More Than You Can Handle

Last Saturday Boyd and I attended the funeral of a little boy who had been fighting cancer for over a year.  He was just about to turn two years old in December.  More than half of his life was spent going through radiation, blood transfusions, surgeries and multiple hospital stays.  The young father gave a beautiful yet very difficult eulogy of his son’s short life.

I remember during his emotional talk a comment that he made and I can’t seem to get it off my mind.  I’m not sure why, but I have heard it said more in the past month than I have my whole life.  I have even said it a time or two myself when I’m going through a difficult struggle.

This apparently popular saying is; “The Lord never gives you more than you can handle.”

Sounds good, doesn’t it?  It seems to give us hope and strength to face one more day.  People say it and believe that no matter what we face, God is never going to allow you to deal with more than you can handle.  It may be what we want to hear, but it’s not what we need to hear.

After hearing that saying from this young father at his baby’s funeral, I couldn’t help but think; really?  What could be harder than watching your son fight cancer for a year and then having to bury him before he even turns two years old?

I decided to search the scriptures this week trying to find out where this saying originated from and why we have adopted it to get us through very difficult times in our lives. 

I think I found where it came from, yet I believe the truth has been twisted and misunderstood.

1 Corinthians 10:13 reads:

“There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man:  but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it.”

There were many LDS talks quoting this scripture referring to “temptations”, not the troubles of life.  We can look at nearly every situation in the scriptures where the Lord shows up in miraculous ways and find that he ALWAYS gave people MORE than they could handle.  That’s when the Lord shows His power in people’s lives.

Moses was given more than he could handle.  He didn’t part the Red Sea on his own.  Daniel should have been devoured in the lion’s den.  Who could possibly handle walking into a fiery furnace by themselves?  Nephi could not have retrieved the plates with his own strength.  Alma was bound by chains within prison walls with no way out.  Even Jesus needed help carrying His cross.

I remember studying the life of Paul last year in my Bible class and being in awe of his faith when he found himself crushed beyond his ability to endure.  Here is what we learn from Paul in 2 Corinthians 1:8,

“For we would not, brethren, have you ignorant of our trouble which came to us in Asia, that we were pressed out of measure, above strength, insomuch that we despaired even of life”. (Paul thought they would never live through it; He expected to die)

Why would a loving Heavenly Father allow people to go through such anguish? I asked those questions because I didn’t understand His ways.  I understand it now that it is out of His great love that He allowed them to face the impossible.  Why?  We have to continue to read into the next verse to find the answer.

“But we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God which raiseth the dead” (As a result, we stopped relying on ourselves and learned to rely only on God, who raises the dead)

There is purpose through our pain.  Heavenly Father always gives us more than we can handle in order to reveal what He is able to do through our faith in Him.  He wants to show us that prayer works.  He wants to bring about miracles that go far beyond our imagination.  He wants to display His power, presence, and glory.  Without situations in life that we CAN’T handle, we would never need God to show up.  We would never have the opportunity to see our own Red Seas parted.  Who wants to miss out on that?

If Heavenly Father is only giving us what we can handle, we are not learning to depend on Him.  We are not stepping out in faith and our faith won’t grow. 

If you are facing situations that are far beyond your control, Heavenly Father may be trusting you more than you trust Him.  He obviously knows that He has given you a measure of faith that is much more than you think. 

If we will put away our fears and doubts and move forward in greater faith, knowing that every obstacle is an opportunity for faith to rise above, we will find ourselves experiencing the peace that Heavenly Father promises to give us as we trust in Him.

The Lord wants to bring us to a place where we realize we can’t do it without Him.  He wants us to fully realize that we need Him for everything we face in life. 

I felt I needed to put this in writing so I could REMEMBER.