I think many people would be surprised to learn that “God won’t give you more than you can handle,” never appears in the Bible. It’s high up on the list of things the Bible never said, up there with “God helps those who help themselves.” But I will admit there are a few places which come close to that theme. One of those is the final chapter of Genesis, in which Joseph’s brothers beg forgiveness for selling him into slavery:
Realizing that their father was dead, Joseph’s brothers said, “What if Joseph still bears a grudge against us and pays us back in full for all the wrong that we did to him?” So they approached Joseph, saying, “Your father gave this instruction before he died, ‘Say to Joseph: I beg you, forgive the crime of your brothers and the wrong they did in harming you.’ Now therefore please forgive the crime of the servants of the God of your father.” Joseph wept when they spoke to him. Then his brothers also wept, fell down before him, and said, “We are here as your slaves.” But Joseph said to them, “Do not be afraid! Am I in the place of God? Even though you intended to do harm to me, God intended it for good, in order to preserve a numerous people, as he is doing today. So have no fear; I myself will provide for you and your little ones.” In this way he reassured them, speaking kindly to them. (Genesis 50:15-21, NRSV) |
The thing is, I don’t think that God causes these bad things to happen to us to help us to grow or to bring some good out of it or because God thinks we’re strong enough to handle it. But I do think that God is fully able to bring good out of our suffering. I think God saw Joseph’s suffering and thought, I can do something good with this. Because Joseph relied on God and stayed faithful through his trials, God was able to work through him to redeem his suffering, and to do good not only for Joseph, but for all of Egypt. God doesn’t put us through suffering and pain in order to bring about some mysterious divine plan, but God can use our suffering for good, if we’re willing.
I’d like to change the original saying. It’s not true that “God doesn’t give you more than you can handle.” Far too often we end up in situations that are too much for us to handle. But when life is too much to handle, God does promise to be right there with us. So instead of telling people going through a hard time “God doesn’t give you more than you can handle,” how about we try saying, God won’t leave your side when life is more than you can handle.
The Presbyterian Peacemaking Program provides a daily lectionary of scriptures based on themes of peace and peacemaking. Over the course of 2019-20 I’ll be basing my blogs on one or more of the scriptures from each week’s lectionary. If you would like to follow along in the lectionary with me, here are next week’s scriptures:
Sunday – Genesis 15:1-6
Monday – Numbers 10:11-16
Tuesday – Amos 5:1-9
Wednesday – Psalm 8
Thursday – Luke 1:67-75
Friday – Hebrews 11:1-3
Saturday – Revelation 21:1-4