I Am Not Enough

“God never gives you more than you can handle.” Ever hear that? I’ve grown to loathe that saying. What bugs me about it is that it implies that I should be able to handle whatever happens because God would not give me more than I can deal with at any given moment.

I’m going to come right out and say it: that is a lie!

If I have been learning anything, it is that God loves to give me more than I can handle! Sometimes way more! I have a number of things on my plate, any one of which would be more than enough to handle. Specifics? Here is some of what has been on my plate lately: a daughter who has been struggling with depression serious enough to land her in the hospital twice, a friend who contracted meningitis, two people who are struggling with cutting, another friend whose dad just died, readjusting my schedule to accommodate the fact that my wife has gone back to work fulltime so that I can take care of my girls, and that’s just the things I am willing to share in a public blog post! Add to that the “normal everyday” headaches and heartaches of being a home owner, family man, pastor of a 300 member congregation, and the academic challenges of working on a PhD thesis. I don’t share this to complain, gripe, whine, or boast. I am not doing any of those things. I share it so that you know I am not making some ethereal or theoretical proposition when I say that I have been learning that God gives me more than I can handle.

What I have been learning is that God’s plan for us includes bringing us into places where we quickly realize that we don’t have what it takes; places where we realize that we don’t have the wisdom, the strength, the resources, the confidence, the man power, the ability, or the finances. He loves taking me to places like that anyway, and I don’t think it’s because I’m “just that special.” He does this because God wants us to see how trustworthy and faithful He is. He is not interested in making you or me feel like we are enough or that we have what we have what it takes. He wants us to come to the opposite conclusion, that He is enough. God is not interested in making us feel capable. He is interested in helping us see that He is capable.

What I have been learning from all this is that I don’t have wonder if I am enough for my wife, my kids, my friends, my church, or even for God. The answer is that I am not. And I am not supposed to be. Life’s first big lesson is learning that you were never meant to be enough. Life’s second big lesson is to be learning that Jesus is enough, and when you have Him you no longer lack anything.

Because of Jesus I don’t have to worry about being enough for God the Father. Jesus took care of that at the cross. He did what I was not capable of, living a life that fully pleased the Father, and dying a death that fully satisfied the Father’s justice for my sin. I don’t need to worry about where I stand with Him. In Him I am enough.

I don’t have to worry about being enough for anyone. They are not my audience or my judge, my heavenly Father is. He is my audience of One. Because of Jesus I have been freed from the idea that my self-worth is the culmination of my performance + the opinion of others. My worth is in being a son of God because of Jesus. And because of Jesus, He is pleased with me, I am precious to Him and dearly loved.

I don’t have to worry about not being enough to handle any problem, challenge, or heartache that comes my way, because Jesus has promised to provide all His wisdom, strength, resources, confidence, man power, ability, and finances to meet whatever need I might have. And He is not short on any of those things. When I get to the other side of these challenges, people know that it wasn’t me—because I’m not that good. God gets the glory. I get the joy of seeing God show time and time again that He is enough.

This side of the ground two things are true: 1). you will always have problems, and 2). when you are done with the problems you have you will find them exchanged with worse problems! That doesn’t change when you accept Jesus as your Lord and Savior. Becoming a Christian will not make your problems go away. In fact, they might get worse! But you will never need to worry about being enough again (you may worry, but you don’t need to worry). Because in Christ, with Christ, through Christ, you will always have enough, because He is enough.