More Than You Can Handle

When going thru a tough time, has some well meaning person told you that “God promised He would never put more on you than you can bear“? Yeah, me too and I’ve probably said it to someone on more than one occasion. It seems like we just want to say something to try, in some small way, be a comfort to the hurting person. But honestly, it never made me feel better. It kinda made me feel like I must be doing something terribly wrong if God thought I could handle this. Or maybe God was punishing me for something.

It never set well with me. Is that really a promise? I mean there are a lot of things we go thru in this life that seems to be more than one person can take. We have a dear sister in our church right now that recently buried her husband and now is planning her sister’s funeral. Her daughter wrote on Facebook “Two sisters, a niece, a nephew, and a husband in one year is just too much.” Yes, I agree. It’s just too much.

My Pastor has buried 6 close family members in the last 5 years, including his mother, father and 3 brothers. What about the mom that lost 3 of her children in a tragic accident while they were getting on the school bus? I can’t even imagine! Or the dad that has inoperable cancer but has 3 beautiful little girls that need him. What about the wife who found out her husband is cheating on her and wants a divorce? He’s leaving her and their two children to fend for themselves. Or the young wife that desperately wants a child but it doesn’t seem to be in the cards for her? It’s just not fair!! We could go on and on about how life is just too much. So how can we say that God won’t give us more than we can bear in these situations?

Where did this idea come from? Well, there’s this….

“But God is faithful; He will not suffer you … beyond that which ye are able to bear…” That sounds awesome doesn’t it? This is exactly how we want life to be, right?!? We know that God is faithful and this sure seems to say he won’t put more on us than we can bear. Let’s go with that, let’s run with it and tell everyone we know when they are going thru something unbearable and we have no words. But see, when we take things out of context we don’t get the correct meaning. Let’s take a look at the full scripture…

There hath no temptation taken hold of you but such as is common to man. But God is faithful; He will not suffer you to be tempted beyond that which ye are able to bear, but with the temptation will also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it. 1 Corinthians 10:13 KJV

So this promise is about temptation. God promises that no new temptations will be put on us (someone somewhere has already faced what’s tempting you, it’s nothing new and doesn’t surprise God) and that He would always provide a way to escape those temptations. That’s the promise! So no matter what the devil brings to us, God has already provided an escape for us. The problem with so many is that we don’t look for the escape. It’s like in the movies when the good guy seems to be surrounded and there’s no way out. The enemy has the upper hand and defeat is definite but then all of sudden at the last second he finds the “escape hatch”. The escape was there the whole time, someone put it there but he had to search for it, it wasn’t in plain view. When temptation is upon us let’s not succumb to the enemy, but search for the “escape”. It’s there, it’s promised, so let’s not give up until we find it!

So what about when life is just too much and we’ve been given more than we can handle? Where’s the promise there? If it’s more than we can handle, what hope do we have? What are we supposed to do?

Maybe, just maybe God has given us more than we can bear on our own because He never intended on us doing this life on our own but He wants us to turn to HIM. Maybe He wants us to be reminded of our need for Him. All thru the Bible men and women have tried to do things without God with unfavorable outcomes. It started with Adam and Eve when they decided they didn’t need to follow the instructions of God and ate from the forbidden tree. They left God out of that one decision and it changed their lives (and ours) forever. We are still doing that today, we seem to think that if we depend on someone else it somehow makes us weak. But God doesn’t see it that way He wants us to depend on Him. He wants us to know that He doesn’t just love us from afar but He wants to be up close and personal. He desires to be a part of every aspect of our lives.

One of my favorite scriptures is “Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.” Proverbs 3:5-6 KJV

See, God wants us to talk to Him and He wants us to trust Him. We can trust God with our deepest darkest secrets, with our pain and all the hurt that we feel. We can also trust Him with our joys, our happiness and our dreams. He wants to share in our lives, both the good and the bad. He wants us to trust Him and lean on His understanding. If we will do that then He will direct our paths. That’s the promise.

“Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness.” Isaiah 41:10 KJV He lets us know that He is with us and He will help us. The one and only Mighty God promises to help us! That’s how we handle this life.

Another great promise, “I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.” Philippians 4:13 KJV – This shows me that God doesn’t expect me to do it all on my own. But He promises that He will strengthen me and that we can do it together.

So when life deals you a hand that you just can’t handle on your own, turn to Jesus. He will give you the strength to get through whatever this life throws at you. That’s the promise! We don’t have to handle it on our own, God wants to help us. At any given moment the phone could ring and we could get the dreaded news that something we can’t comprehend has indeed happened. Unfortunately that is the way this life goes. Don’t wait for the phone call, get a relationship with Jesus Christ now. Make Him center of your life, acknowledge Him in all your ways and then when the unspeakable happens you’ll know where to find the strength you need.

The Lord is my strength and my shield; my heart trusts in him, and he helps me. My heart leaps for joy, and with my song I praise him. Psalms 28:7 NIV