“You Are Not Enough”
“Today, you will eat clean, healthy foods.”
“You’re the only one who thinks about food this much, you…freak.”
“[This isn’t] particularly hard to do. Other people don’t need this kind of hand-holding.”
“You’re such a loser!”
These are but a few snippets of the hateful self-talk that plagues Sheila, played by Rose Byrne in the Apple +TV series Physical. Set in the early 1980s, Physical revolves around Sheila’s struggle with an eating disorder. As a middle-aged housewife who is disenchanted with a life in which she seems to have little agency, Sheila seeks salvation in attaining the perfect body.
I haven’t watched more than a few clips of the show but enough to appreciate what makes it relatively unique in the world of television. Not only do you see and hear the show’s characters as they interact, but you also hear the inner monologue that torments Sheila. Sometimes people refer to emotional struggles and addictions as our “inner demons.” This show gives Sheila’s inner demon a voice. And it is a voice of rejection.
I’m no psychologist, but judging by the show’s reception, in which many viewers have identified with Sheila’s experience, and judging by the ubiquity of this negative self-talk that we’re all familiar with in one form or another, I think ultimately the voice that Sheila hears is a voice that we all hear, whatever our history, whatever our struggles. It is a voice that can speak in any language, in any dialect, using any sort of vocabulary. But it has a single, devastating message. “You are not enough.”
Lent and the
Rejections of Jesus
Today is the first Sunday of Lent, the season when Jesus begins his road to the cross and we are invited to follow him. This year, we are focusing on the various rejections that Jesus encounters on his way to the cross. As I hope will become clear, these rejections are not just a dramatic flourish in the story, something meant to heighten our sympathy for Jesus and inflame our dislike for his opponents. (I’m afraid that’s how the story is read sometimes, and with drastic consequences, as Christians have periodically persecuted Jewish people and others whom they have perceived as heretics and enemies.)
The truth is, the rejections that Jesus endures are a single rejection. It is not a rejection limited to one moment in history. It is a rejection that spans history, a rejection we perpetuate, not only against Jesus, but against ourselves. It is the rejection of the image of God in us. Why would reject the image of God? Because, to our surprise, it’s an image of brokenness. An image of needfulness. An image of vulnerability.
The
Accuser
As it to highlight that the rejections Jesus encounters are not simply some external conflict of good guys versus bad guys, the first scripture of Lent features Jesus alone in the wilderness. The first rejection that Jesus encounters is within. It is the accusing voice that he hears in his heart. Mark calls it Satan. Centuries of embellishment have given rise to a tradition of “the devil,” a figure who is opposite and almost equal to God. But the biblical origins of Satan are much simpler. In the Hebrew, ha-Satan means “the adversary.” Satan is more like a prosecuting attorney, running around and accusing. Think back, for example, to the famous legend of Job. There, Satan accuses Job of having faith only because of the many blessings he has received. The implication is that Job is not enough, is not worthy of God’s love. He must have things in order to be the good person he is.
In the wilderness, Satan accuses Jesus. Mark, the first gospel to be written, does not elaborate on Satan’s accusations, but Matthew and Luke do. According to Matthew and Luke, Satan repeatedly begins his temptations with the phrase, “If you are the son of God…” (Matt 4:2, 6; Luke 4:3, 9). He is effectively accusing Jesus of not being a child of God. He is saying, “You seem weak and needy to me. Prove your worth. If you really are of God, then prove it through some demonstration of your power, of your self-sufficiency.”
Utter
Depravity?
“You’re the only one who thinks about food this much, you…freak.”
“[This isn’t] particularly hard to do. Other people don’t need this kind of hand-holding.”
“You’re such a loser!”
It’s the same voice that Jesus hears. The voice of the accuser, the voice of rejection. It’s a voice within.
