In a sermon recently I stated that I didn’t want anyone to fall for the lie, “God won’t give you more than you can handle.” I called it a lie because it is NOT a Biblical teaching. I guess I could have said a false leading or an inconsistent teaching with the Bible, but I chose to use the word “lie” to get people’s attention … and it worked. So, in looking at the statement that “God does not give you any more than you can handle”, we must understand that is not found anywhere in the Scripture. It sounds good just like “cleanliness is next to godliness” or “God helps those who help themselves.” Sounds good -- not Biblical. No one knows who started this statement. Again it sounds good, but not Biblical concept. There is no doubt that it was said to help someone who was dealing with some issue of life. Again, I believe that it started with good intentions, but again, not Biblical. So, I will attempt to share why that saying is not Biblical. First, let’s begin with the text which many people think it is from: 1Corinthians 10:13 “No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it.” Notice the text is speaking of temptation, that’s it, not experiences or difficulties of life. Let’s look at another passage that Paul wrote. “For we do not want you to be ignorant, brothers and sisters, of the affliction we experienced in Asia. For we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead.” (2 Cor. 1:8,9) That same man penned both passages. The first speaking of temptation, the second, struggles of life. If the second passage doesn’t speak of despair and being thrown more than can be handled, I don’t know what does. We are promised tribulation and persecution in this life. We might even die (or feel like it). But He is made strong in our weakness. John 16:33 “…In Me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world.” The purpose of our pain is to make us rely on God, so that His great power is made evident in our weakness–when we can’t handle another thing. When we are able to continue and survive with peace in the midst of tribulation, others won’t see us. They will see Him. Christianity is NOT the guarantee of an easy life, but the abundant life. It makes us uncomfortable to think about suffering loss and God allowing that loss. God wants us to cling to Him, though, to hold onto Him for dear life sometimes, because, without Him, we would drift away into nothingness. We will suffer greatly, at some time in our life, and it is because of our sufferings and through our sufferings that we can become more like Jesus. Paul wrote, for example: “I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death.” Philippians 3:10 All throughout the Bible we read of regular people who were handed seemingly impossible burdens to bear but instead of trying to handle life on their own, they drew closer to God, fully relying on Him for direction and deliverance. We read in scripture how God allowed or gave (for those who like to use that word) each individual more they could handle on their own and then filled them with strength and capability every step of the way. Just like the characters in scripture, God longs for us to depend on Him when we are feeling overwhelmed with life and burdened by more than we can handle. He wants us to spend time with Him so we can be filled with what we need to get through each day. When our load seems too heavy to carry, it might be that God is not only waiting for us to recognize that we can’t handle it on our own, but also hoping that our desperation will build our spiritual appetite so much so that we wake up starving every morning. Again, Jesus is the one who said, “Come to Me all who are weary and heavy laden.” Again I know many have said this to give people hope, but allow me to share with you a couple of problems with this false statement. When a person comes to Christ and they come to a place in their life when things become so insurmountable, many will become bitter or face despair. The bitter man is the Christian who believes there is a promise from God that says they will never have to endure anything beyond their ability to handle. And yet when he has an event happen in his life that he can’t handle, from that moment they quit trusting God and grow disillusioned and disappointed. The rationale is this- if God lied about this and broke this promise, how can I ever trust anything He says? That’s one possibility. The second possibility is despair- “God will never give me more than I can handle, and yet I can’t handle this.” What must that say to the person about their relationship with God? That they are a failure who isn’t spiritual or strong enough. That their fragility is weakness and their inability is insufficiency. There is a sense of “What is wrong with me that I can’t endure, that I can’t handle these trials that I’m supposed to be able to handle”? which leads to despondence. If we want to give hope to those that need comfort, let’s share with them the true Biblical teaching, God will give us more than we can handle so that we will rely on him. All things direct us to him and his work. The promise is not a perpetual conquering based on our own abilities and fortitude. We are not told to grimace and through sheer force of will bear the burdens on our own- that will only produce pride in ourselves for our ability to endure. Rather, our inability to endure shows that only Christ Jesus is able to sustain us. It might be paralleled to the work and function of the law, which in our inability to perfectly keep it we see our need for a Savior who has kept it for us. For this reason, a more accurate statement that I feel would bring hope and well as directing them to God, might be, “God will never give us more than He can handle for us.”
Posted on: Wed, 28 Aug 2013 12:10:47 +0000
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