Have you ever wondered if you’re good enough? Have you ever wondered
if you do enough for others? Have you wondered if you ARE enough? If so, I have your answer. The answer is yes. Yes, you are. There. I’m
done. I’m kidding. There’s more. Lots more. Seriously, grab some coffee with
some pumpkin spice cream and sit a spell J
Being faced with so much sadness in our community lately and many
doubts about people, choices, things I
hear that are being said and done, and even things that I’ve heard concerning
me and my apathy towards them I have found myself facing a real low point in my
life. I don’t doubt that there is a God. I don’t doubt that He created me, that
He loves me, and that He has some sort of grandiose plan for me in the big wide
world of whatever this all is. I know that I gave birth to two of the most
amazing kids and I’m proud of that and I know that in my daily job as a
counselor to many, many kids what I say and do matters sometimes, but I have
had my doubts, my questions, many of them to be sure, as to why I am here.
Am I really doing enough? Am I
totally and completely selfish that my sweet neighbor lady brings me dinner on
occasion and I don’t know what I’ve done for her lately? Am I totally
self-absorbed because I’m so involved in my work and the kids’ activities and making sure we have quality family time
in there somewhere, that I forget someone’s birthday? I have heard some harsh
things said about people like me (and flat out, about me) that we don’t care,
that we are too busy to care, etc. So, for a long time, being the people
pleasing person that I was (catch the past tense ‘was’), I stretched myself
thinner and tried harder to make people happy. Big mistake!
Most of you are aware that I am a single mom with 2 teenagers. Ok, to
be honest Liam is the teenager and Mary Abbott is the pre-teen, but if you’ve
had a daughter and she’s been 12, you may as well have started calling her a
teenager at the age of eight because that’s when they start trying to be
teenagers. My kids and I have a great relationship. We really do! They try not
to roll their eyes in front of me and I try not to act like a crazy woman in
front of them. That all failed the other day when a woman in a blue minivan was
texting and turned in front of us at a red light… I slammed on my brakes, hit
my horn and let out a few words that “Momma doesn’t say”. I thought I was going to have to go to
confession right then and there, but I looked over and Mary was snickering. She
said “You NEVER say that!” I guess we have some understanding in our family
that sometimes we just allow each other to be real. Actually, most of the time
we do. I like that. Anyway, I digress. (And to the woman in the minivan who
never looked up, dear lord woman you’re gonna kill someone!)
Anyway, So I’m a single mom with teenagers. They are very involved in
school sports, JROTC, and youth group. I am also one of two counselors at a
school with roughly one-thousand students. We are very active in our church and
with our family and I wouldn’t trade our lives for anything. Seriously. I get
along well with the kids' dad and his wife and her son. We are a big, strange,
happy family. But, to say this is easy
would be a lie. A big lie.
Somewhere along my life’s way I have allowed myself to feel less than.
I don’t know who or how or why or what I allowed in my head, but I did. I was
married before I married Todd (the kids’ dad). Not everyone knows that and I
haven’t felt comfortable sharing it, but I am now. It was during that time I’m
pretty sure that I learned that I was stupid, I was too big, I wore too much make-up, I talked
too much, I said the wrong things in front of people, I gave stupid gifts, and
I was selfish. I was vain, insecure, I was too sensitive, and when I was in a
wreck once, it was because I had the radio up too loud. I was never, ever, ever
good enough. The tapes that have played through the years have been incredibly
hurtful and God how I wish we could learn to destroy those things, but it’s not
that easy. In fact it almost seems that we attract other people who spot our
vulnerabilities and rip off the scabs of our healing wounds. Whatever the case,
we are left feeling broken, beaten down, and never, ever enough.
I had coffee with a friend of mine yesterday and Diana can say
something that is like plucking a gray hair. It stings for a second, but you’re
glad she said it. She tells me that I’m so distracted trying to figure out what
I’m supposed to do, why I’m here, that I don’t see it right in front of my
eyes. She tells me that I’m supposed to write. She tells me that my words touch
people. It’s hard for me to hear that because I feel like my words aren’t good
enough. My writings aren’t good enough… and I hear the tapes playing in my head
again. “No one wants to hear what you have to say".
Today at church Pastor Suzanne is in the middle of a series "What on Earth Am I Here For? ". She began to speak and was telling us that our most
important purpose in life, our primary reason for being here (here it comes, I
think, something else I’m not doing enough of, or not doing quiet up to par)…
is To. Be. Loved. What?? To be loved?? Yes. What do I need to do? Nothing. But
I haven’t cooked dinner for my neighbor. Dear heavens, you can't cook! Don't do it! You are here to be loved. ME? Yes.
Why??? Because God created you on purpose. To. Be. Loved.
Now, I gave a talk at the Rescue Mission last year and I am really
fairly good at telling people these things and I do firmly believe it. For you.
I know that you, that we, were created for a reason. I know that we were
knitted together in the womb and that God knows the hairs on our heads and He
knows our names and He knows everything about us. What I had to be reminded
today was I need to stop trying so hard to be loved. I need to stop beating
myself up for not ‘being enough’. I am enough. God created me in His image and
I dare not say that my God is not enough. If my God wants me to do something,
by Him, He will equip me to do it and I will be enough, and I AM enough!
I sat in my seat after church with my friend Judy. I couldn’t move
really. I looked at her and said “When was the last time you were given a
sermon that told you to allow yourself to simply be loved?” Neither of us could
remember.
We are so often sadly and mistakenly told that we are not enough. What
is even more horrible is that we believe it and we cling to that instead of
what we read today in Romans (8:38-39) “I’m convinced that nothing can separate
us from God’s love in Christ Jesus our Lord: not death or life, not angels or
rulers, not present things, or future things, not powers or height or depth, or
any other thing that is created.” See, nothing separates us from God and His
love. Nothing. Nothing. That means that you are good enough. I am good enough.
We are enough.
Suzanne told me today to go and just be. Just be loved. I took a long,
long walk today on the nature trail. No music, just birds, the rustling of the
trees and other people enjoying nature as well. I am challenging myself to just
be this week; to stop beating myself up for not being enough. If the creator of
the universe felt that I was worth knitting together, then I must be enough for
Him and if I’m enough for Him, then I’m enough and I have a job to do. I have
no idea what that is, but I’m listening… not trying too hard to figure it out,
just listening.
I challenge you, if you have had those feelings, to just be. Allow
yourself to be loved and bask in that. Bask in the glory that you were created
on purpose with intention and if for some reason some poor sot out there thinks
you aren’t good enough, remember that poor sot, I mean person, was created on
purpose as well… and God is working on him/her. Maybe it’s your job to be an
example? And if I’m supposed to be an example to the woman in the blue minivan,
I failed miserably…. But I gave Mary Abbott a hearty chuckle.
Loved,
Becky
October 20, 2013
