Does God Give You More Than You Can Handle? The Truth About This Christian Saying | Aggressive Life with Brian Tome

a way to difficulty. And Jesus says, in this world you will have trouble. Just what he says. And he tells me to pick up my cross and follow him. The cross wasn't a really cool religious symbol. It wasn't something of a thing of peace. It was a disgusting place where the most horrible means of execution men have ever invented came into being. Meaning, hey boys and girls, get ready for self denial. Get ready for pain. Get ready for long periods of suffering. That's not a spirituality that the average person wants at all. [MUSIC PLAYING] Welcome to Aggressive Life. My name is Brian Tom, also known as BT. And I'm here with my buddy again, Windex! Yo! Yes, good to see you, Windex. I like your shirt. Your shirt. Dear, are you trying to be like 27 years old or what? You know, someone in the student ministry at Crossroads, which is my day job, gave me this. And I don't know. I don't know where we're out in public. It's all baggy. Everything's all baggy these days. It's terrible. I'm not sure if that's a style. They just got me an XL right like a large.

I don't know. Kids these days. You don't like it? I mean, I don't like when the shoulder seam goes halfway down your arm like it does like on them. Oh, yeah, you're right. That one best, because they gave me the wrong size. The actual pieces. The kids like it. The kids wear certain things though. The kids have been doing, the youngsters. What do you like? You just haven't gone away. Like what? Like what's great? Like the saggy pants are hanging down below your ass when you walk around town. Like I don't, my gosh, I got a staple gun. I'll fix that, pull that up. I don't look at it. That camping for years and years and years and years, I've been like, I think that's good. There's got to be something the kids are doing right. What are the kids doing right these days? Well, it's a form of entertainment that I just encountered recently. I've been doing this for a while, but I thought, that's pretty cool. All the kids getting together and choosing a song. There's some person's favorite song,

and they blast that song and they sing that song together and jump around like maniacs. That's great. I do, I think it's great. It's like, hey, we're having good, clean fun. Yeah, and we're experiencing things together. That's awesome. We then in high school people would use all kinds of slurs against us. (laughing) It would have been awesome. Yeah, that's great. That's great. All right, well, what are we talking about today? Okay, we'll call this part of our pet peeve episode series. There's certain things I hear people say about God, about life, about the spiritual life that really rubbed me wrong way. And I don't mind being rubbed the wrong way. I just mind people going down a wrong spiritual path. That's what I mind. So last time we did this a few weeks ago was around the idea of God, does God have a perfect plan for us? Yeah, yeah. And I think that actually comes out of a phrase that was used back in the '80s and '70s that people would share Christ with people that would say, God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life. And people interpret that as,

there is a blueprint of life I'm supposed to live. There is a spouse. I'm supposed to find a soulmate. There is a career path. There is, and they just get locked into not being able to make decisions, you know, aggressive life because you're just making sure it was, isn't it? So I did that last time. Okay, yeah, yeah. This time, well, we got a whole new one. We got a whole new one. This one is what it is. Well, I, these always feel like country wisdom kind of to me. So I'm just going to try and read it a little like country. It was like, the thing that people always say, they're like, well, you know, God never gives you nothing you can't handle. Now why you got to do that in country? I just feel like that's the kind of thing like my old, my grandpa would say to me like, well, you know, they got to slap their smack their lips like that. Well, God won't give you nothing you can't handle. And I don't know where they heard that, but maybe when you just say it like that, people are like, well, it's probably true. Cause the guy's old needs, that's, you know, suspenders on or whatever. But the question, the question is, is do you believe that's true?

Is that in the Bible? Is it biblical? I haven't heard someone with a Southern accent say that, but I hear people say that regularly. God will not give me more than I can handle. And the way that is communicated is a sense of self assurance, either themselves or the purse they're trying to help. Oh, hey, Windex, God's ever going to give you something again. And the assurance is I'm going to be fine. It's going to be easy. It's going to be God. crushed here i'm i'm gonna come out on top romes a twenty-nine all things work together for good for those who love him or called according to his purpose and look at that they go okay well what if it's purpose all things were to get it for good how does all things work together for good well for those who love him so only for those who love him not people who don't for those who love him for that i got got that one i love and recall according to his purpose meaning i'm on the same page as him as what he wants my life whatever you want to know i'm on that pick called orders purpose would jesus said that god never give me anything they can't handle uh... he didn't handle the cross he didn't he didn't recant his faith but jesus was sweating blood sweating blood

