We’re so excited about the release of Finding I AM by Lysa TerKeurst! In this 6-session study, Lysa takes readers to Israel to explore the places Jesus walked. Each session of the study looks at an I AM statement of Jesus from the Book of John, showing how He fulfills every cry of our hearts. Below we’ve featured an excerpt of the study. Click here to purchase the study or to read a sample. Finding I AM is also available in Lifeway stores everywhere.
The party sounded amazing. The people I’d heard were going are easy to be with, incredibly fun, and all have mad skills in the kitchen. And when I saw the invitation posted on a friend’s refrigerator I smiled at the creative brilliance.
The only problem was I didn’t get one.
I’d been checking my mailbox for days. Every time I walked back down the driveway empty handed, I kept assuring my sinking heart that because we live in a more rural area my mail is always a day or two or even seven days behind everyone else’s. No big deal.
But three days before the party when the invite still hadn’t arrived I ran out of assurance. I lost the pep in my rally. And I realized I was, in fact, not on the guest list.
When I ran into one of the hostesses later that day I lobbed out the equivalent of a Hail Mary throw in the final seconds of a game, “What do y’all have going on this weekend?” And then I felt as pitiful as the quarterback who watches the opposing team take what would have been his shining star moment and turn it into an interception.
She replied, “We’ve got plans with friends most of the weekend but would love to catch up on Sunday after church.”
That’s when the hardest of all the realizations hit me. I wasn’t invited because they simply hadn’t thought to invite me. I wasn’t in the circle of “weekend plans with friends.” Immediately the thought that hopped on me and stuck with super glue tenacity was, “I’m not good enough.”
I smiled and told her I’d check to see if that might work. I mean, checking my calendar was crucial because I was pretty slammed with plans that weekend as well. Indeed, my schedule was jam-packed full of all kinds of urgent plans with Netflix. And, hey, for an extra thrill I could always get a little jump on paperwork for tax returns not due for four more months.
I didn’t want to feel pathetic but I did. Middle school had come for an unwelcome visit bringing with it all the wonky feelings wrapped up in: “I’m not good enough.” I seriously thought by my 46th year of life these feelings would be but a vague memory in my way distant past. Like running while wearing a bathing suit. Or eating pizza at midnight. Or wearing your bangs teased so high people wonder if there’s a nest in the front of your head. You reach a certain age where you realize that’s no longer a good option for your life. So why is it still an option for a grown woman like me to feel like the lonely middle school girl that never got asked to this weekend’s dance?
Since I had all kinds of thinking time during that weekend, I kept pondering that statement sitting on my heart, “You’re not good enough.” And finally in the late hours of Saturday night I had a slight breakthrough. “Good enough” is a terrible statement. Nobody ever wants their friends to say, “Well, I mean, you’re good enough.” I would never want my boss or my family to just say, “You are good enough.” No child would ever want his or her parent to say, “You’re good enough.”
Absolutely not.
God made us to be amazing people who learn and explore and create and give and delight and love. He made us full of potential and purpose. He made us to produce fruit. Good fruit. Fruit that brings glory to God, our vinedresser.
He made us to reach out, not pull back.
He made us to believe the best before assuming the worst.
He made us to freely give grace, realizing we so desperately need it ourselves.
He made us to add goodness, see the beautiful, and rest in the assurance of His lavish love for us.
Never ever for one second did God look at us and say, “My goal for this one is to simply be good enough.”
Without Jesus we are selfish, self-focused, and all about our fruit bringing glory to ourselves. We work and strive and exhaust ourselves all for a pursuit that leaves us with a hollowed out feeling that there’s got to be more to life than chasing what we want, hoping to feel good enough.
With Jesus, we are better than good enough because He steps in and fulfills what we cannot do on our own.
John 15:1 says,
“I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener.”
In essence, what Jesus is saying in this I AM passage is—I am doing what you could not do.
I am the true Vine. Israel, you were supposed to be the vine, but you couldn’t do it. So, I AM is coming and saying that He is about to step in and fulfill what you could not do.
We are in that same boat, my friend. We cannot do what God has called us to do without Him. We are unable to be faithful to His commands. We have failed over and over just like the Israelites failed time and time again. The Jewish people hearing Jesus that day needed Him to step in as the true Vine. And we need Him to do that for us as well.
Do you feel that in your life? That sense that you are not enough? It sits deep in our souls most days. Buried down deep where we try to keep it hidden. We want so much to be enough. To be what God wants us to be. I know we try so hard. But the cloud still looms and tells us we are simply not enough.
Today, I want you to do something that might seem counterintuitive at first—embrace that truth instead of trying to cover it up. Step in it for a minute with me; you are not alone.
In what ways do you feel “not enough” today or this week?
How have you tried to cover this up in your life by doing something? What is it you do to try to cover it up?
Did it work? Did it mask the feeling? If so, for how long?
Have you ever secretly wondered if the reason your longing has gone unmet is because you aren’t good enough? I have. And it took me years to bring that before the Lord and let Him tenderly speak that truth over me.
Write out a prayer to the Lord asking Him to speak to you tenderly and personally about this today. Here are some verses you can incorporate into your prayer: Ephesians 2:10; Romans 8:38-39; James 1:2-4; 1 Peter 2:9; and Zephaniah 3:17.
Might this longing be the very thing that helps you stay most deeply connected to the Vine and therefore be the catalyst to you producing rich fruit in your life? And then imagine the people that would so deeply be blessed by your fruit. Write about that here.
Here’s what I want to take your hand and whisper to you today. Free yourself from trying to be the true vine. You are not it. That’s what Jesus does for us.
We run at a breakneck pace to try and achieve what God simply wants us to slow down enough to receive. We receive from Him everything we need to produce the fruit, therefore we must remember to stay connected to Him.
I am the vine you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.
John 15:5
Notice how Jesus requests that we remain. Jesus doesn’t participate in the rat race. He’s into the slower rhythms of life, like abiding, delighting, and dwelling—all words that require us to trust Him with our place and our pace.
Let Him be the true Vine today. Rest in and thank Him for being the true Vine that we desperately need.
