Posted on 07/11/2017 4:32:32 PM PDT by Gamecock
Have you ever heard someone say, “God will never give you more than you can bear”?
Really?
Is this what the Bible teaches? Is this what your own experience confirms? Let’s be honest. In those seasons when we are walking through “the valley of the shadow of death,” this platitude not only provides little comfort, but it also piles a lot of guilt on us.
The apostle Paul, who was no weakling in the faith, described his feelings of anguish to the Corinthian church: For we do not want you to be ignorant, brothers, of the affliction we experienced in Asia. For we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. (2 Cor. 1:8; emphasis mine)
Paul doesn’t describe the affliction that caused him to despair even of life, but he does let us know that it was more than he could bear! In 2 Corinthians 1:8–10, Paul gives us a minicourse on affliction—a divine lifeline for those times when we are “burdened beyond our strength.” The Reality of Affliction “Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death” (2 Cor. 1:9a).
In his letter to the Corinthians, Paul is intentionally vague about the nature of his suffering. The specifics aren’t important. It is the reality of the pain and hopelessness he felt that Paul seeks to convey to his readers. This means that Christians who face various forms of suffering, affliction, and pain can identify with Paul and be helped in the same way.
This affliction had pushed Paul beyond his limits. His situation was so desperate and utterly beyond his ability to handle, that he thought he was going to die. The very words Paul uses are those of a man on death row. He was in a hopeless situation with no human way of escape.
Does God only give us what we can bear? Not according to Paul! If God only gives us what we can handle, if he only gives us what we can bear, why do we need him? If we have the ability to handle what comes our way in this life, just maybe we have within us the ability to deal with the next life as well.
The Reason for Affliction “But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead” (2 Cor. 1:9b).
Afflictions have a divinely ordained purpose, namely, to change our perspective regarding ourselves. Paul’s words here literally mean, “to make us stand not relying on our ourselves…” He was pushed beyond the limits of his human ability and was confronted with the complete inadequacy of self-reliance in the face of certain death. This pain brought him to the place of dependence upon the One who not only has power over death but also has defeated it.
This is why afflictions are a divine blessing in disguise. When we are pressed beyond our limits, these hard providences reveal our inability to deal with the ultimate reality: death. If we can’t handle cancer, what makes us think we can handle death? These “unbearable” times are when God draws us closer to himself in simple faith.
The Response to Affliction He delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will deliver us again (2 Cor. 1:10). Because we know that our good and gracious God is at work in our pain to bring us to a greater dependence upon him alone, we can respond to these times with hope.
Hope grows in the soil of affliction. In this fertile ground, the Holy Spirit makes us aware of the glorious hope we have in Christ. Our gracious heavenly Father often does deliver us from the many afflictions of this life, but these temporal deliverances cause us to look to the future with hope and anticipation for the great deliverance yet to come. While we cannot be certain that God will remove the crushing burden we face right now, we can be assured of his ultimate deliverance. He is the one who raises the dead, and upon him we have set our hope.
The gospel is not a promise that all our problems in this life will be solved—or that we will never face anything beyond our ability to bear. The gospel is all about Christ. He is everything we need. He is our only hope. Our loving heavenly Father often burdens us beyond our ability in order to deepen our dependence upon Christ, who is our true strength. He may even bring us to despair of life itself, so that we might find the comfort and strength of resting on the One who raises the dead.
I will pray for God sized problem for you. This is of great encouragement for me as it is usually the only prayers I get answers to. Let me know if how it goes.
This is an absurd example, since not all cancers are deadly, not all people will have cancer, but every person will experience death.
On June 1 the man that preached the Gospel to me that the Lord used to bring me to salvation died in his sleep. He had just been to the doctor for a complete psychical the day before and was given a clean bill of health. His wife of 46 years was amazing to watch as she trusted in Gods Sovereignty during this tragic sudden life changing event. I was inspired.
Yes God will give those who fully trust in His Grace everything they need when they need it.
Gods decretive will promises it.
Romans 8:28 has to be believed even when we can’t explain it. The qualifier is you have to be fully trusting in the salvation that is only through the work of Jesus Christ.
I've always thought this is nonsense. People DIE every day.
Yes. That's similar to how I have understood and experienced it as well. A great comfort when most needed.
I think the article is off on another tangent than this.
That is an example, feel free to insert the terminal disease of your choice.
My son was diagnosed with leukemia Jan 2015 and for 2 1/2 yeas we tried to get him well... took him to Houston where they work miracles. Prayer was going up all over the world for him to be healed.
But God said no.
He visited my son one night and in that vision, he saw loved ones.. he saw his dad .. and Jesus with his hands spread out to him. Some months later I sat with him, prayed, sung hymns as my beloved son drew his last breath. Nothing in life prepared me for seeing my son slip from this life into the next.
My husband had died a few months before my son was diagnosed and the double whammy is still hard to take. But that vision my son had took the fear out of the months that followed.
One day I will ask God how he chooses to heal some and not others. How some who don’t deserve to live live long lives, and some very good lives are snuffed out before their time.
“You can never learn that Christ is all you need, until Christ is all you have.”
Should Christians escape tribulation?
Your story is indeed a challenging one for anyone to figure out apart from God's sovereignty and I certainly do not mean to be smug or snooty, so please take my comment in the right spirit. When a life (on Earth) comes to an end, it is exactly at the time it is supposed to occur. It might happen before our time but it is precisely according to His.
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