He Is Enough

I have become painfully aware lately of how many decisions I make every day that are driven by fear. It’s humbling, embarrassing, as a matter of fact, to come to the realization that I don’t trust God nearly as much as He deserves.

This God who has lovingly made me one of His own, who has sovereignly ordained events and people in my life that always work things out for my good and His glory. A God who daily wants to bear my burdens. One who sent His only Son to die for me. Yes, the one who protects me from so many things I know nothing about and the One who gives me new mercies every morning.

I shrink back from Him. I hold onto things way too tightly, not even realizing I’m doing it.  I react out of a heart that is still convinced that I need to understand everything, that my opinion is far weightier than it really is, that somehow I know better than He does, and that maybe He isn’t really good after all.

I could justifiably throw myself onto Him in reckless abandon based only on what I’ve had the privilege of seeing Him do in my life and the lives of many others. But I don’t.

Instead, I forget.

I forget the countless times He has met me in the deepest, darkest places where no one else could go. The times he has turned circumstances around in a way that only He could…to show me how much He loves me and to prove His mighty power to me once again.

I forget those moments when His presence simply overwhelmed me and my spirit cried out, “Whom have I in heaven but you, and there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you.” Psalm 73:25

This God who is enough?  I have known this Enough when I grieved the loss of our grandson at birth. I have known this Enough when our youngest was born with a life-threatening heart condition. I have known this Enough when I thought sleep deprivation was going to KILL me as a mom of many young children and when our finances were looked bleak and hopeless. I have known this Enough when I was betrayed and rejected by those I’ve deeply loved.

So why?  Why do I keep returning to this place of faithlessness? Maybe because I am too comfortable...because my heart is more wicked than I can imagine? Yes, and yes, and more.

But, then there is God.  

He doesn’t look at me and see this pathetic version of His child that I see.  Why?  Because He has the compassionate heart of a father and because He is in love with His daughter, He sees what I cannot:  He sees a little girl who forgets and get scared. Who forgets who her father is and that she belongs to Him…that she bears His image and this icky version of herself is not who she really is.  

And when that little girl realizes this once again, she becomes fearless...fearless because her heart is able to trust again, to throw herself into her daddy’s arms and surrender everything to Him: her life, her family, her future. And what she gets back is far, far greater than all she could ask or imagine.

So I ask myself, “What if?” What if I abandoned my exhausting efforts to protect so many things I deem as “important” and instead live daily in His presence, convinced that He IS enough?

God, let it be so.

“My heart and my flesh may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.” Psalm 73:5