Grateful for Enough

What follows is a transcript of Pastor Gina’s message from our Sunday morning gathering. We share these messages on our blog for those who appreciate the opportunity to read the sermon again—whether for deeper reflection, personal study, or a quieter moment of prayer and introspection. As you read, we invite you to linger with the words, notice what resonates, and remain open to how God may be speaking to you through them.

A Message from Pastor Gina Johnson

I remember when I was younger, you know, it was really, as a kid, I had a children's Bible that no one ever read to me, but I would read stories in it. And you just didn't really question it, you know, it was just kind of that thing.

You know, there was an ark and two animals of each kind went on it. And, you know, Moses parted the Red Sea. And then, you know, we jumped forward into the New Testament and Jesus was doing miracles everywhere and he fed 5,000 plus, actually, not just 5,000, 5,000 plus.

And, you know, there are times in my life where maybe I had a little bit of an error towards the way things were going and you kind of want to err towards God sometimes. And I thought, like, there's no way that all those stories in the Bible happen that way. And this is prior to seminary and getting told 20,000 different ways to think so we can come out of there knowing how to think for ourselves, you know, but prior to that, I remember having those times like, is this figurative? Is this literal? I mean, can this really happen if I go get five pieces of bread right now and a couple sardines? If I stay there long enough and talk to them, will it then turn into abundance? I don't know.

But the thing is, I think we've all had a time in our life where we can relate to having experienced a small amount of something. It doesn't always have to be monetary. It doesn't always have to be stuff.

Just a time where we look like what we had, whether it was the people there to help us, whether it was our own feelings within us of being able to get a job done or being able to wake up and get out of bed that morning. There are times where we feel like we didn't have enough, but with relying on God, he turned that enough into an abundant amount. And sometimes it might have been when someone in our lives is challenged with illness and it doesn't look like they're making a recovery.

And the next thing you know, that recovery is coming on and it's night and day compared to where they were in the beginning. There might be times where we planted a garden and as it starts to come up, we're thinking, gosh, I did everything right. And there's no way this is going to turn into anything.

And the next thing you know, it's just that trust and that faith in God that it starts, flowers start to bloom and you start to see your plants start to come up. And next thing you know, you're trying to give away your tomatoes and your cucumbers and you had to pull all the weeds because there was far more than you could see in the beginning. You know, maybe some of you have experienced being laid off by your job, having to worry about your bills.

Maybe some of you have experienced not having enough, but all along we always had enough. Whatever the not enough is in your life, you need to do what Jesus did in this story. So let's turn to the scripture in Matthew 14, starting in verse 13.

When Jesus heard what had happened, he withdrew by boat privately to a solitary place. Hearing of this, the crowds followed him on foot from the towns. When Jesus landed and saw a large crowd, he had compassion on them and healed their sick.

As evening approached, the disciples came to him and said, this is a remote place and it's already getting late. Send the crowds away so they can go to the villages and buy themselves some food. Jesus replied, they do not need to go away.

You give them something to eat. We have here only five loaves of bread and two fish, they answered. Bring them here to me, he said.

And he directed the people to sit down on the grass, taking the five loaves and the two fish and looking up to heaven. He gave thanks and broke the loaves. Then he gave them to his disciples and the disciples gave them to the people.

They all ate and were satisfied and the disciples picked up 12 basketfuls of broken pieces that were left over. The number of those who ate was about 5,000 men besides women and children. And that concludes the reading of the word.

So when I say we need to do what Jesus did in this story, it's, you know, we need to lift up our not enough. We need to look to God. We need to look within to the Christ within us and learn how to give praise and thanksgiving.

We have to recognize that we always do have plenty, no matter what we see right in front of us. When you put your not enough into God's hands, you can watch that God will do something with that not enough. He'll provide through the midst.

He'll turn into plenty and abundance, whatever it is you bring. So when we look at the text there, it starts off, you know, Jesus, he withdrew. And the reason he withdrew is because he had just heard about the death of John the Baptist.

And that was very painful for him. So he took the time to be in a deserted place. And of course, the people followed Jesus and his disciples.

And when he saw them, he showed compassion on them. He healed the sick. You know why I believe the people started to follow him? Because I believe in some way they were all experiencing their own not enough.

They were all needing a form of healing, whether it was physical, whether it's spiritual, whether it was emotional. You know, maybe some of them they just felt a new essence being around him. They felt uplifted.

They felt hope for tomorrow. And so maybe all they wanted was his presence. You know, I found something very interesting.

