I am not enough. It is a terrifying phrase that goes through our heads on quite a regular basis about a plethora of things. Let me tell you a few of the stories I have heard just from my close circle of friends.
Bekah leads boot camps. As she leads neighbors and friends through workouts, she also has seen them through cancer battles and through difficult divorces. She regularly is given the opportunity to talk about Christ, but she wonders all the time if she is doing work that is important enough.
Laura has consistently been among the top salespeople at Noonday, but she still comes home and wonders if her personality is outgoing enough to be in sales.
Sarah had a massive stroke and spends most of her days in rehabilitation, learning to speak and read and walk again. Yet she has found a way to communicate that she worries that she is not a good enough mom to her three kids.
Jesse is in her sixties and divorced many years ago. Jesse glows with love for Jesus. Her kids are grown, so she has free time and recently came to class on mentoring. But she never followed through. When I reached out to her about it, she said, "I didn't think anyone would want to be mentored by someone who has been divorced." Subtly saying, I am not enough.
I want to shake my darling friends. They are pouring out their lives in unique obedient surrender to God, and yet they cannot see that the narrative they are believing is all wrong. And trust me, on a given day they've wanted to shake me too for believing the same lies.
We are so often drug along in the darkness and unable to save ourselves from our thoughts and from our shame and from our mistakes. We tried to slap self-esteem tactics on our fears, but they don't stick because, well... it's true. We are not enough.
It would be a terribly depressing thought -- if it weren't followed by the most freeing truth in all of eternity.
God knew we would never be enough. So He became enough for us. Jesus is our enough.
Now before you glaze over like you are in sixth grade Bible class, stop.
If memorizing that truth was enough to change us, we could end this thing right here. The problem with all our souls is we think we know a truth, but we don't live like it.
Maybe you say you believe Jesus is enough, but then why are you not pulled out near to Him every chance you get? Why do we keep running to everything on earth except Him? Or why has your time with Him become more of a chore than the thing that breathes life into your weary soul?
The truth that we are not enough and Jesus is enough isn't just good news on the day that God saves us. We need to preach the truth to ourselves and each other every day. We have been rescued from a life of striving today.
