“Fully Full”

Dinner often goes like this in my house: “Mom, I’m done! I don’t want to eat more vegetables. I’m full!” followed in short succession by, “Can I have dessert?” And with that final request, my kids unintentionally expose a truth: how one can both be full and still have room for more. I’d love to call out the blatant deception in their mealtime “gaslighting,” but Acts 6 shows us that fullness can have layers. Maybe my kids are onto something. (But don’t tell them that.)

Acts 6 is full of the word “full”: The “full number of disciples” (v. 2); men chosen to serve who were “full of the Spirit and of wisdom” (v. 3); Stephen, a man “full of faith and of the Holy Spirit” (v. 5); Stephen again, described as being “full of grace and power” (v. 8). “Full” in Acts 6 is not full like you feel after eating a big meal—it’s full like you’re a cup filled to the brim, but the water keeps coming and starts spilling everywhere.

Stephen is that kind of “fully full” of faith, wisdom, grace, and power, and his fullness was dynamic. It impacted everyone around him. Stephen was already full, yet the Spirit kept filling him. He overflowed so much that his face literally shone like an angel’s (v. 15).

For Stephen, fullness wasn’t a stopping point—it was a launching pad. Our “fully fullness” is too!

That kind of fullness doesn’t stay hidden. How could it? Even when people opposed him, they “could not withstand the wisdom and the Spirit with which he was speaking” (v. 10). Fullness, when rooted in the Spirit, doesn’t just hold steady (which often feels like a pretty good result to us); it overflows and multiplies.

The Easter story paints for us the ultimate picture of “fully full.” The empty tomb is a paradox: It looks empty, but actually, it’s filled to the brim. It teems over with the fullness of God’s victory over death, the fulfillment of his promises, and the abundant life now available to us in Jesus.

“Fully full” doesn’t stop. It never runs dry. The Spirit’s fullness is dynamic, overwhelmingly spilling everywhere, demanding and providing more and more and more.

Respond: Write your name, followed by the “fully full” description from Acts 6:5. (For example: “Janetta, a woman full of the Spirit and of wisdom, full of faith and of the Holy Spirit, full of grace and power.”) Now, begin to imagine how God is making these qualities true of you. What might be standing in the way of this becoming a reality in your life? Take some time to reflect and write those things down, and ask God’s Spirit to make you fully full and overflowing.