when i finally came into picture in the focus of what was going to happen he was arrested with eleven of the twelve disciples uh... all of whom other than john who wrote the book of relation died of natural causes with those eleven disciples who all were were were crucified beheaded stone to death tortured would they all say god i didn't give me more than i can handle if if that means it's going to be okay really it's going to be if you can die it's not going to be okay right right and it may be okay and in the light of in the light of heaven it will be okay in the light of heaven there's no tears no sorrow all joy there uh... this this is just a momentary bad dream our worst times are just a very flip flimmer of a flicker a bad dream but i'd just think that we're not accepting that this life will be hard and it actually may get too hard so no i don't like that phrase at all well what does the bible actually say like what are some of the things that come to mind when someone says that in whatever accent they might say it in what are the immediate things you're like what you know what i know is is this well it's

let's defend the the the statement from it i think we're that comes from the one verse where i think that could come from is is for a second krentians one eight to nine which says when temptation comes god will give us a means of escape as what's being communicated there uh... so uh... that's good what does that mean you could probably take a poll of guys who use porn and you could probably say uh... we asked them like is it fairly frequent that something happens to divert you from porn or you you god gives you an out you're about to go on but then a phone call comes in you're about to go surf but then you know you're wife coming down the stairs are coming in the office whatever or you're at that there's i bet if guys were also like there's often times reminder and i could blow by that right go okay yeah that's good so i think he does safeguard us that way so i think that that first actually does speak to that god does care but i just think that we are

of first to difficulty and most of us are into spirituality to deal with and explain the way that difficulty the the the the draw of Buddhism is the denying of evil because that's the core of Buddhism you're not hurt there isn't anything wrong no there to deny evil deny yourself deny evil there isn't that there is explaining explaining the way we we go and lean into god when we need a higher power because we're in a a which i think is great wonderful come down to our come down the bottom and we need we need something and god is there for us excuse me but but so much of our spiritual pursuits are to explain away and avoid pain and suffering and he says in this world you will have trouble that's what it did right what he says right and he tells me to pick up my cross and follow him right because today the cross is a piece of jewelry it's a piece of art hung on church walls or wherever but therefore we've we've missed what Jesus was saying when he when he told people that in the first century that the cross wasn't a really cool religious symbol wasn't something a thing of peace

it was a disgusting place where the most crucifixion It was the worst thing that could happen in fact scholars and medical practitioners would tell us It's the worst way that humans have ever invented for someone to die Not a worse one And jesus telling us To carry around our electric chair He's right he's telling us to carry around well, what's another means of election of lethal injection Or a fire injection squat about lethal injection one is an easy one. It's a little vile firing squat yet beheading the guillotine Okay, carry around your own guillotine that'd be good carrying carry around your uh Your electric chair, but even those those are those are immediate things that boom you're done The cross the crucifixion when jesus dies after after a few hours Pilate gets word because he's really he's already he's dead already because Pilate seen jesus. He's been jesus was stunned. He was stunned by him How he handled himself and he had a strength about him and you're like wait Because they come by to jesus to to speed up the process The ones what they do and they break the legs the the shins on the purse take a big massive hammer So he can no longer push up to get a breath or to exhale on the cross That's just a bonus part of the the death right what I mean like that's not even saying it kills you It's just a bonus Terrible terrible right exactly so he has You know and he tells us to pick up our guillotine pick up our thing and follow him meaning Hey boys and girls Get ready for self-denial Get ready for pain Get ready for long periods of suffering Get ready for feeling like you've been abandoned because if you want to be a christ follower