When you can truly silence the noise of the world and sit in the presence of God, time is of no importance. You know, when you can be in that space of all you are focused on is everything that you have to be grateful for, the greatness of who God is and the greatness of all you have because you are one with God, then all of a sudden that place of not enough can be filled by the Holy Spirit. And so as these people were there with Jesus, it started to get late and they started to get hungry and the disciples were at a loss because they could not yet see things quite the way Jesus could see them.

And that's when he says, you know, send them away. They need to go get food. This cannot be our burden.

But you know, isn't it funny as community, that's what we're here for. We're here to shoulder each other's burdens together. We're not here to take it from one another.

We're not here to grab a hold of it and pretend it belongs to us, but we're here to help each other carry along. And if we remember what the scripture says, you know, Jesus tells us to bring him our yoke and he'll give us his, which is light. So he's not saying, let me just take it all away.

It's like, hey, take mine. My yoke is light and I'll shoulder yours. And we come to points in our life where perhaps we are feeling like we really need someone to carry our yoke.

And perhaps we can't see the understanding of that someone is always there, that someone is always present and that someone is Jesus. But I'll tell you what, if for some reason you just can't feel that, because sometimes it's hard to lean on someone. It's hard to trust in someone.

It's hard to follow someone who you cannot see. Well, that's a really awful excuse. Because I see Jesus.

Look, he's wearing a blue sweater. Look, he's wearing a striped shirt. Look, he's wearing a scarf.

Look, he's wearing a thing around his head. And it goes on. Look, he had to have a cough for a moment.

And there he is sitting back there. And there he is sitting right there. So I understand.

There are those moments. Like I shared with you guys, sometimes I think I run into those moments. I'm like, man, I don't need any more message.

I don't need any more examples in my own life to bring this to life. But yesterday, I don't know. But I had a rough moment and I let that moment spiral.

And I'll tell you, when I pulled myself out of that moment and really looked at all the things I have to be grateful for, and really looked at that understanding that I could dwell here on all the things that don't seem to be going well, or all the scenes that don't fit, and I can build this mountain of not enough even larger. It's going to be the largest mountain of not enough, if that's not a contradiction statement right there. But I could do that, right? And then from it, it'll get so high that things will start to fall off it and we'll have an avalanche.

And in the end, guess what? If I just soak in that and stare at that, I've gotten nowhere. How about sit there for a moment and just recognize there is no mountain. Because there may be in the moment, but there truly is nothing that can come into your life that the Lord is not going to strengthen you, empower you, and provide you to get through.

And you know, if it's going over the mountain or through the mountain or around the mountain, just trust that the way you go when you're following the Spirit, it'll get you to the other side. And if you can be really confident, then you can just do what? Have that faith like a mustard seed and be like, mountain, by the name of Jehovah, get out my way. And just go.

And the mountain will vanish. You know, the trouble in this scripture is that people were feeling like they didn't have enough, and they were looking to Jesus to be the one to meet that. And though there is truth in that, the way he would meet that is by teaching them to see enough within themselves, to be grateful for what they have, to continue to pursue the truth of who they are, that they too are the I am, that they too have the embodiment of Christ within them.

But that can be a lot. And so he does, he starts by talking to them, feeding them, healing them, and nurturing them. You know, people today, they complain about not having enough for whatever reason, and they don't always take the moment to be thankful for what they have.

You ever go to a concert? I'm sure you guys have been to concerts or shows. And when the energy in the room is so high up, is so elevated, even if you're not a clapper, singer, yeller, you'll get pulled into it. You know, I went to a Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons concert, and it was when he was doing a tour where he would recruit four guys from a local college and take them out on tour.

And it was so exciting. And I was one of the youngest people there, okay? And this is in Fargo, North Dakota, and the first maybe 15 rows are full, but then the rest is pretty empty. But I'm looking at these hundreds, there's still hundreds of people, and he starts singing, and nobody stood up.

And I thought, what? This is ridiculous. You know, and I remember standing up and thinking I was so weird and awkward, but eventually more and more people standing up. And I wasn't in the front, so I couldn't be like the anchor that says, hey guys, let's stand up.

You know, but instead I sat back there dancing and singing along and just wondering what is going on. But once people started to stand up, the energy just took the room, and we all were on our feet through that whole concert. During the intermission, we were clapping, just so thrilled, back in our seats right away just to get up again.

You know, and it's so interesting because a lot of times when we move through life sharing all of our complaints, all of our worries, all of our burdens, it can be that same thing where we suck people into that mentality. I met a young man yesterday named Tylan, who I've engaged before. I got to speak with him a little more, you know, and he was talking about how people can just be succubuses of your energy if you're not careful.

