More Than Enough

One of my favorite Bible stories is the feeding of the 5,000.  It is such a beautiful story of God’s abundant love and care for God’s people.  One of my favorite details in the story is that everyone is able to eat until they are filled and there are multiple baskets full of leftovers.  The message is clear. God not only provides, God provides in abundance.

God’s abundance isn’t about opulence or extravagant wealth.  It is about having more than enough for everyone to be cared for - more than enough for everyone to be loved and fed.  God’s abundance is about creating something beautiful out of nothing (God’s specialty) and making a way where no way seemed possible.  God’s abundance is about bringing life out of death.

The opposite of abundance is scarcity.  And scarcity is the message that we get bombarded with every day - 1 day only!  Limited time!  While supplies last!  Or the old adage, not enough hours in the day.  Politicians use a scarcity mentality and fear of “other” to polarize groups and pit “us” against “them.”  The threat is always that “they” will take what “we” need.  Scarcity mentality grows from fear of there not being enough to go around, but it also LEADS to fear of there not being enough to go around.  It is a cycle of anxiety that makes us close off and protect what’s ours, even at the expense of others.

In the midst of all of this fear and anxiety, our biblical witness points us again and again to a different message - the message of God’s abundance.  When we pay attention to God’s abundance, what grows within us is not fear but hope.  God’s abundance leads not to defensiveness and hoarding, but generosity.  When we live our lives rooted in God’s abundance, we experience God’s generosity which allows us to be generous as well.  God’s generosity allows us to be generous with our kindness, compassion, forgiveness, giving people the benefit of the doubt, and welcoming our neighbor.  God’s generosity allows us to be generous with who we are and what we have, sharing our time, our abilities, and our resources. 

Biblical scholar Karoline Lewis writes, “This is the nature of abundance - it cannot NOT overflow.”  When we pay attention to God’s abundance, when we see it in our lives, recognize and give thanks for it, it naturally overflows in how we treat one another, how we share ourselves and whatever we have to give.

This is an anxious time in our country and we are surrounded by messages of scarcity and fear every day.  I invite you to ground yourself in the hope-filled promise of God’s abundance.  Practice looking for it… Where do you see God at work in your life, providing and caring for you?  Where do you see God abundantly providing for creation?  An easy way to start this practice is making a list of things you are grateful for - thank God for the sunshine, for the kind words of a stranger, or the warm hug of a family or friend.  Thank God for the beautiful color green in the tree outside your window, the time to sit and listen to your favorite song, or the delicious meal someone prepared for you (share the love and thank the person who cooked it!). 

However big or small, taking the time to list the various and abundant gifts in our life reminds us of all the ways God cares for us.  It helps to fill us up with joy and gratitude until we can’t help but overflow. 

We are cups, constantly and quietly being filled.  The trick is knowing how to tip ourselves over and let the beautiful stuff out.  - Ray Bradbury