That means I follow the ways of christ which means I follow having a at times at least a painful troublesome life That's not a spirituality that the average person wants at all right Right I mean, there's a there's a question for the people that are asking this you know the people that that wonder if this is true Okay, so if that's true If if we follow a beaten and bloodied savior as you've said and your friend had said well, you mentioned he said that away Yeah, oh get this right when I went through my more recent crisis and I was uh processing with uh some pastor friends of mine uh things that I thought were uh unjust that were happening to me and um and things that were just very very painful One of them uh Paul Taylor from rivers crossing church in um north of Cincinnati I was there with him matt mazzy from the vineyard and mark speaking from seven hills. We meet Frequently have for a while He said hey, man, who are we who are we kidding? We follow a beaten and bloodied savior All right, oh then there's that you're like man. I was really hoping you'd say well, you know God won't give you nothing you can't handle Or tell me like yeah screw whoever whatever whatever just like do the you know it's like you know french would do that just like yeah Oh, you know if you're if your girlfriend's messing up and she's bought well screwers. Yeah, you know friends do he was like well Yeah, it's kind of what we signed up for. Yeah, great story is blooded and beaten guess what we get to as well It sounds It sounds tough. So what's the upside? What's the upside for you of following a beaten and bloodied savior What's the what's the upside of getting the shit kicked out of your ego time after time after time What's on the other side of it? Well, the upside is I become more like him and so he offers a piece that passes understanding and It's only in hard times and crises that on the other end we get a piece to pass understanding if it's not If your piece Is situation dependent you just haven't had enough pain yet. Hmm. Most people don't know pieces

They think pieces just tranquility on vacation when no one's blowing up my emails with things like I deal with at work Nobody's bugging me. Yeah, and that's fine. I like that too, but no There's a there's a rock solid identity you get from Jesus and an X factor of his presence known as the Holy Spirit that fills you That gives you the ability to smile when others aren't smiling Gives you the ability to hear his voice when others are only screaming at him And that comes to you as a result of the things that break. they break you, that's a big benefit. I get to become more like him. And when I come more like him, you mentioned earlier, Jesus says, "Greater things where you do." I can do things he did and greater things. Let's just take him as word, greater things where you do. - Right, right. Yeah, I mean, like you said, like Jesus said, you're gonna have trouble no matter what. This is, this is in my own experience, it's a path, it's a peaceful path through just the shitstorm, you know. - Right, now, and I would also say, I just wanted to hammer really hard poke holes in this fallacy that everything is gonna be fine and God's not gonna let things go too far. I wanna punch holes in that because that has happened. Now let me come here and say the same point and just remind us that for those of us who have received Jesus, we're part of a family and we've received him and we also cling to promises where Jesus quotes things and says, "A bruised reed, he will not break. A smoldering wick, he will not snuff out."

You know, a reed that's been, you can just see this, it's wilting, it's barely hanging on. He's not gonna come and go, "Yeah, enough of you." You know, snap, you're hope and faith is just, it's hanging on, there's the slightest bit of warmth coming from a place where there was fire, it's just smoldering, there's a little smoke coming up. He doesn't come up and go, "Let me let my fingers hear it." You know, he does care for us and there is probably gonna be a time where he steps in. Probably gonna be a time where he steps in. When I was in my recent pain season, I had a guy, it was Jenny Allen's husband, who spoke at wherever she was and we had the men's, oh, couples, couples can't, right, couples can't. Oh, share my was, was that, I can't say that. So, well, when I was one of my really, really dark times, a friend said to me or a counselor said to me, something that was very, very helpful and I'll just say it to you the same way I heard it. He said, "You know it's not always gonna be this bad, right? "You're gonna get better." He said, "That's it." Yeah, it's gonna kinda, it's actually helpful. Yeah, yeah, right, I used to hear that. So, I think we need to have hope in those moments, hope that God has us, hope that we're going to have more hope in peace as a result of it on the other side.

We just can't think that we are owed and easy out. We're not. We just can't think that this is probably the line. No, it's not. Your line is way beyond that. You think it's here. Anybody tell you in survival situations, when you think you're at the end, you got another 20% more. So, don't think that, okay, it's almost over. God, where's God? He's always right on time. You got more in us. You have more in you. God cares. He is present. Just stop trying to forecast what he's gonna do with your life and the amount of pain that he's gonna keep you from. The amount of still considerable distance you're gonna have to walk with your current pain. Yeah. One of the Bible verses that came to mind for me as you were, we were asking this question is second Corinthians 12-9, and it's Paul wrote it. Apostle Paul, and he's telling his own story. He's like, I asked for this thing to be taken away from me and what God said to him. And it's actually, I heard somebody say, it's actually one of the few red letter bits,

