Is God Enough?
“For this reason I bend my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner self, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled to all the fullness of God. Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us, to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen. ”
This was the question my friend posed to me as I fought back tears. “But I’m human, I have needs too.” I knew that in that moment that I replied, God was not enough for me. I’m so grateful for the people in my life who allow me to be human and listen to my raw emotions and thoughts without judgement. Over the past few weeks that passed since that conversation, the question has been in the forefront of my mind. Some days, I wake up at peace and happy that God is enough. Other days, I have to fight to make God enough. And still others, if I’m being completely honest, it feels like my faith is just not adequately strong to say that He is enough.
I think it’s very easy for us, in our (religious) pride, to say God is always enough. We frequently dismiss the pain and suffering of others by using one version of “God is enough” or another. But to be human is to say that while we know that God in Himself is enough, our brokenness often doesn’t allow ourselves to embrace Him as enough. We seek validity out of our rejection, companionship out of our loneliness, and comfort out of our pain, and we seek all of these alleviations from others or objects rather than from Him. In other words, the basis of God not being enough is often that we just don’t look to Him to be enough - we look everywhere else.
For those of us with chronic illnesses, allowing God to be enough is painful. Literally. There are times when we must choose whether God will be sufficient to bring us through situations in which medications, doctors, and other people have failed us. For God to be ample quite often means understanding that the discomfort will not cease and must be endured; that the battle must be fought in our inner selves through the power of the Holy Spirit. After long bouts of battle, endless days of pain, and no relief on the horizon, quite honestly, it does not feel like God is enough. To endure chronic disease and pain is to endure the cycle of faith that goes from “I can do all things through him who strengthens me” (Philippians 4:13) to “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? O my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer, and by night, but I found no rest?” (Psalm 22:1a; 2) In that cycle, our comprehension of God goes from Him being enough to Him barely being present.
And the same can be true for many other circumstances in our lives whether it be in the process of grieving, in finding our identity in Christ, in figuring out exactly where we belong in ministry or in our careers, or through other arduous trials. We go from being certain of who God is and what He is to us to feeling abandoned and uncertain of His promises. And if and when we realize that we have not allowed God to be our center, our rock, our “enough” through the process, shame can begin to rear its ugly head. It really is a vicious and spiritually-damaging cycle.
We have two options when we have hit this sort of bottom of the cycle- first, we can continue down the path on which we continue to seek the answers to all of our needs and disappointments from people, places, ideas, or things, or, second, we can begin to shift our attention to all the ways we have neglected to give God the opportunity to be enough, and begin to open the door to healing and subsequent fulfillment. Now, I have to emphasize that this is a personal choice. The caveat to God being enough sometimes means painfully relinquishing control, letting go of dreams, or even shifting the trajectory of our entire lives. No one is saying that the process is easy, and thus there is no judgement from me for anyone who continues to pursue what he/she wants despite disappointment and roadblocks. But, at what point will God be enough? That is the question to ask before heading down that path.
I have to say that despite my own struggles with allowing Him to be sufficient, I am pretty confident that I know what God wants. He wants to be enough for us in every circumstance and situation. He knows our needs, our desires, the human psychological traits and sociological tendencies that drive us, and our worries. He knows the pains of this life and the burdens of living in this world. He wants to be our refuge in the midst of it all. But He doesn’t force Himself on us, because He understands how true love works. He desires us to love Him the way He loves us and to acknowledge that He is all-sufficient and has an infinite capacity to meet every single need that we have. He has shown us through Jesus Christ that even though we alone will never be enough for Him, we are made enough through the redemption and justification that came by way of Jesus’ death and resurrection. And if we, in all of our messy, dirty, destructive, selfish ways can be enough for Him, surely the perfectly righteous, one and true living God can be enough for us in any circumstance.
Food for thought: Is there an area(s) of your life in which you are feeling alone/isolated, disappointed, or burdened by? What is missing and where are looking to fill that gap? Are you willing to make God and His will be enough in that area?