I am enough. He is enough. “I Am” IS enough.
I have recently been working on some affirmations from God’s word that I know God is saying to me. “I am enough” is only one of about forty words or phrases. Yes, that is a LOT. But the way I see it… there is always room for improvement in our lives. Right? And when I think about “I am enough,” it leads me to “He is enough”... and ultimately, “I Am” IS enough.
How did I land on sharing this one with you? I have this emotional pain words sheet that my counselor shared with me way back in the beginning of counseling nearly 3 years ago. The list consists of 137 words. I had decided back then to go through it and pick ALL the ones that were pertinent to me. There were several… forty-four words to be exact. We have worked through many of them while in counseling. Time has a way of putting salve on the wounds. I did realize recently though, that I needed to revisit the list just to see where I was at in my progress. I found that I still have quite a few that need my attention… twenty-six. Not that I deal with all of them on a daily basis… but some do follow me daily. Others pop up like the Jack-in-the-box that pops up when you crank the handle. And yes, they sometimes make me jump. Jump out of fear or jump out of surprise, wondering, “where on earth did that come from?”
The list of words are extensive and also somewhat disheartening if I look at them as a whole: abandoned, alone, overwhelmed, stressed, unprotected, wounded, angry, anxious, bitter, confused, despair, failure, fear, forced, frustrated, guilty, lonely, lost, sad, scared, suffocated, trapped, unsafe, vulnerable, out of control…or rather, no control over anything. That is a good chunk of the list and gives you an idea of what surfaces on any given day. I hope it also helps you to know that you are not alone in your feelings, whatever they are. I will attach a copy of the Emotional Pain Words here for you. The first six words I wrote above are the words that are present almost on a daily basis to some degree. They lurk around the corner to jump out at me at any given moment. And after all of that, I just need to insert here… but Jesus. Always Jesus who is enough to remove them.
Mentally Smeared
I had a particularly rough week not long ago. I felt “mentally smeared” (credit to my daughter, Rachael) Or as another friend put it, “I let a thousand lying voices of doubt fill my head.” I was allowing the father of lies to be my apprentice when it came to negative feelings and self talk. Honestly, I have fought with this through most of my life… perhaps you have fought those demons as well? That alone is exhausting to a precious soul.
My realization when I walked into counseling later that week was that I had been wanting to throw in the towel a lot in recent days. The wait (for whatever!) is long and exhausting sometimes. Days become weary long days when there are lies jumping out from the surrounding woods to badger and taunt me. Taking the next step is a treacherous feeling at times! So after some discussion in my session, I was encouraged to listen to “You Say” by Lauren Daigle… on repeat. Well, she was not wrong about that! I needed that song… repeatedly. But before we finished, she prayed over me. When she prayed, she asked God to show me that “I am enough.” He began the work of my knowing and believing that I am enough, at that moment as He whispered to me, “I love you more than you will ever realize.” I have to stop here and tell you that every time I feel that He comes so near to me whether it is in word or vision, I am overwhelmed with the complexity of, and yet simplicity of His love and care for me amongst His many other children that He also deeply loves. I am moved to great emotion at times. I remember the goodness of God and the Truth that He comes near. (Psalm 34:18) The Truth that He is in my midst. (Zephaniah 3:17) The Truth that He will make the darkness within me a beacon of light and never leave me undone! (Isaiah 42:16) I LOVE that!
He Says...
As I began listening to “You Say” while sitting quietly, I knew that I had to combat some of these feelings. Feelings that while valid, can be tools of the enemy to drag me down. Why was I feeling this way? What is the root cause of what I am feeling? What is truth? So what would be the best way that I could find answers and combat them? Scripture of course. It was time to search further into what and who God says I am. Get to the heart of the matter. I began by checking out my thesaurus to find words that were the opposite of what I was feeling. Then I took those words and went into my Bible software of choice to find verses that would pertain to that particular "new" word. Narrowing the verses down was a lesson in chiseling! It was so hard to find one verse when they are all so beneficial. Though, I knew I had to get them as narrowed as possible!