You know, and that's so true because when you are having a challenge, like not having enough to eat, not having enough get up and go, not having the provisions or the trust or the hope for those in your life, let alone yourself, then you surround yourself with people who are in the same place and you just start to commiserate. Or you start complaining and talking so loud that you start to pull people in. Instead, pause and stop and just be grateful.

Be grateful for what you have. You know, when you lift up you're not enough, God will show you if you just have the faith that you always have more than enough. I met this wonderful lady, she was my roommate when I was in South Africa and we were sharing different stories of miracles that took place in our life.

She is from Georgia and she was sharing with me the story of her and her husband running a food pantry in their local community and there was a plant there and the plant had closed and a lot of people lost their jobs. Well, they were serving a church together and their church only had less than a dozen people in it and their food pantry always had tons of people coming to it, but this less than a dozen people just continued to serve and serve when that plant closed. Needless to say, the food pantry became depleted rather quickly and there was a particular, she was telling me about this young lady who was the manager over that ministry and all she would do would be a constant complainer.

She would say, you know, ever since this happened each week we only have three to five items at the end of our distribution day and now we have a whole month because they only gave out once a month to try and come up with enough for the next crowd and if it gets bigger than this we won't even have enough for everybody. And I remember sitting there and Elaine telling me that her husband kept telling this lady that you need to give thanks for all those that you've served. You need to give thanks for the provision that God has already given you and you need to trust that the Lord will replenish the pantry and I remember her saying that they made it a point in that time from that distribution to the next one that every day they would give thanks for those that they had served, they would give thanks for the opportunity to do this continual ministry and they would put it in God's hands and so once they did that they wouldn't complain, they wouldn't run and check how many new donations came in, they wouldn't even speak about the food pantry, they would just go through their day because they placed it in God's hands.

Well over that month that lady did continue to complain in the days she saw them and the Wednesday nights and in the evenings and do you guys know anyone that sounds like this lady? That despite every good thing around her, despite all the efforts that have been taking place, she just keeps complaining and complaining or maybe it's a he or maybe it's you, who knows? But the thing is Jesus he told the disciples to feed the crowd and they responded with this is this is all we have and Jesus in the midst of all of that he reminded them of the power of their faith, the reminder of calling upon God, the reminder of pulling together as a community and trusting. Today we sung that song Jehovah Jireh and in Philippians 4 19 it says but my God shall supply all your needs according to his riches and glory by Christ Jesus. It's not that he supplies all your needs in this monetary fashion, it's not that you have a wish list and one item at a time he checks it off.

Not saying that can't happen but it's he supplies all your needs because when you reduce your needs to a healing for a sickness, when you reduce your needs to being able to pay a bill or being able to mend one relationship or being able to keep a life alive forever and ever so you never have to feel the loss, when you reduce those needs to being all your needs then you're missing it all. You're missing all because those are not our needs, those are our wants but God through his riches and glory he supplies for all of our needs and it starts in here, it starts in here and it radiates here and it comes out here and it reaches out here and he does that for us but we have to be willing to see it. You know when I read through this text and I read through it so many times it reminds me of when I've been like the disciples and I didn't understand that by the powers of God there will be enough.

It reminds me of sometimes when I took something that looked chaotic or broken or something, no way but I messed up myself that I could take it and I could place it in God's hands and remember his promises, remember all the spaces in my life where he showed up again and even though right now I don't know how he's going to show up, I'm going to pause and I'm going to be grateful and I'm going to say thank you and if I'm not feeling like being thankful then I'm just going to look down and start with well I'm thankful for my shoes, I'm thankful for my pants, I'm thankful for my shirt, I'm thankful for my health. Just go through it because eventually you figure out man I'm just being thankful for little stuff. I'm thankful for Dorothea Johnson, my baby.

I'm thankful for all of her siblings. I am thankful for you people sitting here. Cheryl, I'm thankful you came back today.

It's so good to see you, and then it gets even bigger than that. I'm thankful for this guy named Bruce and this lady named Jean, who live out on the east coast, and they raised me. And though I may have these moments of wondering, gosh guys, what handbook were you working with, I am thankful because I'm so happy to be who I am.

I met with Linda Davison earlier this week, and I was talking to her about the challenges, the levels of maturity in life, and just some of my own things. And I just felt a call to her because she has a very dynamic, neutral spiritual presence, where I feel like she will not just listen, but she'll really listen to me, and she'll see me and speak from her heart. And as somehow the conversation took us to talking about her son-in-law, and the reason it went there is because I said something like, you know what, Linda, though with all of my mistakes, all the things that I've done, and all the things that have been done for me in an unpleasant way, I am so grateful because I love me, and I love all the me that surrounds me. And I have to remember that when I'm looking out at you all.

