Enough: I Have Had Enough
by Daniel Burton
So, here I sit. It is 2:30am and my mind is racing. Not in a bad way either. Today has been marked, all day, by merely conversations about God. Conversations of where faith and life violently collide. And in the midst of that, one of the most honest conversations took place where two people could be vulnerable about the struggles without fear of judgment or condemnation. We talked about honest issues and pains of struggles past and present but we did so knowing that each one cared deeply for one another. Fraternitas. The deep love of two brothers as family.
In the course of the conversation, it became abundantly clear to me that the thing I had been putting off dealing with was its time to come to head. While we all know that we sin and we struggle, sometimes we don’t want to change, at least not immediately. We can see the effects that it has on our lives but for whatever reason, we aren’t prepared to give it up. Sure, we can acknowledge our sin, but there comes a point when we must look our sin in the face, call it by name, and say “I have had ENOUGH!”
Lay It At The Foot of The Cross
It is our sin that first separated us from our special connection with God in Genesis 3. We had eternity in our grasps, and through sin, were banished from the Garden of Eden. Our sin heaped upon our backs, we strain under the burden of weight of that consequence. We may try to lift that weight on our own, but frankly, the weight was too strong for us to bear, let alone to conquer. The only thing that can defeat an eternity shattering decision is the one thing that shattered fate through an act of sacrificial love.
“Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool.” – Isaiah 1:18, NIV
So we cast our sins upon the cross. Not flippantly as if these are some casual acts, but we cast our sins upon the cross knowing that it was the weight of our sins that drove the nail through the hands of Christ. We lament our sins and the distance that it placed between us and God. And Christ received the burden and weight of our sins. Our death is defeated and we are made whole. Chains are broken and we are free from ever having to return to the things we laid before the cross. They are defeated and our victory is assured in Jesus Christ.
Don’t Go Alone
That is why I love that fraternitas. As two people with affection and intimacy, not romantic but brotherhood, can engage those real conversations of where life and faith meet, there is a mutual encouraging and an exponential strengthening. We were never meant to live our lives alone. Even the very nature of God speaks of both relationship and complete unity. Where we find the temptation to struggle privately to resolve our own sin, we can lay that before the cross as well, for in the family of God, we are stronger together and designed to build up one another.
Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.
– Ecclesiastes 4:12
So here I sit, typing at 2:30am finding myself eternally thankful for the love of a heavenly Father and gracious for the friends who encourage and inspire me even without knowing they are doing so. I am undertaking the fight against sins and temptations left unchecked for too long. I am saying “I have had enough!” and beginning to fight, not as Daniel fighting against sin, but as someone whose victory Christ has already won, standing firm with my brothers and sisters in the faith.
