it’s not up to us.
I feel so inadequate.
The words replayed in my mind as the water from the shower sprayed across my back, hot and relieving after another long day.
I had just finished our family bedtime routine, and I don’t know about you, but nothing makes me crankier than a long, drawn-out, jumping-through-all-my-children’s-hoops bedtime circus. The end of the day is certainly not when I parent at my best; I’m so tired and ready to be done. But unfortunately, my children seem to need me the most during the hours of 7-9:00 pm.
I feel so inadequate.
While my mind reviewed all the things I’d said in impatience and frustration, I did the thing I always do when I’m feeling down and started time traveling to their teenage years, thinking about how if I can’t handle parenting now, then I definitely won’t be able to handle it in the coming years (such a helpful thought pattern, right?).
I just feel so inadequate. All the time.
The words dripped from my head and down to my toes with the water circling the drain like my mind when it likes to spiral.
But thankfully, this spiral didn’t last for long. The Lord, sensing my discouragement and feelings of distress, sent me a little miracle in the form of a new and much more helpful thought: you only feel inadequate when you think it’s all up to you.
Isn’t that the truth? My inadequacies weigh on me when I think I must solely rely on my strength, my abilities, my skills, and my endurance. As if God our Father would leave me on my own to parent three of his precious children. As if He didn’t send His Son down to this earth to dwell with me in complete compassion and understanding. As if we didn’t have the universe’s most capable Savior not just standing in our corner but working and redeeming and loving in every one of our corners.
Why is this so hard to remember sometimes?
I am not alone. You are not alone. And yes, the truth is we are inadequate to face all the challenges this life will offer us—unbelievably so. But recognizing that inadequacy is kind of the whole point.
The trick is to not let this realization bring you down but to raise you back up; this isn’t bad news, but the best news there is! We may be inadequate, but Jesus Christ is enough.
And through His grace, we are made strong and fully capable. He will take our strengths and make them stronger. He will hold our weaknesses with tender care, adjusting them ever so slightly each time we offer them to Him with shaking hands, until one day we no longer recognize them as the stumbling blocks they once were.
As silly as it sounds, Christ will help me conquer bedtime—one tired night at a time—and every single challenge I face after that.
He is more than adequate. And through Him, so are we.
It’s not up to us—isn’t that such a relief?
