Enough is enough, but not enough is never enough. 

On paper my income should be sufficient.  I get a steady paycheck every month.  We don’t spend what we have recklessly either. My wife Jill shops at garage sales. We’ve paid off both our cars. I think we work hard very hard to make the ends meet. 

But we still struggle. We have two children college, and two boys and home who he eat half their body weight in roast beef sandwiches. Maybe that’s why they grow out of their shoes every other week. On paper what we have should be enough, but often at the end of the month the numbers just don’t jive.

My reaction: fear.  I have a deeply embedded instinct to panic provision.  Maybe this comes from some wound of disappointment in my childhood. Or maybe I’m just a normal human. Truth be told I really battle against fear of not having enough. When I search my soul I find that this fear is one of my weakest links.  I guess I really believe that I have to supply all my needs, though I know I’m not clever enough to succeed.

I need another source of supply beyond my own ability.  I need God’s provision. 

As David says in his famous Psalm 23, “The Lord is my shepherd I will lack nothing…”

Provision is something God promises, and something he delivers.

I need to see and believe this again, today…

He’s another piece from Mark’s Gospel about the wonder words of Jesus and provision.

“Be yours” (Mark 11:24)

“What do you need?”

The enemy is your thief. You shall want. He makes you lie down in desolate places. He leaves you beside cesspools of deprivation. He devours your hope. He guides you down alleyways of empty promises for the sake of his own perverted pleasure. You shall want.

“Have faith in God,” Jesus answered back. “I’m shooting straight with you. If anyone tells this mountain, ‘Go, dump yourself in the ocean,’ and inside his heart does not doubt, but believes that what he says will happen, it will be done for him. So, this is what I’m saying, whatever you ask of God, believe that you have already received it, and in reality it will be yours.” “Be yours!” “Be yours!” Jesus promised.

“Be yours!” was enough. It was enough for more bread and fish. It was enough for the water to become wine. It was enough to put a gold piece into a fish’s mouth. “Be yours!” brings enough. For the Lord is your shepherd. You shall not want.

The thief is taunting you with poverty-words. Never enough time. Never enough money. Never enough energy. He talks a “zero-sum game” of scarcity. But you will borrow Jesus’ words and set them loose to work the wonder of multiplication. Never again, “never enough.”

Answer the poverty mindset: “Be yours!” Answer real lack: “Be yours!” Answer debt and hunger and fear and self-pity and pride and anger and worry: “Be yours!” Fight poverty with words. Put Jesus to the test. Rest. 

Your mission: Make a promise on behalf of Jesus. Find a need. Fill it with his words: “Be yours!”

Question: “What do you need” Answer: “Be yours!”

You can down load the entire Fight Like Jesus ebook at www.markherringshaw.com.