There is Enough?

There is enough
There is enough
There is enough, Lord
Enough and some to share

With those words we gathered for meals at Domesticated Chickenfest West. It was a beautiful reminder not only the abundance we could see with our eyes but also of the God whose hand was behind it.

A few years ago I was playing with the idea of “manna theology.” It was a way of holding together the God of the Exodus with Jesus’s stories about the Kingdom of God.

Provision comes in the places where it seems least likely to appear. Food falls from the sky, turning the barren dessert into fruited field. The single seed produces a hundredfold crop. A thousand people eat the produce of one loaf of bread—and have to make sure that they gather the leftovers for next time.

Manna means enough and more than enough. It also means abundance.

Abundance and Hoarding

But manna also comes with a demand. It is a stern gift that way. The demand is simply this: the continuing, the ongoing, provision is what must be trusted. Yesterday’s gift can’t be hoarded for tomorrow. Gather just what you need. There will be enough again in the morning.

When you sit with your group of fifty or a hundred and eat your fill from the loaf that has made its rounds, you don’t stuff your pockets. There’s abundance here that is not to be hoarded.

There is enough, Lord, enough and some to share.

The Syrophoenician woman knew this, and needed it: there is more than enough falling from the table of the children for the dogs to eat their fill, too. The disciples still needed to learn the lesson.

The Gospel of Luke makes sure we realize that these are not only stories of the hoary past: It’s a fool who builds towers to hoard his grain; the cost of discipleship is renouncing worldly possessions; the shrewd steward uses the wealth of the world to make friends with the oppressed pour.

There is enough, Lord
Enough and some to share

 Yes, But…

But all of this leaves me with two lingering questions.