Sister Jeannie…
“What to Do When It’s Not Enough”
We’re going to talk about what to do when it’s not enough… what to do when you don’t have enough. Now just hear me the right way. When it looks like God’s not doing enough, what do we do? And I will tell you, when the Holy Spirit gave me this phrase, the second He said that “what to do when it’s not enough” immediately, there were five examples of what to do when it’s not enough that came to me. And in those examples, everything became more than enough.
The Word is precedence for us…
But, you know, we face realities that look like it’s not enough. In fact, it kind of can slam us in the face and slam us, you know, just mess with us pretty much all day long if we don’t know what to do when it’s not enough. So, we’re gonna go over a few examples in the Word. And the Word is precedence for us. We have precedents in the Word. When you bring your case to court, if there’s a previous court case where it was similar and the ruling was in your favor, they always bring that precedence. And we have precedence of what to do when it’s not enough.
The first and best example is Jesus…
So let’s start out with the absolute best example of what to do when it’s not enough. The first one is Jesus. So we’re gonna read a passage from Matthew 26 and it’s when Jesus was in Gethsemane and He wanted to give up. Jesus! Jesus wanted to give up. In fact, in His suffering at the time, He couldn’t do it in His thinking. And He went to God and said, “I don’t wanna do this. There’s gotta be another way.” Did you know that when you wanna give up and it doesn’t look like there’s another way, you’re not sinning? The Word says that Jesus never sinned. So if you are in that place right now where you wanna give up, because it doesn’t look like it’s enough, Jesus shows us how to get past that.
And even as I read this in Matthew 26, what’s interesting is three different times… Even the people that He asked to pray for Him were not enough. When you’re in a place where you not only wanna give up, but those people that you rely and depend on are not enough. Matthew 26:36, “Then Jesus went with them to a place called Gethsemane and He told His disciples Sit down here while I go over and pray. And taking with him, Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, He began to show grief and distress of mind and was deeply depressed.”
So imagine that… friends of Jesus that had seen Him do all these signs and wonders, they knew He was in deep distress. You might be in a place where your friends know you’re in deep distress. And then He said to them, My soul is very sad and deeply grieved so that I am almost dying of sorrow. Jesus said that to His friends. Stay here and keep awake and watch with Me. And going a little farther, He threw Himself upon the ground, on His face and prayed saying My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass away from me. Nevertheless, not what I will, but what you will and desire. And He came to the disciples and found them sleeping. He said to Peter, What are you so utterly unable to stay awake and keep watch with me for one hour? Even Jesus was hurt that they couldn’t be there for Him. Yet He didn’t sin. Even when He wanted to give up, He didn’t sin.
And that’s us. That’s you. That’s me. When the pressure is on, when it looks like you just can’t do it anymore, when those around you can’t even stand or be there for you, there’s precedent set that we can do it.
Isaiah prophesied about Jesus…
In fact, even in Isaiah… it’s interesting how Isaiah prophesied about the cross in past tense: “And he was bruised for our transgressions.” So way before it even happened, it was prophesied that Jesus would walk it out, that Jesus would get it done. So in those moments, when you feel like you’re gonna give up, God knows you won’t.
It was in that pressing through, in that leaning into the Father that Jesus completed the words that were spoken over Him. And that’s what we’re doing today.
The next example is Peter…
When you’ve had enough and it’s still not enough… Have you been there? When you’ve done all you know to do, and it’s still not enough?
Then we have Peter whose done all he knows to do, and he still can’t get it done. In Luke 5:5, “Now it occurred that while the people pressed upon Jesus to hear the message of God, he was standing by the lake. He was standing by the sea of Galilee. And when he saw two boats drawn up by the lake, but the fishermen had gone down from them and were washing their nets. And getting into one of the boats that belonged to Simon Peter, he requested him to draw away a little from the shore. Then He sat down and continued to teach the crowd from the boat. And when Jesus stops speaking, He said to Simon, Put out into the deep and lower your nets for a haul. And Simon answered, Master, we toiled all night exhaustingly and caught nothing. But on the ground of your word, I will lower the nets again. And when they had done this, they caught a great number of fish. And as their nets were at the point of breaking… there was such breakthrough that it humbled Peter.
Now you’ll find a common thread in these examples, and we’ll get to that at the end.
