I recently posted in my Instagram stories a quote negating the fallacious and cliché statement we have all heard from well-wishers when experiencing trials: God will never give you more than you can handle.

It sounds good. It sounds comforting. It soothes the ego. Grants a little leverage against the mighty God of Heaven whose ways are entirely past finding out.

And I used to believe it too. Until I was given far, far, far more than I could handle. Until like Paul, I was pressed beyond measure. Until like Job and Elijah and David, I truly just wanted to die, wanted a permanent release from the unbearable sadness. Suddenly it was incredibly obvious that I could certainly not handle it and that trying to handle it had actually just plunged me into the night of lupus and nervous collapse.

God does give us more than we can handle. All the time! And for two incredibly merciful reasons.

1. When we consider the immensity of our need and the absolute inefficiency of our strength: His strength is made perfect in our weakness. His majesty, His power, His omnipotence are on full and awesome display. It is then that we realize there is no god like our God, that He is above all–immensely and unfathomably so. He is incomparable in His wisdom and in His might. His plans are like chariots of fire that charge across the sky, unhindered and unashamed.
2. And that is when we fully understand that we are but dust. We are so poor. So failing. So, so sinful. Oh the stab of pain to realize the depth of my trials equals the depth of my wickedness, the breadth of my sorrows the volume of dross that must be burned away! The greater the refinement, the greater the suffering. How could I ever imagine that I could somehow handle this adversity! This trial is transcendent, far out pacing this tangible, sub-lunary, passing world. This sorrow is not really about family and health and enemies and economics. Those are merely the pictures on the packaging.

I recently read The Consolation of Philosophy by Boethius which I so highly recommend, I pause to give our 6th century brother a modern day plug: Read it, listen to it, soak in it. He says the following:

“Strange is the thing I am trying to express and for this cause I can scare find words to make clear my thought. For truly I believe that ill fortune is of more use to man that is good fortune. For good fortune, when she wears the guise of happiness and most seems to caress is always lying. Ill fortune is always truthful since in changing she shows her inconstancy. The one deceives, the other teaches. The one enchains the minds of those who enjoy her favor by the semblance of delusive good, the other delivers them by the knowledge of the frail nature of happiness. Accordingly, you may see the one fickle, shifting as the breeze and ever self-deceived, the other sober minded, alert and wary by reason of the very discipline of adversity. Finally, good fortune by her allurements draws men far from the True Good. Ill fortune oftimes draws men back to True Good with grappling irons.”

Obviously, the True Good is God himself and therefore we must accept the ill fortune as the best fortune that could ever occur. As Faber says in his hymn: “Ill that God blesses is our good…and all is right that seems most wrong if it be His sweet will.”

There is a lot of wrong that feels so difficult to accept as what is right. How is it right that the wicked prosper? How is it right that the righteous are hated? How is it right that the foolish and ignorant are platformed and believed? How are those wrongs right?

It is right because it is the meek who inherit the earth;
it is the persecuted who receive the kingdom;
it is sinners redeemed who somehow through the mercy of God and the love of their Savior will stand before the throne crying ‘worthy is the Lamb.’

As R.C. Sproul said when asked why bad things happen to good people: That only happened once and He volunteered.

These are all wondrous acts of God’s providence, guiding us and refining us unto that Perfect Day.

In my last post, I mentioned that we were going to have a day camp at our house for all the believers in this area. The very next day, the only highway between here and the cities to the east was closed and has been under major construction ever since…thank God (there were huge potholes and lots of accidents) but with 7 hour wait time, it made travel impossible, so the camp was cancelled. That also meant we couldn’t be with the Christians in Atasta either. These are, again, things that are so hard to understand in the moment yet clearly discouragement and frustration are not the appropriate response. It is good to have to trust. It is good to have our plans frustrated. It is good to remember we are merely threads in the tapestry, vessels in the Potter’s hand. That God’s work is indeed His; that no amount of effort on our part can equal the strivings of the Holy Spirit.

Personally, I have been hurt very deeply in the last few months. Although it was something I fully expected to happen for about a year, the fruition was no less painful. It is easy to wallow in self-pity. It is easy to despise other people, to wish ill upon them, to become bitter. It is HARD to forgive but oh, so necessary! and so freeing, and so humbling and therefore…so good.

A jaguar came to visit us the other night. It had already been a day of worldly cares and stress. It is scary to have a cat like that roaming around, to suddenly feel your haven violated. But it is good sometimes to be unsettled and insecure. How much we take for granted! It is good to have to rely on the Rock of safety.

When I was a teenager, I kept several poems and quotes on post-it notes on the inside of my closet door. Every morning before going to school they were imprinted on my heart. There was one, though, that for years I haven’t been able to recall. I have strained my brain, searched old notebooks…nothing. The other day I took some garbage out and standing next to our van was simply thanking God. It had been in the shop for almost 2 weeks requiring repairs far beyond our reach, yet somehow the Lord through the mechanics found ways around it and found accessible solutions. “It is enough,” I thought, “Enough that God my Father knows…” and the poem came back like I had just read it on my post it note yesterday and not 17 years ago:

“Enough that God my Father knows! Nothing this faith can dim. He gives the very best to those who leave the choice with Him.”

May God bless you, my reader. It is enough that He knows, enough that the choice and the handling are all done by Him. Oh sweet consolation to be a child of God.