You are enough.
Or, at least, that’s what everybody says. That’s what’s on the t-shirts and the coffee mugs and the pastel Instagram graphics. It’s the mantra of every female empowerment influencer. You are enough. Having a bad day? You are enough. Dealing with “toxic” friends? You are enough. So frustrated with your kids that you can’t get through the day without a glass of wine? You. Are. Enough.
This little phrase is quite popular these days, especially amongst women, even amongst some Christians. These three words are meant to be encouraging, inspiring, empowering, to remind you that you’re doing the best you can do and that’s okay. But while the phrase may make you feel warm and fuzzy inside, it shouldn’t be automatically accepted as authoritative truth. As with everything else, we ought to take it to the Bible and see how it lines up with the teachings of Scripture.
So, what does the Bible have to say about this? Does the Bible teach that we are enough?
In Mama Bear Apologetics, author and podcaster Alisa Childers argues,
“You are absolutely, most definitely not enough. You are so desperately not enough that it would be impossible to even calculate your not-enoughness.”[1]
If you’re used to constantly hearing that you are enough, this may seem a little harsh. But it’s true. And more than that—it’s biblical. The Bible teaches that all humans are unrighteous sinners who fall severely short of God’s glory (Romans 3:10, 23). Even our good deeds and best intentions look like filthy rags in the eyes of our righteous and holy Heavenly Father (Isaiah 64:6). We are not enough. We are sinful, broken beings with a propensity to disobey God and an inability to follow every word of His Law.
But these facts shouldn’t cause us to fall into depression or despair because the Bible also teaches that we have hope! In her own book, Live Your Truth (and Other Lies), Childers writes,
“I am not enough is actually the best news ever. You see, Jesus is enough, and that’s enough for me.”[2]
We are not enough, but Jesus is. Like the Father, Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is perfectly righteous and holy. When He was sent to earth, He lived the sinless life that we were never able to live. He followed the Word of God and obeyed the Father, even to death on a Roman cross. In doing so, Jesus paid the penalty for our sins and secured eternal life for all who put their faith in Him.
But why? Why did Jesus do this? Because we’re enough? Because we deserved it? Because He just couldn’t live without us? No. It’s because He loved us with a great and merciful love (Ephesians 2:4-5). As Rachel Jankovic explains in her book, You Who?,
“God did not save us because we were so valuable. We have value because He saved us.”[3]
We are not enough, but that’s okay. Before Christ, we were dead in our sins (Ephesians 2:5). Without Christ, we can do nothing (John 15:5). We are not sufficient in and of ourselves. Any sufficiency we have comes from Him (2 Corinthians 3:5). It is by grace through faith that we are saved (Ephesians 2:8-9). Not by our works. Not by our enoughness. Really, claiming to be “enough” could be seen as a denial of the gospel, a denial of Christ. Allie Stuckey claims in her aptly named book, You’re Not Enough (and that’s okay),
“If we were enough, we wouldn’t need Jesus to do these things for us, but we do. Without him we’re hopeless, purposeless, and dead in our sin.”[4]
We were dead in our sin. But God.
Our righteousness was like filthy rags. But God.
We were not enough. But God.
All of us were depraved, unrighteous sinners who could never be enough or do enough to enter the kingdom of heaven. But God loved us and showed us grace and mercy and sent His Son to die on our behalf. His love has nothing to do with us—our merits, our good choices, our obedience—and everything to do with Him and the affection He has shared with the Trinity before the dawn of time. Because of Him, because of His love, we can be made righteous and we can be saved.
And yet, even after we receive salvation, we’re still not “enough.” We still sin. We still choose disobedience. We still have weak faith. We won’t be fully sanctified until we exchange this earth for a heavenly one. But for now, we can let our weakness and not-enoughness remind us to fully rely on Him and point others to His supreme glory.
“But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.” 2 Corinthians 12:9, ESV
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[1] Mama Bear Apologetics: Empowering Your Kids to Challenge Cultural Lies, ed. Hillary Morgan Ferrer (Eugene: Harvest House Publishers, 2019), 210.
[2] Alisa Childers, Live Your Truth (and Other Lies): Exposing Popular Deceptions That Make Us Anxious Exhausted, and Self-Obsessed (Carol Stream: Tyndale Momentum, 2022), 41.
[3] Rachel Jankovic, You Who?: Why You Matter & How to Deal With It (Moscow: Canon Press, 2019), 222.
[4] Allie Beth Stuckey, You’re Not Enough (and that’s okay): Escaping the Toxic Culture of Self-Love (Sentinel, 2020), 27.