the red letters are the words of Jesus in Paul's writing, 'cause he's normally writing his stuff, but this is like, this is what Jesus said back to him. Through the Holy Spirit or whatever, he said, my grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. What's your response to that? That's a good one we should unpack a little bit. You just breathe by it. There's a lot there. Yeah, there's a lot there. He talks about, I prayed that God removed the thorn in my flesh. And I think it's really great that he doesn't define what his thorn in his flesh is. Some people have surmised that the thorn in his flesh was bad eyesight because of another letter. He says, I'm writing this with my own hand. So he's been praying, like, give me good eyesight, God. You know, I could do a lot more for you and travel around and share your truth if I only have better eyesight. Some people think good about eyesight. Some people could think the thorn in the flesh was broken relationships that he had with people. Maybe his thorn in the flesh was... know what it is. And that actually is very helpful because all of us can identify a thorn in our flesh, something that God just won't take away. My bad back, the memories of my abuse, my mother-in-law. You agreed that went too fast. Right, Joanne is great. I love you, Joanne. You're great. You know, but there's this

thing for Paul's life that's not going to go away. And the reason it's not going to go away is because he's learning what God's grace is. And you just quote the verse, right, "My grace has made sufficient weakness." And most of us would rather have the thorn go away and not have more grace. The thorn is there to attract more grace and to teach us about grace. Because that's where the real presence of power of God is, not just the removal of the thing that's pricking me. Right. You know, I think this, you know, you look for like, where's the truth in the Bible? I see it. It's outside the Bible, too. Like every great story, the better the conflict, the bigger the conflict, the better the story is, the more you have to overcome to oversee it or to overcome it. You know, like even like a Super Bowl champion, like what obstacles do they have to get through versus, you know, somebody who endured countless sufferings and came out on the other side or whatever. So like, I think it is kind of it's, we see it even in the natural world, like going through some stuff and coming out on the other side is actually maybe that's how God wired us, you know? And the fact that he can be there in the midst of it and all the promises that are in the Bible that says like, "I'm not going to leave you in the midst of it." But like, I think it goes deep, man. Well, you think about documentaries. I'm a big documentary guy. What's one thing all subjects have in documentaries? They had hard times. That's why that's what made them who they were. Yeah. That's a part of it. There's nobody who just woke up with a silver spoon and everything was great and easy. There was, there's a great story because there's tension and there's pain in there. The hard times actually make it interesting. Right. Yeah. And create, maybe create the art that takes it away. Was that you and I talking about the air clapton one? No. Okay. Someone was telling me they saw there was an air clapton documentary that went into this guy's pain. Oh my gosh. Oh, yeah. He's been through it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. He, you know, that tears in heaven's song was when his son fell out the window and died and I guess he had a, well, I don't want to go. I need to watch the whole thing. But yeah, his, his music and his art is so rich because of the pain in his life. Right. That's right. There's something for all of us to learn in that. Yeah. Absolutely. What, if, if someone's thinking through this and I mean, they've gotten some real life application kinds of bits in here already, but is there something you'd just speak directly to somebody

who is, who is at a point where they're like, I, I got more than I can handle. God has not given me less than I can handle. I got more than I can handle. What do I do? Okay. So one of the things you do is when you have more than you can handle, you start looking around for help. I need help. My most recent physical example of that was the moose hunt I did with friends and my son was with me and we went to do the second load, which was the head, the cape and the, and then a couple bags of various meat scraps. Like the first, the first load was front quarters and rear quarters, which was very, very heavy, but bone weighs less than the muscle. So the femur and the ball joint and the hip and all the shoulder, all that stuff, that was pretty light. So it's very heavy, but the second trip ended up being way, way heavier in the first trip, which surprised me because those are huge rear quarters. Yeah. Just massive. The straps on the backpack would barely go around it. And I just couldn't do it. I could not, it was the first thing in my life I ever wanted to physically do that I could not do. I mean, when I go work out, yeah, there's plenty of times I can't get a last rep or something, but that's kind of what working out is for. You're supposed to come to point point of failure. You can't do it anymore. Right. But in normal day to day life, recreation, this is the first thing I ever wanted to do that I couldn't do. I just Could not do it and I just had to tap out trade trade loads of my other well how can we turn around to help the other people yeah this is really where male loneliness is so insidious is you're lonely and you're having a hard time and you got no options that's why the suicide race so much our amongst men than his women men are more more isolated it's a really bad cocktail we've got a we've got a perfect storm Molotov cocktail in the making we've got men who are more isolated than ever and they're doing more potentially destructive things than ever like online gambling and betting on every football game I'm not an anti gambling guy I go to Vegas so a time a year because I said it's love it it's awesome but it's also very dangerous you're not really on top of your game you know what do you think is gonna happen when these guys start getting deeper and deeper in the hole as they are you ever talk to somebody yeah I'm I'm I'm I've been losing a lot recently no everyone's oh yeah but I'm up I'm up oh you're not you're not up you know you're lying you

