As a parent, eating a bowl of ice cream can feel like criminal activity.

All you want to do is enjoy your ice cream in peace, but there are times when the only way you can truly enjoy it is when the kids go to bed.  After all, the last thing you want is your kids eating mass amounts of chocolate and sugar at 10 PM! 

The other night, I was about to treat myself to a bowl of some of my favorite ice cream when I heard the familiar pitter-patter of my toddler sneaking up behind me.  Hurriedly, I put the lid back on the ice cream, hid it behind the salt and pepper shakers, and prayed that my quick thinking prevented him from seeing what I was really up to. 

Thankfully it worked, and within a few minutes he was back in bed, and I was back to my ice cream.

But that’s when the real problem arose. 

You see, what I didn’t realize is when I put the lid back on the pint of ice cream, I didn’t put the correct lid on.

Unbeknownst to me, there was a lid to the chicken noodle soup container still sitting on the counter from our dinner earlier.  With the kitchen lights dim and my action rushed, I didn’t realize I had put the wrong lid on the ice cream. 

While this might not seem like a big deal, the issue was the lid still had residual soup still clinging to the lid.  When placed on the ice cream, it proceeded to drip the leftover soup all over the top layer of ice cream.  As much as I love ice cream, chocolate-chicken-noodle-soup ice cream just doesn't sound all that enticing to me. 

Thankfully, I was able to skim off the top layer of soup-contaminated ice cream and salvage the remaining bottom layer.  Crisis averted! 

As comical as this might sound, I’ve found myself reflecting on this experience. 

The ice cream was almost ruined because it was placed beneath the wrong lid.  This got me wondering – is it possible that we are living beneath the wrong lid?

The soup lid fit well enough, and it certainly would have kept things from the outside from getting in, but the lid itself came with its own problems.  The residual soup remains threatened to ruin the good stuff contained within.  Is it possible that we too are living beneath lids that seem to fit and do in fact offer some protection, but are tainting the best parts of who we are? 

So, I’ve got to ask, what’s your lid?

Is it your finances?

Is it your family history?

Is it your strength or intellect? 

Is it your reason and experience?

Is it your capacity for work or multitasking?

We’ve got to identify what our ‘lid’ is because if we’re living beneath the wrong lid, it may sustain us for a season, but in doing so, blind us from the ways we’re subtly being tainted by the very thing we think is covering us. 

Paul, one of the leaders of the early Christian movement, once pleaded with God to remove some hardship (we’re not sure exactly what) he was experiencing in his life.  Instead of removing this pain, here’s what God said instead:

“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” (2 Corinthians 12:9)

Paul had come to the place where he realized his own lid (think strength, will, capacity) was insufficient for the problem he was facing.  His lid, his will, strength, power alone was too low, too small to face this obstacle and come out victorious.  He realized this limitation, so he prayed to God to take away the problem.

But check this out: God said no.  Sometimes God does that. 

Rather than remove the problem, God wanted to expand Paul’s lid.  Instead of making Paul’s life easier, God wanted to make Paul stronger by moving him out from beneath the limits of his own strength and capacity so he could learn to live beneath the limitlessness of God’s grace (undeserved goodness and kindness). 

Our strength, our lids – whatever they may be – always have a limit.  They may not feel insufficient now, but give them time and they most certainly will.  God’s grace, however, has no limit.  God is more than sufficient. 

Every other lid (strength, capacity, power) we place ourselves under will inevitably come up short and this frailty can contaminate our lives in so many ways – bitterness, anger, jealousy, hopelessness – these kinds of things will undoubtedly flow from the failings of our own lids.  However, when we place ourselves beneath the limitless lid of Jesus Christ, who can do far more than we can think or ask (Ephesians 3:20), we discover a grace that is more than sufficient.  In fact, what we discover is that there, in our weakness, God’s power is made perfect in our lives. 

Chances are, you’ve been praying for God to remove something, change something, stop something in your life.  And maybe He will!  Keep asking, just be open to “No” as an answer as there are times when what we need most is not for the problem itself to stop, but to learn to take shelter beneath God’s limitless, boundless love and power.

So, may you come out from beneath whatever false lid you’ve been operating under and find rest beneath God’s limitless love and power.  And there may you discover, just as Paul did, that God’s grace is “sufficient for you”.