'ENUF' IS ENOUGH

“Enough. There is never enough you can do to help others. Enough.”

‘Mrs. B’ (as the cool kids called her) paced back and forth in front of our 3rd-grade classroom, administering the weekly spelling test. Her gum cracked, and high heels clicked, interjecting tension between my slumped shoulders.

Spelling came easy to me, but with sharp lead poised on that pale blue line, my mind went blank.

All the pencil scratching stopped around me. I panicked. 

“Enuf,” I wrote.  

It didn’t look right, but it was time for the next word.

“Telephone. If you don’t get a good grade on this test, I will call your mother on the telephone. Telephone.”

Giggles erupted around me. Oh, that ‘Mrs. B’ was a jokester, but perhaps she wasn’t kidding.

Cheating, lying, stealing - these were unthinkable actions to a Sunday School girl like me, but on that day, I stole a look over my classmate’s shoulder and solved my immediate problem.

Quickly erasing my first mistake, I made another. 

“Enough." 

That word has haunted me ever since.

Every time I write it, I am reminded of all my shortcomings, of how I don’t have all the answers.

For far too many days, I have faked my way through life’s tests, desperate not to fail the people around me, trying to look like an “A+” student of Christ’s when, in reality, I am a solid “C-."

But I’m learning my Heavenly Father isn’t interested in how the world grades my efforts. 

He asks me to bring my papers home to Him to go over the mistakes together. 

And God knows, there are some lessons I may never master this side of earth’s classroom, but He still adores me and proudly displays my latest project on His refrigerator.

Because I’m His kid. 

In His hands, I am enough. 

And so are you.

And so I am sure that God, who began this good work in you, will carry it on until it is finished on the Day of Christ Jesus. 

Philippians 1:6 GNT