more than you can handle

Christians use a lot of funny cliches.  One of my favorites and probably the most popular is "God never gives you more than you can handle." 

But I don't think that's true.

I think that God always gives you more than you can handle.

If we were only given what we are able to handle, we wouldn't need to turn to God for anything.  We wouldn't need His help because we'd be able to do things by ourselves. 

But that's not what God intends for us. 

I've found that the times I'm the closest to God are the times that I'm struggling the most.  I turn to God when I'm most desperate, and I seek Him more because I need Him more. But when things are going fine and I don't need God to help me with big things, I don't think of Him as much.

Since God loves to have relationships with us, wouldn't it make sense that He put challenges in our lives to make us depend on Him? God wants us to know Him, so I think He allows trials bigger than we can handle so that we would ask Him for help.

God wants us to rely in Him.  That's why Jesus said, "Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest."  He wants us to trust in Him because He cares so much for us. 

He knows us and He understands our weaknesses: "For He knows our frame; He remembers that we are dust" (Psalm 103:13).  So why do we try to hold onto cliches like "God doesn't give your more than you can handle" instead of just admitting that we don't have it all together?

Because we don't like admitting that we can't handle it. We want to be strong, independent, and capable of handling any challenge that is thrown at us.  We don't like to appear weak, or worse, admitting we are weak. 

But that's the paradox about God. I think that God gives us more than we can handle because that's the only way He gets our attention.  When we have too much on our plate, we have to pass it on to someone else.  God wants to be that help!  

Paul got it right when he said "I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me" (2 Corinthians 12:9). 

He wants us to come running to Him, admitting we are weak, and that we don't have it all together.  He doesn't want us to rely on ourselves to handle it all.  That's why He gives us more than we can handle - we weren't meant to handle our troubles without Him. And He loves when we let Him take care of it all.

He gives us more than we can handle, so we can let Him handle it.