Our Old Testament text today takes us all the way back to right after the Flood, when God makes a covenant with Noah and all of creation never to flood the earth again. But right before that covenant, there is a curious scene, in which Noah offers a sacrifice of thanksgiving, and after God smells the pleasing odor, God says, “I will never again curse the ground because of humankind, for the inclination of the human heart is evil from youth” (Gen 8:21). I will confess, I always read that verse as an indication of humanity’s inherent wickedness or sinfulness, what the famous theologian John Calvin would call our “utter depravity.” I’m not a Calvinist, and I simply wish to point out that this theological idea of our utter depravity is not a requirement for faith. There are and have been many followers of Christ who do not understand humanity as having an in-baked wickedness as the result of Adam and Eve’s actions. Rather, they understand humanity as God seems to have understood humanity—God who, right after having created humanity, saw that they were “very good.” We humans are God’s very good creation, endowed with the creative capacity of choice. When God recognizes that “the inclination of the human is evil from youth,” that is only one side of the picture. The other side has already been told, that the inclination of the human is also good.
I revisit this story because it seems to provide a backdrop for the voice of rejection, the voice of the accuser, whom Jesus hears in the wilderness just as clearly as we do today. This voice within is the “inclination” toward evil, toward a bad view of ourselves and the world. This voice is not who we are; it does not mean we are utterly depraved. It’s just a condition of being human. Perhaps it is at least a comfort or consolation to know that we are not alone in experiencing this voice. Jesus knew it too.
Broken
and Blessed
Apparently in the TV series Physical, Sheila slowly finds a sense of self and power through the burgeoning aerobics movement of the 1980s. But her empowerment is not an altogether good thing, because she begins to employ it hurtfully against anyone who gets in her way. Her sense of self is recovered, but mistakenly so. She believes herself self-sufficient, a force separate from others, a force to be reckoned with.
In the wilderness, Jesus shows us a different way to respond to the voice of the accuser. And it all seems to hinge on what he heard right before he went out into the wilderness. Another voice within, an altogether different voice, that affirmed him, “You are my beloved son; with you I am well pleased” (Mark 1:11). And so to each temptation to prove himself, to show his power, Jesus responds by claiming his identity as a child of God, which means just that—as a child, he is trustful and dependent on a higher power. This is that image of brokenness, needfulness, and vulnerability that we are all tempted to reject. But Jesus claims it.
The paradox of the good news, at least as it is seen from a worldly perspective, is that to be a child of God is to be both broken and blessed. As we follow Jesus toward the cross this Lent, we will see him continually respond to rejection not with bullish bravado and a show of force, but as a child of God, blessed in his brokenness. What might this mean for us who follow Jesus? For me, it’s pretty simple. To be broken and blessed like Jesus, is an invitation to ask for help—help from God and others. Because I cannot do it all on my own. And also because I am worth it as God’s beloved child. It is an invitation to let go sometimes, to recognize my limits and also that I am not in control. It is an invitation to accept the present reality as right where I am supposed to be. If the accuser’s voice is a voice of rejection, the voice of God is a voice of affirmation, a voice affirming God’s goodness and presence in ourselves and all things.
The poet Mary Oliver writes with this divine voice of affirmation when she reflects on a moment of quiet bliss in a field of daisies. She writes, “It is heaven itself to take what is given, / to see what is plain.”[1] This is the opposite of “You are not enough.” This is, “It is enough, enough, more than enough.” She wrote this about daisies, but it could be written about literally anything: the sunrise, a loved one, a pet, a song that breaks you open, even a time in the wilderness, a time of deprivation and loss.
“It is heaven itself to take what is given, to see what is plain.” Heaven on earth. The kingdom of God among us. Blessing amid the brokenness. Sound crazy? Jesus invites his followers, “Come and see.” This Lent, Jesus shows us the way.
Prayer
Who shares our inclination toward evil,
Who hears the accuser’s voice that we hear,
The voice of rejection that tells us,
“You are not enough”
…
Teach us anew our belovedness
As fellow children of God.
Help us to hear the voice of affirmation,
The voice of God, saying,
“You are my beloved child;
With you I am well pleased,”
So that we might accept our brokenness
And in it God’s blessing.
Amen.
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