Clyde could live.
It’s called non-directed donations. In directed donations you give an organ to somebody you know. But in a non-directed donation, you give it to somebody you don’t know. They performed the transplant, took a part of her liver, put it in young Clyde’s body. As a result, Clyde lived and wrote a note to whoever this anonymous donor was. The officer received it. And she was so moved by the fact that something she did could give life to another person.
But as she read the story, the medical bills were too high. And she did the unthinkable. Not only did she give her liver, she stood by the road with a sign which said, “I donated my left liver to 11-year-old stranger. Help me raise $20,000 for his transplant bill.” And people stopped and gave money. And the hospital bill was covered. Ten thousand from more strangers, and she helped pay the bill. That story is almost like what the Son of God did for you and me.
He loved me and through a directed donation, even though I didn’t know the donor. Knowing that my lung conditions could not keep me alive, He gave His life, not just a part of His life. Gave Himself up. And paid with His life as my medical bill. And so I now live by faith in the Son of God who loves me and gave Himself for me. His faithfulness in giving Himself up in love inspires, motivates, and stimulates my faithfulness to Him. The basis was His faithfulness.
The interaction and active response is my faithfulness. But it’s in a new atmosphere, new state, new condition, new system. You live by faith in the Son of God, because His oxygen pump replenishes your spiritual blood. And you can live. The secret of our welling is his indwelling.