How does that statement make you feel?  Does it give you comfort knowing that God is watching over the kind and amount of trouble hitting your life?   Or do you secretly want to tell the utterer of these words to shut up because the pain in your life certainly feels like more than you can handle?

In these past few years, I’ve leaned much more towards the latter.  The agony of losing a husband can be nearly debilitating and certainly doesn’t feel like God has held back any pain. Feels like we get hit with both barrels, or more, if there was such a gun.

But then I stop myself because I remember that the Bible does make this promise.  Sort of.  Here’s the scripture that is generally behind this statement:

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 (1 Corinthians 10:13 NIV).

If you put the two statements side by side, I think you’ll see that they are NOT saying the exact same thing. 

The “God won’t give you more than you can handle” statement suggests that God will stop our trials and pain at some point that hopefully feels like relief to us.  At best, it’s a bit vague, because who can really say just how much we can handle? What does it mean if we CAN’T handle something?

The scripture text, however, is talking about TEMPTATION, not the amount of pain or trials we find in our lives. And of course, for any good biblical discussion, it’s important to look at the context of the statement, and what the author’s intent was.

Here’s how Colin Matton explains it on the website, www.biblicalcounselingcoalition.org,:

When we look to the context of the passage to determine which meaning Paul intended, we find that he is addressing sin, not suffering. Verse 6 addresses those who “desire evil.” In verse 7 Paul addresses “idolaters,” showing the context of this passage is sin. Verse 8 identifies this idolatry specifically as “sexual immorality.” The following verses continue to address sin as we read of “put(ting) Christ to the test” in verse 9 and grumbling in verse 10. Verse 12 gives the exhortation “therefore, let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall,” which continues the focus of the passage on addressing sin. Verse 13 continues to address sin within the context of these verses. The plain reading of this text should lead us to conclude that Paul chose to use the word “temptation” to address temptation to sin, not trials and suffering, in this passage.

God, through Paul, is telling us in this passage that no one will be tempted to sin beyond what he or she can bear. That is amazingly good news. Praise God for His grace to us. However, this passage does not teach that a person will not face a trial or suffering beyond what he/she can bear.

There really is good news in this for us.  God will not TEMPT us beyond what we can bear and he will give us a way out.

So, what about the pain and heartbreak of our trials? What do we do with that, if God does NOT promise us he won’t give us too much?

There’s another scripture text that addresses this perfectly, and has become one of my favorites during this season of my life. 

But he [God] said to me [Paul], “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong 2 Corinthians 12:10).

It is EXACTLY when we have no strength of our own that several new perspectives can take root.

• We acknowledge that this world DOES throw more at us than we feel we can handle.
• We stop feeling like every trial is ours to fix.
• We stop feeling like failures when the trial continues, or the pain is never-ending.
• We begin to see that God never expected us to take on this burden alone.
• We switch our hope from our own power to God’s almighty, all-sufficient, never-ending power.
• We focus our limited power on surrendering our desire to be in control of this trial, and turn everything else over to God.
• We have victory over our trial, not in its elimination or mitigation, but in knowing that God will do great things in our life THROUGH it.

So, my friend, I hate to break this news to you, but God WILL give you and me more than we can handle. And he does so because he wants us to recognize our own weakness, and to see greater things done through us because of that trial.

We are all likely to face trials of various sizes throughout 2021.  Unfortunately, turning the calendar to a new year did not eliminate that fact.  The other, more encouraging promise, is that God’s power also didn’t change or disappear with that calendar turn.  We can forever count on that and I am grateful for that constant in my life.  How about you?

Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.

Hebrews 13:8