Then, I just completely paraphrased the verses so that at a glance, I could easily see His Truths staring back at me. Truths like, Chosen, I am not alone, I am restored, I am protected, I am freed from fears, I’m redeemed, I have every reason to be hopeful, I am strong, I have authority over satan, I am His child, I am wise, I am called, I am His beloved, I am heard, and so many more! Oh I already know these things but I don’t always believe them or even remember them. The enemy has a crafty way of building a wall to try to keep me from seeing the Goodness of God.
According to II Timothy 1:7, God has given me a sound mind. Other versions say, “sound judgment”, “self-control” “sobriety” “personal discipline” “wise discretion” “temperance” “sensible” “wisdom” “good mind” and “prudence.” His Word exhorts me to give up worldly entanglements so as not to choke the Word. Those “old” words or feelings ARE worldly entanglements. Devastating words that I have lambasted myself with for a long time… and they greatly increased with the loss of Ed. I self criticized out of the pain. Out of my fear. They literally did choke the Word! And I let them. Not on purpose… it just happened. Why on earth would I allow that to occur? Grief. A LOT of grief through many years of feeling like I was not enough. These escalated after losing Ed because he truly was my cheerleader… and the field and stands are now silent. Dr. Henry Cloud gives me a thought provoking word about this;
“You wouldn’t want someone walking around criticizing you all day, so why would you do that to yourself? Self talk matters.”
Intentional Trench
I’m not sure why I allowed it except what I mentioned above, the deceiving enemy is out to steal, kill, and destroy at any cost. And, I think once we start down that road, it gets miry and mucky and foggy and we really have a difficult time seeing what we are doing to ourselves until suddenly we find ourselves deep into the bog, wondering how on earth we got here and realize we have to really fight our way out to change our mindset. As Craig Groeschel puts it in his book Winning the War in Your Mind, (pg.86)
“Instead of living in a rut, you can create a truth trench that runs deeper, diverting the flow of your thoughts from old pathways to new ones.”
I will add to that from personal experience, digging trenches while in a muck rut is definitely a challenge! But don’t give up. Don’t become disheartened while the muck is trying to pull you back in because God’s Truth will become your Truth as you hear what He says and face the challenge with His vision for you.
Craig also says this on page 93;
“We constantly have thoughts that we did not choose. Studies reveal that we are bombarded by about five hundred unintentional and intrusive thoughts a day. Each unwanted thought lasts about fifteen seconds. Do the math. That’s almost two hours a day of thoughts we do not want to think.”
That is a LOT of wasted thought time! It weakens and exhausts us. It is toxic and unhealthy to our very being. But I can’t leave you there! Be intentional about meditating on His Truth… focus all the other twenty two hours… ok, minus eight hours of sleep… so, you have fourteen hours to focus on healthy, good thoughts! That is a win! Also this… Romans 8:6;
“For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace.”
I'll take life and peace.
Feelings do Not have intellect
I recently hosted the "Going Beyond" Priscilla Shirer simulcast, at my home. Which, by the way, I highly recommend that you give her a listen if you want a Holy Spirit infused sermon about recalibrating your identity to who He says you are. That is one great sermon! The entire conference I hosted was also helpful. But my favorite part came at the end from her worship leader brother, Anthony Evans. Their family has had several losses close together. I believe there were nine in five years time. That is overwhelming! Anthony shared that he really struggled through it. But one day he sat down with his dad, Tony Evans, and his daddy told him this (paraphrased),
“Your feelings are real and heavy but your feelings do not have intellect. They cannot think so you have to bounce them off of Truth. Worship in spite of how you feel. When our hearts are broken we need to walk in the direction we need to go and eventually our feelings will catch up with our feet.”
You see, Anthony felt left, lost, and abandoned. Abandoned. What was my first word on my list above? Abandoned. If I had one negative word that has been stamped on my life since before I was born, it is abandoned. What Anthony said resonated within me. I believe it was this point in history that I fully started to realize how damaging I had let these other thoughts become. And his daddy was right… they have no intellect! Don’t get me wrong… like I said, I have worked through many of these thoughts but the reconstruction is not finished by any means.
