Yesu Anatosha

Yesu Anatosha


These words are plastered on many of my things, but mainly on my heart. They declare "Jesus is enough" in an African language I do not know. I first saw them in a picture about a year ago. There was a little family clustered in a small, dirty shack in some African country. Their hunched and guarded postures spoke weariness; hooded eyes told me their battle was against much more than simply hunger, and the tired faces that stared back at me from the photo reminded me that I am not the only one who wants to give up. Scrawled in defiance of the destruction that threatened them from all sides, in red paint behind them on the only wall in their makeshift house were the words "Yesu Anatosha".




Unfortunately, I often speak the words on an empty heart, because I do not have to own them.  I say it. Rarely do I volunteer to live it. Jesus is enough, as long as I have enough already. Jesus can be enough, as long as I have a safety net where the safety is not having to depend on God to provide. The idea is to eliminate variables and risk, to make things efficient, with as many safety factors as I can manage to accumulate. Safety in a plan. In having enough money. In having the resources. In having the connections. In having things under control. My control.


And then the rug is pulled out from under me and my control is shattered. The plan is ruined, the dream in limbo, the safety factors vanished, and still I am compelled, by a truth I know to be real, to reluctantly pull the words out of my constricting throat while I feel as if the entire world is coming down on my head.



Yesu Anatosha. Jesus is enough. Enough to feed and protect a family on the brink of starvation and massacre. Enough to provide all my needs outside of any material thing I thought was imperative. Enough so that I can say "Take my life, take everything I ever had, I only care that I have Jesus."


I'm declaring it, because it's all I know to do when I don't feel it. Maybe someday, I'll be old enough to remember that truth stands independent of feelings and obedience often seems like blindly leaping into a dark chasm


Until the better time comes, until things feel right again, until my heart doesn't ache anymore, I'm going to keep telling myself, over and over until the night gives way to the morning.


Jesus is enough.