Lent Day 10: Lies Christians Tell Part 1

I have decided that among these 40 blogs there will be several that will follow the theme, lies Christians tell. I have at least one more planned, but I am sure I will think of more before too long, but if any of you out there in blog land would like to make a suggestion feel free to comment on here or on the Facebook link and I will attempt to write a blog on your chosen lie as well.

So, let's get into it.

Lie #1: God never gives you more than you can handle.

There are several things wrong with this statement. The first in my view is the whole 'God gives' aspect. Why? Because I don't believe that everything that we go through in this life is a direct gift from God. You may disagree, and that is your right as a human being, but I do not believe that God gives people diseases, or miscarriages, or car accidents, or broken hearts, or fill in the blank. The author of James wrote that every good and perfect gift comes from God, not every painful and crappy one (James 1:17).

But even if you fall into the God as chess player camp, the Bible never says anything about only being given things you can handle. The closest the Bible does get is to say that we will never be tempted past what we can overcome (1 Corinthians 10:13). This, of course, only covers temptations, not tribulations.

Now, while I do not believe that God brings us pain, I do believe that a) God never leaves us when we are in pain and b) that God often uses our pain for good. What I mean by that second item is that crap happens to us and God sees the crap that has happened to us and works with us so that the crap can be useful to us and to others. An illustration may be helpful.

There is a best selling novel titled Joshua that was turned into a movie. Minor spoiler alert: Joshua is Jesus. Anyway, in the course of the story Joshua encounters a woman who has lost her husband and is in a lot of emotional/spiritual pain. At one point Joshua is telling her that her life is beautiful and she picks up a small glass sculpture and throws it on the ground, shattering it into a thousand pieces and says, "That's my life." A short time passes and Joshua leaves town, but he leaves behind a new glass sculpture that was made from the broken shards.

That is what God does with the pain in our lives, God takes what is broken and makes it new and beautiful again. That is the buisness that our God is in, not the  breaking of things but rather the restoring of things.

The thing of it is that in this life a million things, some small and some gigantic will come and knock us for a loop. We won't be able to handle half of them, and what God does, is come alongside and help us to carry the burden. What God does, is to give us hope in the darkness, strength in the times we are weak, and love in the times when we feel lost and alone. 

God says, 'My child, you cannot handle it, but together maybe we can.' That's the God I know, the God I follow, the God I love. And more importantly it's the God that loves me and the God that loves you. Period.

Peace and Love,

Pastor K