And if you all could do the same for me, that's just some version of me in a different set of clothes, in a different place in life. And if I can't have compassion on them when they're struggling, or on them where they're ignorant, or on them where I just can't understand, how do I expect them to have that compassion on me? If I can't look at someone who's falling short in front of me and see that they are more than enough, even if I'm not agreeing with them in that moment, how can I expect people to look at me and see that?

And so it's really interesting, as Jesus reminds his disciples who they are, as Jesus reminds the people who they are, guess what? They're all still gonna mix the message. They might get a little piece. They might get a little piece, but they're still gonna miss the message, and they're still gonna continue on and go through their unfoldment with glitches and hang-ups and moments where they fall down. And Jesus has to come back again and say, you're enough, you're enough.

Well, I don't expect any of us, especially me, to walk out of here today and say, oh, we're never gonna have that stumble again. We're never gonna have that moment of sitting and listening to Pastor Jean and saying, no, I know how you feel because I've been there, because we're never gonna be there again, right? Well, we probably will, because we're stubborn. And being God's children, we like to run around like this: I can't hear you. Wait, where are you? Where are you? Oh, I can't hear you, God.

But I'll tell you, if you at least take for a moment and hold it within you that Jesus will provide for you, that Jesus will give you your enough in every situation, I'm gonna say it for the last time, and I don't mean monetary or with stuff. I mean a situation that has you questioning as you've lost your loved ones, and your health isn't doing well, that has you wondering as you're having to downsize your house and move into the next chapter, as you hear of friends who are having challenges and you're doing all you can to help them, but right now you have to focus on yourself and your own family, so you don't feel like you have enough for them. Or when you show up in church and it gets a little shaky because, man, we're all here today. Why can't it be like this every Sunday? Well, it can, but until it looks that way, feel it now. Feel it with me now. It's enough.

And the more we think that, the more we take our eyes off of the budgets and off of the numbers and off of every place we're falling short, and just have gratitude for what we have. Did you guys see this place over the holidays? It was gorgeous. It was decorated with life and love, and that's who we are. And when we walked out of there, that was our opportunity to take what takes place in here and bring it out into the world. We are the loaves and the fish that can go out there and feed the 5,000 plus.

I want to tell you, as we close, about that friend of mine, Elaine, and her husband, their congregation. They spent that month praying. They spent that month every morning putting it in God's hand. And I remember saying, why do you have to put it back every morning? Did you keep picking it back up again? And she's, oh, not me, but maybe he did. And you know, so true, so true. But they kept doing that.

And then the Sunday prior to the food pantry being open for the community, there were these three ladies that walked into the church, and they had worshiped with them before, but it'd been quite a while. And they sat there, and at the end of the service, they walked up to Elaine, and they gave her a check for a thousand dollars. And they said specifically, we felt led to give this to you for your food pantry. They were on vacation at Calloway Gardens in Pine Mountain, Georgia, and they were drawn to this little church. And while they were there spending time, they heard the message: God is still performing miracles through his people to bless one another. When you can't see God, trust that you're that person to perform that miracle. And when you trust that, God will send a blessing, and he'll send it through you.

And so those ladies, they just felt drawn to give that offering to that church. And so they went, they gave that offering, and they were able to share that and more. And from there on, the food pantry, it continued. Not to say it didn't have its struggles here and there, but the food pantry just got stronger and stronger.

You know, sometimes we forget how Jesus provides for us, and we have to always reflect back and remember that when we didn't have enough, we still got through it, and God provided. And I just want to encourage all of you today just to have that faith, to have that trust. You each have your own, whether it's this big or this big, space where you're questioning. And maybe the question has nothing to do with I don't have enough, but then you find the synonym. Whatever it is that has you there, doubting, worrying, questioning, thinking, with this new chapter, this new transition, how am I going to make it work? I challenge you to recognize that you have enough. And when you start to see that abundance of blessing, share it with others who are in need.

Please pray with me.

God, our almighty, we are so grateful for your living word. We are so grateful that you prepare a message for each and every one of us through the power of your almighty spirit. We are so grateful that we can call on your name, night or day—Jehovah, Jesus, Emmanuel—our lover, our provider, our almighty father in heaven. And God, as we go from this place, may we embody the trueness of this message, that as we are each beautifully made in your image, we are each beyond enough, and our abundance is here to be shared. So thank you for this reminder. Thank you for your grace. Thank you for your mercy. Thank you for being enough, so we can be enough. It's in Jesus' name we pray, amen.