I am Engraved And inscribed
All of these encounters led me to this point. It was also right about this time that I met up with Habakkuk again. He is one of my favorites… if you haven’t read it yet, I HIGHLY recommend it! Three little chapters that don’t take too long. You can also find a great study on him in two different places: The Daily Grace Co. (Great sales!) & the First Five App. (Free!) I happened to be doing The Daily Grace study this time around. It was the last week of the study that I encountered the following question:
“Habakkuk prayed the Word of God back to God. This is so helpful for us as we come to the Lord in prayer. Think about what you are facing in your life right now. What passage of Scripture can you pray today?”
I thought about it… but not for too long. The word abandoned surfaced willingly. So I decided to investigate a little more in His Word. I found several verses to help my thoughts to actually have some Biblical intellect that I wrote down as part of my answer. I got to one verse in particular. Isaiah 49:16 NASB:
“See, I have engraved (inscribed) you on the palms of my hands; your walls are ever before me.”
Wait. What? I had been looking for one word to counteract, or rather, demolish my “abandoned” feeling that has no intellect. The emotions overwhelmed me at the discovery of this word. I was completely moved to tears. A question in my Habakkuk book had led me to the answer that I had been searching for, for a long time. I may feel abandoned, but I am not without hope! I AM ENGRAVED. Other versions; “Inscribed” “imprinted” “picture” “written” “tattooed” “marked” “I have made you a part of me.” I am engraved on the palm of His hand. I AM ENGRAVED.
I cannot explain to you how much freedom I felt within moments of reading that word. Friends, don’t let anyone tell you that God isn’t working it all out in your life. Even if we don’t see it… He is always working it out and is always near you to show you when you are ready to see and hear and He is ready to reveal it to you. It feels greater than any one thing you will ever feel. And that feeling… is a fact from God… and it does have intellect because I am IS MORE than enough!
“The more you know God, the more clearly you can hear God.”
- Henry Blackaby
unpacking Darkness and light
I know when I have listened to the voice of lies… I feel darker… more sad… like there is a cloud hovering over me. And if I listen to all the accusations being thrown on me… I become depressed… it just makes it hard for people to be around me… they don’t know what to say or do sometimes. I don’t blame them. It is sometimes like a dark room to them. I know if I walked into a dark room… I wouldn’t know where to move or what to say except do the easiest thing and that is to find the door and back out. Then again, with what I have been through, I think there would be times I might reach my arms out groping in the dark - hoping to find the light switch, so that the darkness would become light. Psalm 119:130 reminds me of the importance of flipping the switch to the light-giving Words;
“The unfolding of your words gives light; It gives understanding to the simple.”
In Matthew, chapter five, God says that we are the salt and the light. We are called to make every effort to preserve the world from corruption and darkness. Since that is a part of my call as a believer in Christ, I need to take heed. It seriously becomes a challenge to preserve and bring light when I am listening to the enemy in the midst of the darkness of my own tongue defeating myself. Proverbs 18:21 tells me…
“Death and life are in the power of the tongue,”
I don’t know about you but that stings a little bit to realize that I have basically brought that sliver of darkness and death within me, on myself. I have frequently walked into the dark room with these damaging words in my head… and then slowly backed my way out of the room. Repeat. Regret says, "If only I had been as persistent to reach for the light and life giving words as much as I was hard-headed to insist they were my truth. The light within the room would have illuminated so much sooner!" The world says, “Better late than never!” Or...more importantly, God says, "Grace! Grace, Mona, because you did the best with what you had... but now you know and you have persevered as a warrior... so go forth and spread Light and Truth because you ARE enough and I AM enough for you."
“You bind the thought or the thought binds you.”
-Louie Giglio
TRAILBLAZING:
I am here to encourage you with all the Scriptures… never stop saying all the good things to yourself that you know that God says you are… all the things that Holy Spirit whispers in your ear! He is our light and there is no darkness in Him!
Walk around the house saying His Truth… what He says to you… say them in the car… say them in the store! Out loud. People might think you are crazy… but that is okay… maybe your words will give them life that they too are searching for because we are a witness to the Light. You have every reason to hope in Light and Life and Truth!
Give a listen - Voice of Truth by Casting Crowns
Free download printable from Priscilla Shirer sermon… please consider subscribing to my blog! Thank you!
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