I Am Complete

I am a fanatic when it comes to jigsaw puzzles.  Give me a 300- or 500-piece gorgeous scene puzzle and I will work on it steadfastly until completed.  Last week I finished a 500-piece puzzle, or should I say “I almost finished” the puzzle.  There were four pieces missing from the puzzle’s border which drove me crazy!  I Am Complete means simply there are no missing pieces to the “puzzle of me”; it’s all there.

“In Christ I am deeply loved, fully pleasing, totally forgiven, Complete, and accepted” is the quote from Robert McGhee in his book “Search for Significance.”  Today we focus on the idea that I Am Complete, but only if I am “in Christ.”

Ephesians 3 has an amazing message of being whole or complete in Christ.  In verses 17-19 we hear Paul’s prayer that “Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. . . .so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.”  Seriously Paul?  You honestly believe that each of your readers can “be filled with the fullness of God”?  Sounds to me like I Am Complete is exactly what happens to Christians who have allowed Christ to dwell in us. 

Sorry if this sounds too simplistic, or too “evangelical” or “conservative.”  My favorite seminary professor John Ralls, who taught me the Semitic languages Hebrew, Aramaic, and Akkadian, told a story about “completeness” that I have never forgotten.  A famous Rabbi was asked by his student, “Rabbi, how best does one study the Torah?”  The Rabbi answered the question, “Turn it, turn it, turn it, it’s all there.”  No missing pieces!

I Am Complete, as long as I am “in Christ.” I actually, and literally, can have all the “fullness of God” inside me.  How awesome a thought is that?  In Exodus 3:13-14 Moses has an amazing conversation with God who had asked Moses to go speak to the Israelites.  Moses says, “so if they ask me who you are what shall I say?”  and next he asks God, “please tell me what your name is.”  God then answers Moses with, “I am who I am.”  The Great I Am has come to be a well-known moniker of God.

The Hebrew for the English words “I am” is the Tetragrammaton (four-letters) y-w-h-w.  Most transliterate it as Yahweh, which morphs into Jehovah as God’s name.  But wait, there’s more!  The Tertragrammaton can also mean “I will be who/what I will be” and it can also mean “I cause to be what I cause to be.”  So when, in Christ, I proudly and confidently claim I Am Complete, all of The Great I Am who spoke to Moses is also living inside me!  In Christ there are no missing pieces in me, I Am Complete!

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