Monday, May 24, 2010

Superstar instead of Just Enough

We have always heard that God is more than enough and that He is all sufficient in nature, and that's simply who our Savior is. He is able to supply all that we need, from salvation to every physical and spiritual. God is more than enough to fill the emotional voids in our life with His presence. He is more than enough for everyone who believes He is so and this is 100% true. But why do so many of us act differently and have a relationship with God like He is not enough?  We have been conditioned to have a "superstar" mentality of Jesus, thus producing a deficient relationship with God rather than Him being just enough. If you look back over the new testament when Jesus came on the scene and began discipling, changing the platform, performing miracles, setting the pace, and ministering to the crowds, you will notice that often times he had crowds following him everywhere and it almost seems like they were bombarding him. Often times Jesus would try to escape them in order to seek a place of solitude, but everywhere Jesus went He always noticed those who were of sincere faith. Ex, in the midst of the crowd He realized the woman who touched him with the issue of blood. Many flocked to Jesus as onlookers or observers of his miracles, and basically they were his crazed fans.
Have you ever watched the E! channel or seen someone who is obsessed with celebrities, it's awkwardly funny how they follow so many actors and actresses and refer to them by first name and talk about their life as if they are friends. Well this is a crazed fan and in many cases, a lot of the crowds that witnessed Jesus were this exactly. Many were changed, transformed, healed, delivered, raised from the dead, and saved but it seems like not everyone in the crowd were actually interested in who Jesus was but they wanted to see Him perform over and over again. I can see it now, "Oh cool Jesus do that again" Almost like an instant replay on our DVR's. We tend to establish and base our relationship with God on that one time God did something really cool in our life or that one time He performed really awesome (He showed up in a service) and our entire relationship cannot be founded on a performance. With this mentality it puts us in danger of getting bored with our relationship, just like at the movies or anywhere else. When we  feel like God hasn't performed it's easy to be done, feel like we did something wrong. It's easy to not press into His presence, or not pray or read our word. When the entire time, as a child of God in order to be filled by God we should have the expectant heart that He is more than enough. His presence, His word, a prayer time is more than enough. It doesn't take some thrill seeking, over the edge, top notch performance for us to know God, it takes daily relationship and that is something that is satisfying and that will allow us to be firmly planted and grounded in who God really is and allow us to be most effective in our individual walks and as the body of Christ. It's unfortunate for an individual to base their entire relationship with Jesus based on the fact that He performs in "superstar" mode constantly rather than the fact that He is daily abundant; however, it's an even greater misfortune that the Body of Christ has got away from the simplicity of the importance of the presence of God and "set the stage" for a more superstar presence. (I'm definitely not a church basher, but the church is made up of individuals and if every person is like me then they have person work that can be done and viewpoints that can be changed in order to get back to the basics of the gospel)! Recognizing this will change our mindsets and change our connection with God. It will cause a shift in how we perceive God personally and corporately, by daily realizing that He is enough. Rather than expecting Him to perform, He can be enough daily to us. This will bring us back to being one with God and experiencing Him in ways that are powerful and effective. Knowing God is more than enough is life changing and prevents us from have a roller coaster relationship with  God, who is constant.

The woman was a Greek, a Syro-Phoenician by birth, and she kept asking Him to cast the demon out of her daughter.  But Jesus said to her, “Let the children be filled first, for it is not good to take the children’s bread and throw it to the little dogs.”
 And she answered and said to Him, “Yes, Lord, yet even the little dogs under the table eat from the children’s crumbs.”  Mark 7:26-28



This woman approached Jesus, even though she was a gentile, and she showed her faith in her response to Jesus. She recognized that Jesus was enough to set her daughter free, but that all she needed was just a tiny bit of Him and even in that tiny bit or crumb then she would still receive and over abundance from Him. 
Often times when we (I), bring our problems to God we need something huge to happen and it's honestly hard to satisfy us. Surely our crumb would not satisfy our problems, we would need an entire feast to deal with our struggle. 
Simply put, Jesus is more than enough. It's inherent to who He is, but we have been so conditioned to view Him as more of a performer, but how different would our personal relationship with Jesus be, along with our witness, if we just allowed Him to be more than enough in our life, seeing Him as the abundant God that His is rather than waiting for the superstar Jesus to come blow our problems away and sustain us for 20 minutes!  
Jesus gave until He had no more to give and in this shows His abundance to those who love and trust Him. He  is faithful to those who are faithful and even when we walk away, He is still faithful to hang around. Unlike most people, He is willing to go any depth or height for humanity. He is the antidote to the lost, He is what the hurting long for, and He is victory over in and every situation no matter how great or small. He is daily more than enough for us! If you notice Jesus gave out of His brokenness. He was at the most broken place in His life for humanity and facing what He knew would be a very trying time as He prayed in the garden of Gethsemane yet as He came near the end of His life He gave all that He had. Out of His sacrifice, He became more than enough on so many levels to all mankind. When we are broken we expect, expect, expect, instead of give as He did.

Now Jesus sat opposite the treasury and saw how the people put money into the treasury. And many who wererich put in much. Then one poor widow came and threw in two mites,[j] which make a quadrans.  So He called His disciples to Himself and said to them, “Assuredly, I say to you that this poor widow has put in more than all those who have given to the treasury;  for they all put in out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty put in all that she had, her whole livelihood.”Mark 12:41-44


This story contains so much depth, but one thing to notice is that this story is about a widow who gave. Widows are are normally broken and out of that place in her life, she gave all that she had to the Lord. She knew His worth and she knew that it was more about a performance based relationship, but she knew that He was more than enough, so she could give everything in return! 


Jesus is all we need. 

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