I have to be honest with you and share that there have been many times and seasons over the past three and a half decades of walking with the Lord when I didn’t believe He was enough. I believed a lie and it was a simple one: If I was “good” then the Lord was obligated to give me my hearts desire. This was most obvious in my early years of being a Christian.
I figured it worked with raising children and since He was a good Father, it only made sense that if I behaved and followed all the rules He’d give me what I wanted.
And what I wanted back then was another baby. We’d had one amazing daughter two and a half years earlier but after an ectopic pregnancy and subsequent miscarriage, my fallopian tubes were shot and the experts were telling me and my husband that was it, there were going to be no more babies for us unless we adopted. (You can read more about my struggle with infertility here.) And all our attempts at adoption fell through.
Four times.
I thought I had it all figured out. God was obligated to His word and He owed me another baby. I mean, come on! After all, in my immature reasoning, what I wanted was a good thing, children, babies I could raise into decent humans who loved God and wanted to serve Him. I do good and He has to bless me, isn’t that how this thing works?
Not so much. I wrongly believed God was obligated to me. To me!! Can you even imagine? But in my immaturity, He taught me huge life lessons. He took me a long way around to come to a few realizations, truths about Him I couldn’t deny. I’d love to share them with you today because just maybe, you’ve felt the same way I did.
God is Enough
1- He isn’t interested in my happiness as much as my highest good. He knows me far better than I know myself and He alone knows my future. No one in the universe knows exactly what I need more than God and my job is to trust Him even when I don’t understand and even when I don’t like it! It’s the difficult but oh so necessary part of maturing in Christ if we’re ever really going to be able to trust Him. Don’t be afraid to trust Him with your ‘why God?’. Only He knows why I’ve battled anxiety for almost four years. Only He knows why I’ve dealt with seizures since 2018 began. He knows about your struggles too and He cares, deeply.
Anything in life I think can satisfy more than Him simply won’t. He will have nothing less than my whole heart, full of Him and empty of all else including every idol rattling around I feel compelled to bow down to. The good things we desire, like children or finding a spouse or the perfect job, can all become idols if we let them.
Sweet friend, nothing you desire, not the baby, not the relationship, not the job, the raise, the position, the spouse, the influence or recognition, the income, the platform–none of it compares to one real moment in God’s presence. As John Piper famously says, “God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him.”
And God is most satisfied when He can look into our hearts and see His own face reflected there because our hearts are so full of Him.
2– God wants us to want Him for who He is not for what He gives. He is so much more than anything this world could offer although in complete honesty, it took me a long time to learn this. I wanted another baby way more than I wanted Him because I couldn’t see God’s why. All I could see was the huge, gaping hole in my heart, the empty place He couldn’t fill. The hurt and the hollow, the bleeding need.
It took me some years before I was able to understand God’s why. He had very make-sense reasons why He wanted my husband and me to raise an only child and when I look at our daughter’s life today, I totally get it and it makes complete sense, but it didn’t at the time. I promise you, the years will give you a perspective you might not have right now.
3- His greatest mercy is sometimes wrapped in His deepest test. His mercy is so much bigger than our happiness. But know this: God is faithful. He follows through on His promises…
…Every. Single. Time.
It may not look the way you think it should but we aren’t the ones who get to pick. He chooses our future and our job is to “… hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful.” Hebrews 10:23
Are you believing God for something you deeply want or need? What is He teaching you right now? Do you desperately want to avoid the lesson? I get it because I tried to avoid it for years!
But friend, take it from one who’s been there and done that. The best thing you will ever have is Him. Trust me when I tell you, whatever good thing you want, no matter how good it seems right now, can’t ever compare to what He has in store. He’s so much more than you think and He alone knows exactly what’s best for you. Let Him peel back the layers and get to your heart. It’s part of the maturing process.
As you allow Him access to your deepest desires and submit to His deep lessons, you will gain intimacy with Him. As He takes you through and you find He comes through, as you gain firsthand knowledge of His faithfulness, you’ll hear His heartbeat and He will send you out to bring comfort, healing and hope to other bleeding souls.
Perfect Party Sandwiches