Inadequacy

The word inadequate has always been an interesting word to me.  The picture to the left is of a man standing beside a a large body of water.  I don't know if you have ever had the pleasure of standing beside an ocean, but there are only a few other phenomenons in the world that humble you in similar fashion.  It shows you how weak and insignificant (inadequate) you really are, but at the same time it draws you into the majesty of God's creation.  This is a healthy understanding of inadequacy, but most of us struggle with the unhealthy version.

I had a long conversation with one of my good friends yesterday about inadequacy and I have come to the conclusion that everyone deals with it, at least in some capacity.  I think some just hide it better than others.  I have also come to the conclusion that inadequacy is always tied to jealousy.  I say this from personal experience.  Hopefully the following passages help illuminate this connection.

The tenth commandment says, "You shall not covet your neighbor's house" (Exodus 20:17, NASB).  The commandment mentions other objects that we should not covet, such as spouses, servants, oxes, and donkeys.  (I can honestly say that I have never coveted my neighbor's donkey, and come to think of it, I have never had a neighbor who owned a donkey, so I guess I am good on that part).  Today, I really want to hone in on the idea of what it means to covet another's house, because I believe it encompasses the origin of inadequacy.

There are two events described in the book of Numbers that portray the idea of one person coveting another person's "house."  We are taking the word "house" to envelop all the things that one can covet.  The first one comes from Numbers 12:1-15 and the second is found in Numbers 16:1-35.  Numbers 12 is the story of Miriam and Aaron, the sister and brother of Moses, murmering against him concerning the ability to communicate with God.  They said, "Has the Lord indeed spoken only through Moses?  Has He not spoken through us as well?"  Eventually, the Lord came down in a pillar of cloud and told all three of them that He speaks to Moses "mouth to mouth, openly, and that he beholds the form of the Lord."  The result was that Miriam turned "white as snow" and Aaron begged that his jealousy not be accounted as sin.

Numbers 16 chronicles another situation describing jealousy and covetousness.  Here, it is the sons of Korah who question Aaron and Moses' ability to communicate with God; "why do you exalt yourselves above the assembly of the Lord?," they asked.  Moses and Korah set up a showdown of sorts to see who was God's chosen leader.  In the end, God told Moses, "Separate yourselves from among this congregation, that I may consume them instantly."  In the end, you have the first record of an earthquake, and Korah and many of his descendants were destroyed.  (Psalm 46 was written in lieu of this event).

So what does Miriam, Aaron, and Korah's covetousness have to do with our feelings of inadequacy?  Well, I believe that it is impossible to feel inadequate without first feeling jealous, or first coveting something from your neighbor.  The word "covet" literally means "to wish for."  In a sense, it is telling God, "I am displeased with how you formed me.  I wish I was more like that guy!"  Inadequacy is always preluded by covetousness, and as we saw earlier, we are not supposed to "covet our neighbor's house."  It is a result of measuring yourself up next to someone else and wishing that you were more like them.  Inadequacy is always related to jealousy, I am convinced of that.

The point of all of that is to say this: Inadequacy is a type of "desparity jealousy."  Miriam, Aaron, and Korah were jealous of Moses, but they weren't only jealous of him, they were desparingly jealous of him.  They saw God using him in ways that they wanted to be used, and they knew that there was absolutely nothing that they could do to control that.  They also wanted God's favor for the wrong reasons--their own glory.  I believe that these are the two elements that sometimes breed inadequacy.  We see someone else doing well, we want to do well ourselves, we then compare ourselves to them, realize that we cannot control their life and our life so that we can be doing better than them, and in the end we feel inadequate.  Usually, we want the glory for the wrong reasons.  How can I say all of this?  Because I deal with it all the time, and I think I have finally realized how sinful I have been.

Today, if you are feeling inept, insufficient, unsuitable, or inadequate for any reason, I encourage you to stop and think, "why?"  You will probably come to the understanding that those feelings derive from an unhealthy jealousy of those around you.  Most of the time we compare ourselves to those that are around our age or in the same profession.  We think, "Why am I not as successful as he or she is?"  or, "I am older or more educated, why am I not noticed more by my superiors?"  These are all feelings of inadequacy, and really, they are forms of "coveting your neighbor's house." 

Know this: God has you right where He wants you.  Just as God had a plan for Miriam and Aaron, so does He for you.  Everyone cannot be Moses, nor is everyone called to be Moses.  God calls who He wants to call, and we should be honored to serve Him in the specific way that He calls us to serve Him.  After a long jealous path, this is what I have learned.  We should not feel inadequate because God has made us adequate through His Son Jesus Christ (Isaiah 1:18).  As long as we are seeking His will, our adequacy should be found only in Him.