You are Enough - Day 16

There are so many days when you might feel like a fraud.  If you're like me, you rolled out of that hospital with your first baby in your arms, half looking over your shoulder expecting someone to come to take him away and tell you that you aren't qualified.  I mean, you're barely an adult, have only had a little practice playing house before a baby appeared, shattering all your certainties.  You have shining moments and pray God will let those be the memories cemented into your kids' brains.  But you feel sure those moments are overshadowed by your uncertainty and missteps.

This is a serious job.  You feel the weight of eternal souls entrusted to your care and development.  You've seen Judge Judy's courtroom enough times to know that getting it wrong can get ugly.  The last thing you want is someone carrying your last name around in the future, like a banner of your parenting skills, while they're acting like a brat and being irresponsible.  You don't want it for you, and you certainly don't want it for them.  But getting from point A to point B seemed like a much more straight line before you were holding an actual person with your last name in your arms.

You're giving this everything you've got.  You pray with more urgency than you ever have before.  And you've leaned in to do some deep work in your soul, knowing that you don't have a choice about putting it off any longer.  You are giving pieces of yourself that you didn't know existed.  You're finding out the hard way that the well you are drawing from isn't as deep as you thought it was.  Disappointment and fear want to have their way with you because now you know you're not enough for your precious child.

I get it.  I've felt the panic-laced catch in my throat and  I've talked myself down off that ledge more than once.   But I've also found an antidote to this fear, the secret sauce, the magic bean, the THING that will help you not only feel like enough but actually BE enough!  Sharing it with you makes me giddy! I am beyond confident this can change everything about your mothering - if you just believe it.  So lean in, listen close, take this one lesson deeper into your soul than any other.

YOU are enough for TODAY,

because God CHOSE you for today,

& He is enough EVERY DAY.

I am convinced the answer to all of life's challenges is really just one monumental truth. When we fill our minds with a bigger, more accurate understanding of who God is - that's it! This answers everything, even the big question of how to be a good-enough mother.  It's a simple formula really, like algebra or computer coding.

 IF this, THEN this.

IF God is the giver of life, THEN He gave this life to me.

IF God always does what is right, THEN making me this child's Mom wasn't an accident.

IF God has a good plan for my child's life, THEN I must be a part of that goodness.

IF God designed the family, THEN He must be using it for His purposes.

IF God is always working, THEN He must be doing something in my child's life.

IF God powerful, THEN my failures aren't big enough to thwart His plans.

THIS is the secret friends - your little is always ENOUGH when it's put into God's capable hands.  You give your best, you pray, and then you rest....and watch God do what God does.

There was a great crowd following Jesus and His disciples one day.  They were thrill-seekers, people who just wanted to see a show.  But they were also just people at dinner-time, people who were hungry.  Jesus saw their needs and cared.  He also saw needs in His disciple's hearts and cared about those.  To meet both needs, Jesus asked His disciples where they thought they should buy dinner for the crowd.  Phillip answered right away because the answer was obvious!  None of them had enough to feed this many people, the needs were too great!  "Impossible!" was Phillip's answer.  But then Andrew spoke up.

You see, Andrew had been watching Jesus.  He knew that sometimes things that shouldn't add up, did when Jesus was involved.  And so Andrew ignored the obvious in favor of miraculous potential.

There was a boy in the crowd who's Momma had packed him a lunch.  Andrew led this boy to Jesus with his lunch open and said, "Here is a boy with five small barley loaves and two small fish, 

but how far will they go among so many?"

That's all Jesus was waiting for, a paltry offering and the unspoken question, "Can you meet the needs I see with this, even though it's not enough??"  

Jesus had the people all sit down and began breaking the food, giving thanks and passing it out.  He didn't stop until "....they had all had enough to eat."  Jesus didn't just give them a snack to tide them over, He satisfied them with an offering that was totally insufficient until it was in Jesus' hands.

You have loaves and fishes in your hands right now.  You have to decide what to do with them.  The end of the story is up to you.  Will you cry over those loaves and fishes because it's so painfully obvious there isn't enough to go around?  Will you hunch over and protect the little you have, fearful that it will get used up and you'll be left empty?  Or will you walk up to Jesus, holding your tiny treasure in outstretched arms?  Will your panic turn to adrenaline as you hand it to Him knowing that He WILL make it ENOUGH.  Will you live freely and be a Mom who can smile because you've found a rock-solid place to put your confidence?

Give your best today.  It will not match the needs before you and you will feel inadequate.  Good.  That's the right place to be because it's the place God most often does His loaves & fishes things.  He gave you those specific children, with those specific needs and He made your inadequate heart.  He has a plan and it will not be thwarted.  Just offer up what you have and get ready.  You're going to need baskets to gather up the leftovers of God's goodness and you're going to need to have an answer ready that points to the goodness of God when people ask you what just happened!