More Than I Can Handle

I often hear fellow Christians (and myself at times) state: "God won't give me more than I can handle." I realized today that we are stopping that statement shy of the truth. The truth is, God will not give me more than I can handle without His help. I believe that it is because He loves us so much that He actually will give us (or at least allow us to experience) more than we can handle on our own; because when we cannot handle it, we turn to Him. He does this out of love as He desires this relationship with us and it is in partnership with Him that we can do (and handle) so much more than we can without Him.

Think of all of the biblical heroes who cried out to God and He helped them do more than they thought they possibly could. Could a young virgin have dealt with an unexplainable pregnancy without Him? Could a young Jewish woman have stood up for her people to her husband, the king, risking almost certain death? Could a man lead the Jews out of captivity without drowning them in the Red Sea when pursued by the Egyptians? Could a man who stoned Christians have become the founder of so many churches and author of several books of the bible? Could a carpenter have taken on the sins of the world and saved us all? Not without HIM.

Another thing happens when God asks us to take on more than we can handle... when we are successful, when we do overcome the challenges, He is glorified. For there is no question that what was done was not of our own ability. There is no question that He was with us every step of the way.

So the next time you have more than you can handle, praise God and ask Him to work with you in it knowing that with Him and through Him you too can handle whatever He asks of you. And when you want to grow closer to Him, take a risk and actually invite Him to give you more than you could possibly handle without His help. My prayer for all of us who follow Christ is that God will use each of us to do a work that is more than we can possibly do on our own and, in so doing, we will grow closer to Him and the world will know He is at work in us.