The other example is Jehoshaphat…
In 2nd Chronicles 20. “After this, the Moabites, the Ammonites, and with them the Meunites came against Jehoshaphat to battle. 2 It was told Jehoshaphat, A great multitude has come against you from beyond the [Dead] Sea.”
A great multitude has come against you. When it looks like there’s a multitude against you and it’s just not enough. And it says that Jehoshaphat feared and sought the Lord. And we know what happened. He heard from God. He did what God said, and there was a massive victory.
Example of the feeding of the 5,000…
And then there’s the feeding of the 5,000 when the disciples go to Jesus. It’s in Matthew 14. “When evening came, the disciples came to Him and said, This is a remote and barren place. And the day is now over. Send the throngs away into the villages to buy food for themselves. And Jesus said, They do not need to go away. You give them something to eat. And they said to Him, we have nothing here but five loaves and two fish. And He said, Bring them here to me. And then He ordered the crowds to recline on the grass and He took the five loaves and the two fish and looking up to heaven. He gave thanks and blessed and broke the loaves.” And we know what happened. He fed the 5,000 and there was more leftover.
What was the common thread with all the examples?
But what was the common thread with all of these… with Jesus, with Peter, with Jehoshaphat, and with the disciples? They stayed in the conversation. They stayed engaged with God. Have you ever encountered something where maybe, you know, where you just shut down and walked away and decided just to numb out and stop talking to God about it? I have. Have you ever looked at the news and just decided to watch Netflix and numb out for a while? That is not where our breakthrough lies.
Have you ever just thrown up your hands and walked away frustrated and eat that pan of brownies or turned to pornography or go drink or whatever? Just whatever! The common thread with Jesus and Gethsemane was He stayed engaged with the Father. He asked three times, “Can I be released from this?” When God would not give Him the answer He wanted, He did not leave the conversation. He stayed in the conversation.
When Peter was exhausted and had enough and probably had a massive attitude by the way. But he stayed in the conversation with Jesus. He even was snarky about it. “Well, you know, I’ve been fishing all night. Okay, but because you said so I’ll do it.” But he stayed in the conversation. He kept talking to Jesus. He let the dialogue continue. And that’s what a relationship is. He cared enough to stay in the conversation.
With Jehoshaphat, it said that he feared and then he sought God. Does it say that he feared and then he went and got drunk? Does it say that he feared and then he went on Amazon and bought a bunch of hats? Do you see what I’m saying? No, he feared and he sought God.
We just have to stay engaged in the conversation…
We can trust Him to lead us to the solutions. We just have to lean in and let Him talk to us and stay engaged and stay in the conversation. I love that Peter didn’t try to be perfect to keep the conversation going with Jesus. And don’t you love that even though Peter had to get his 2 cents in, Jesus still brought breakthrough. Peter’s response was not perfect. But it was his heart to stay engaged with God.
And then the feeding of the 5,000, we always talk about how the disciples just saw a trillion things that Jesus had done and they still couldn’t see that the loaves and the fish that were there weren’t enough. But here’s the thing. They didn’t walk away. They didn’t try to leave early. They talked to Jesus about it. And even when they disagreed with Him, they stayed engaged.
So let’s stay engaged…
Let’s stay engaged today. Let’s stay in the conversation in the middle of everything that’s happening. We have the massive opportunity to stay engaged. And out of staying engaged, we will say, “Should we go in and recover all?” That will be the question that comes up when we stay engaged.
Prayed…
Father today, we choose to put that stake in the ground and stay in the conversation.
We declare with our authority that these things are turning… changing… revival… awakening is being heard in the land today.
We tell all roadblocks to get out of the way … relationships amongst leaders, amongst countries, relationships of leaders with you, Father… the way is being made for them to have eyes to see and ears to hear … that the way is being prepared for your plan.
We declare right now that prophetic word from George Washington Carver over a hundred years ago from McAllister college… It’s time. It’s time. It’s time right now. It’s time right now in our cities, in our schools, in city council, in the library it’s time right now.
Father, we thank you right now that we have eyes to see that it’s time for those things to come to pass. Thank you.
In the church today, Father, hopelessness has to go … strengthen the body right now that she can see what you’re doing and keep in the right. … those that are feeble in their minds, in their bodies, in their thinking for you.
