Enough

My roommate went to Urbana during the Winter Break and she was telling me about her experiences there. She ended up sharing this video with me which I only got to watch it today. The speaker's name is David Platt, he's the writer of the book I'm currently reading. This message is basically the beginning of his book, its exactly what I read but I realized I missed a point which God used this video to reveal to me.

In his message, Pastor David Platt asked this question "is Jesus enough?" and it hit me, I've always known that Jesus is more than enough, I've sang worship songs on that a bajillion times whether its for Praise team or in the audience during worship, I've even told people that when they were going through difficult times..but does my action live up to it? I don't think so.

Being born in the U.S, I was blessed with a lifestyle that really isn't at all that difficult. There's so many things in my life that I can rely on, nothing I do really takes a lot of faith. My parents provide me with money for school, a warm house to live in, food..and so much more. I have a church family I can count on when I'm facing difficult moments. But at what point is God really all I have?

People who live in countries where loving God is illegal, those people gave up everything to follow him. They put not only their lives in danger, but also the lives of their family members. Some of them tell their family that this is the last time they will see each other because what they are doing for God at the moment may cost them their lives. Because they know how precious God is, they were willing to give up everything for him.

I'm not saying its better to live in a country where persecution exists but what if we took a step back and really see just how blessed we are. Those who live in a country that persecute Christians go out to share the gospel even if it cost them their lives. They're not doing this because they  have nothing to live for, they all must have families and people who love them very much but yet they are willing to risk it all for the sake of other's knowing God. Because they understand just how great God is and how much their people needs him, they were willing to give up everything to share what God's done. What about us? I know so many Christians who can come up with a ginormous list of excuses as to why they can't outreach to people..me being one of them. "I don't want them to judge me, I'm scared, I don't think I'm called to evangelize..." Ok so people look at us funny, some of them may reject us, we may hear some very uncomfortable hurtful things but how bad is that compared to knowing where those people will go after they die and doing absolutely nothing about it. Sharing the gospel is not a gift like tongues where only a few people will have it...its a calling God has given us all.

Like the story in the bible about a man who found treasure in a field. He sold everything he had to buy up that field because the treasure was worth much more than what he owned. Jesus is worth much more than the treasure he found in the field, so shouldn't we be willing to give up everything to follow him? Shouldn't he be more than enough for us so that we wouldn't have to indulge in material items to be happy? We have so much to give, we just need to have the willingness to give it up. Pushing ourselves aside so God can be the center of our lives. God is so great, he's like the entree in a meal, everything else we have is just the special garnishes he blessed us with. We don't have to have them, nor do we deserve them but we NEED God. He is more than enough.