The Filler Upper
- ameschenjie
- 3 days ago
- 3 min read
by Amy Ji | Nov 14, 2025
This month, I had to be in Korea for my cousin's wedding, and some of my friends asked if I was going to do any fillers. (I didn’t!) Whatever I got done on my face—cheek filler, nose filler, jaw filler or the like—would merely be temporary. As time passed, age and weathering would still show on my face.
The Bible says in Psalm 24:1-2,
The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof, the world and those who dwell therein, for he has founded it upon the seas and established it upon the rivers. (ESV)
The original “filler upper” is the LORD! It is He who founded the earth and created the world upon the seas, establishing where we live upon the waters.
The apostle John, when introducing us to Jesus, describes Him like this:
All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. (John 1:3 ESV)
As if it were not enough to say “All things were made through him”, John repeats it in reverse with emphasis: “without him was not any thing made that was made”.
The Psalmist is awed by the same revelation years before the incarnate Christ. He declares that the earth is the Lord’s as well as the world and all who dwell in it, because it is the Lord who made all things. The fullness, the inhabitants, the created things all belong to Him.
So overwhelmed by this realisation, the Psalmist asks in the rhetorical,
The reader recognises that the answer is NO ONE. No one can ascend the Lord’s hill or the Lord’s place because it is HOLY. There is no one worthy or able to meet the Holy God face to face without instant death.
Verse 4 tells us just how impossible it is:
He who has clean hands and a pure heart, who does not lift up his soul to what is false and does not swear deceitfully. (Psalm 24:4 ESV)
Clean hands? Pure heart? Does not lie? Does not swear? I am pretty sure I had the temptation of smacking my toddler when she overturned our newly opened carton of milk this morning. No one is able to meet God's standards, because He is Holy.
But before we back down in the hopelessness of the situation, Yahweh Himself intervenes. We read in Psalm 24:5,
He will receive blessing from the Lord and righteousness from the God of his salvation. (ESV)
The Lord Himself will give blessing; the gift of righteousness will then mean our salvation. Our only recourse, at the end of the day, is the Holy God Himself. The Holy One who comes down to the earth He created to give His very life in exchange for our salvation. The Lord to whom belongs the earth, the world, and all who dwell in it. This is the kind of Lord we belong to, who will allow us the righteousness to commune with Him if we will be a generation that seeks His face.
And so what is our response?
We can take the lead from the Psalmist, who proclaims,
Lift up your heads, O gates! And be lifted up, O ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in. Who is this King of glory? The Lord, strong and mighty, the Lord, mighty in battle! Lift up your heads, O gates! And lift them up, O ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in. Who is this King of glory? The Lord of hosts, he is the King of glory! Selah (Psalm 24:7–10 ESV)
Let the King of glory in!
Let the King of glory into our lives, into our homes. Recognise, like the Psalmist, that the earth is the Lord’s; the world and all who dwell in it belong to Him.
Rather than filling ourselves up with the pleasures of the world, which will not last, let us consider instead how we can fill ourselves up with the original “filler upper”. Let us surround ourselves with all the good He has made—nature, forests, oceans, animals, plants, and the like. And let the King of glory in.
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