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Am I Enough?

Yes, I know the Gospel. But quite honestly, sometimes, the Gospel doesn’t seem enough for me. It seems too good to be true. And so sometimes I fail to live as if it were true. “What? God did everything and I did nothing? How can that be? I know I’m unworthy. I know I’m not enough. How could a perfect, holy, and righteous God ever overlook my ‘not enoughness?’”

So let’s sit with that question for a moment, the question that haunts many of us, “Am I enough?”

11 years of off-and-on counseling has helped me to break free from some of my people-pleasing tendencies. So I’ll just be blunt and tell you what my counselor told me. “No, Tiffany, you aren’t enough.” “What? What do you mean I’m not enough? What am I paying you for? Aren’t you supposed to tell me to look in the mirror and tell myself that I am worthy of love? Aren’t you supposed to tell me that I’m beautiful and accomplished and a good person? Aren’t you supposed to tell me that I just need to find myself and then I’ll be okay?”

But she’s right. The hard truth is that I am not enough. You aren’t enough. None of us are enough. We are broken and sinful people living in a broken and sinful world. And we cannot fix ourselves. Hard as we may try, we can’t cover over our “not enoughness.”

But the good news is that Christ is enough. And because he is enough, and his work on the cross is enough, now I am made new and am enough. Because Christ is enough, therefore I am enough.

And it’s get better. Not only is Christ enough for our salvation, but because he has given us his Spirit, we get God with us and in us transforming us into the image of Christ.

Because life with God isn’t about moralism. It’s not “Do better. Try harder. Go farther.” No, life with God is about becoming alive—alive in Christ and full of Christ—by the power of the Holy Spirit.

And so let’s get real practical for a moment. What does living in light of the fullness of Christ actually look like?

Paul says that it looks like this: “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me” (Galatians 2:20).

Life with God looks like living by faith. It looks like trusting God with the mundane details of your life, the major decisions of your life, and everything in between. It looks like being confident in your enoughness since you are a redeemed child of God. It looks like praying in trust and dependence upon God. It looks like living with joy and thanksgiving in light of the blessings you’ve received.

And it looks like praising God. Because you’ve received justification, which leads to fellowship with God and eternal life, as well as the gift of the Spirit. And all of this takes place in Christ, who is enough. 

Tiffany is the Women's Ministry Coordinator at Irving Bible Church, and a graduate of Dallas Theological Seminary. A proud, native Texan, she and her husband, Jason, live in Grapevine, Texas. She is passionate about advancing the God-given value of women and helping women to embrace their unique identity in Christ. She serves as a board member for the Association for Women in Ministry Professionals (AWMP) and served for the past 3 years on the leadership team for Polish Ministries, a ministry dedicated to helping young professional women connect their faith with their career.