Lectio:
“To care means first of all to empty our own cup and to allow the other to come close to us. It means to take away the many barriers which prevent us from entering into communion with the other.”
— Henri Nouwen, Out of Solitude: Three Meditations on the Christian Life
Meditatio:
There was once an old monk who lived in a monastery in the mountains. People came from far and near seeking his counsel — asking to be taught, to be formed, to be opened to the Word of God. He seldom turned any away.
One day an important man came to visit. He was a man accustomed to command, to deference, to having his questions answered on his terms. He arrived with the confidence of someone who has never had to wait long for anything.
“I have come to ask you to teach me about God’s Word,” he said. “Open my mind to Christ.”
The monk smiled and invited him to sit, suggesting this would be better discussed over tea.
They both sat down, empty cups in front of them. The monk then began to pour tea into the man’s cup. The cup filled. The tea rose to the brim. And still the monk poured — until tea ran over sides of the cup, onto the table, and began to spread toward the man’s fine clothes.
“Stop!” the visitor cried. “The cup is already full. Can’t you see?”
The monk set the pot down.
He said nothing for a moment.
“You are like this cup,” he said finally. “So full that nothing more can be added. Come back to me when the cup is empty. Come back with an empty heart. And God will do the filling.”
The man rose, gathered himself, and left.*
He was not the first to stand at that threshold. A young man once came to Jesus with a similar question — Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life? — and listed his credentials carefully, as men who are full of themselves often do. Jesus looked at him and loved him. And then He told him to empty himself of the one thing he clung to most dearly. The young man went away grieved, because the cost of the empty cup was more than he was willing to pay (Matthew 19:16-22). And Jesus, watching him go, said quietly: Many who are first will be last, and many who are last will be first (Matthew 19:30).
The important man and the rich young man are, in this sense, the same man. And so, in our worst moments, are we.
This is the condition Paul names plainly: Those who think they know something do not yet know as they ought to know (1 Corinthians 8:2). It is not a rebuke so much as a diagnosis offered in love. To arrive already full is to close the hand of grace before it can open.
What is needed — what has always been needed — is the willingness to be emptied.
This is not a comfortable teaching. But it is a deeply Christian one.
Jesus told His disciples that unless they became like little children, they would not enter the kingdom of heaven (Matthew 18:3). A child does not arrive with answers already prepared, already full of knowledge and pride. A child holds nothing yet, and therefore can receive everything. The posture of the child is not weakness — it is the very shape of openness to grace.
And the shape of grace, as Paul makes clear, is kenotic. Christ emptied himself, taking the form of a servant (Philippians 2:7). This self-emptying — kenosis — is not incidental to the Gospel. It is the pattern of divine love. It is the form love takes when it chooses to make room for the other. And it is the form we are invited to imitate, not by striving, but by consent.
John the Baptist understood this. He must increase, I must decrease (John 3:30). These words are not spoken in defeat. They are spoken in freedom — the freedom of someone who has discovered that his truest self is found not in his own fullness, but in his willingness to be poured out.
Mary echoes this same teaching when she sings that God has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty (Luke 1:53). Scripture is clear. Those who arrive full leave empty. Those who arrive empty leave full. The cup that is already overflowing cannot receive what God desires to give.
We are not told what the important man chose.
We are only left with the question he carried down the mountain — and the one we must now carry ourselves.
Is the cup empty yet?
*This story is adapted from the traditional Zen story “A Cup of Tea,” found in Zen Flesh, Zen Bones, compiled by Paul Reps and Nyogen Senzaki (Rutland, VT: Charles E. Tuttle, 1957; 1985), chap. 1.
Oratio:
Grace, empty me
for Your purpose.
Strip away my false selves,
burn away my false idols,
rid me of all false understanding —
leaving not vacancy,
but openness
to be filled by Your love;
not absence,
but receptivity
to Your presence.
Quiet my mind
that Your voice may be heard
through the noise of the world,
the chatter of desire and fear.
Heal all of my brokenness
in light,
in love,
in the stillness of truth.
Contemplatio:
What would it mean for you to come to God today not with answers or credentials, but with an empty cup — open, receptive, and willing to be filled?
Related Scripture:
“Create in me a clean heart, O God, and put a new and right spirit within me.” — Psalm 51:10
For Further Reading:
If you enjoyed this post, you may also like Doing Nothing: Finding Rest in Surrender and Sacred Stillness, which explores a similar Zen-rooted wisdom through the lens of Christian surrender and Sabbath rest, inviting us to trust that God is at work even when we are still.
~Robert Van Valkenburgh
Grappling With Divinity.
Wrestling With God.
Returning To Love.
Leave a Reply