are lying like a rug you're not up because your reason they keep paying for those advertisements they're very expensive is because on the whole everyone's losing yeah right right you know yeah well what do you think is gonna happen when they are in crushing debt now because they're a loser mmm cuz when you have gaming losses it's you are a loser you have lost more times you want you are a loser where do you think you go with that shame and get help when you're isolated you can't talk you know where do you think you go you go to the pills you go to the pistol right the thing that's coming right um what was I'm so I'm just saying like we got it we have to build holistic lives that tell tell me that when God is not when I feel like God's not stepping in when pain is enveloping me like a heavy wet blanket where do I turn what do I do how do I survive this Christian story gives us those answers yeah and it's not trite phrases well you know it would never get too bad right right right right yeah what would you what would you replace this phrase with instead of saying well God won't give you anything you you're not strong enough to handle what's the truth that you what's the new what's the new phrase the coin God won't allow you to go through anything that he won't walk side by side with you hmm and he's actually gone before you before you and he'll be beside you he he will never leave you of her sake you in midst of the of your pain and there is always the X X factor of his presence because he gives a piece that passes along her standing that sounds pretty great I had thought about to you stand that's good oftentimes I was like four sentences but I mean I we can compress it just take the first one you know it's pretty good all right is there is there anything else that you would say I mean I think we've covered a lot with all of this I think we've unpacked like what's what's true and what's not and all this but you got any final words yeah I think what I regret about this discussion is there's two types of people there's the person who this is a theoretical safety valve for them and that's the person I've been really speaking with here and then there's the person who right now is in the shit mmm you know right now they are they are bent and they are bruised right now they are smoldering right they

they're they're that person I have got a I got a real real hard for yeah and my answer would be different for both I would yeah I still believe everything I said yeah but I waited too much the theoretical spiritualist that needs to get a clue you know but yeah for that that person out there that's that that's hurting I would just remind you that there is a savior who has hurt for you and that's what he is he is a savior more than a teacher more than an instructor more than a modeler he is a savior came to save the world and he came to save us not just from our the consequences of our sin and enable us to escape an eternity of destruction he came to bring hope peace yeah in the current situation we're in to save us in this situation I was thinking recently about I was at Elijah Elisha can't remember which you know the one was Elisha was the was the spiritual son of Elijah so I get their their their stuff mixed up but Elijah came to a woman who was in poverty and had massive massive debts and she was single mom and she had a kid and he does a miracle for She gets all the containers and they say, "Okay, now pour the oil, the olive oil you have, just pour it in the other container." And she starts pouring it in and goes all the way to the top. And there's more oil. Goes the next container, fills up, goes the next, got us supernaturally resupplying the oil and filling up every single container she's brought. She doesn't know what's gonna happen or why she's supposed to get all these containers. Probably halfway through while she's doing this. Like I should've got a lot more container. She's probably going, "Man, if I'd have known this was gonna happen, maybe I'd have been more diligent and borrowing, maybe I would've gotten a deeper debt." And bought more because I don't know,

you guys wonder like, "Oh my gosh, this is amazing, amazing." And then of course she comes to the very end of the last one she has, the oil stops. And Elijah says, "Take all that, pay off all your debts, and you and your son live on the rest." Now this is a profit of the Old Testament. Profits of the Old Testament oftentimes get a reputation for being ornery. This is an Old Testament prophet who is representing God. And God is saying, "I got you, I got you. You have more than you know that you have because you have me and you have the access to me." And I would say it to all of us. God is still saying, "I got you. There is an X factor to my presence. I am not unaware of what you're going through, and my grace is sufficient for you. Hang on a little longer. God loves you." - That's strong, that's super helpful. I mean, even with that T-shirt, it was really good. - Right, every time I look at the monitor, I'm like, "Oh, that is a horrible T-shirts." Horrible. - Yeah, we'll work on some more. - We'll get some new ones for you. - Yeah, all right, good. Well, that's all we got for today, right? We got nothing?

I think that's all we got for today. Hope that's helpful for you. Hope that helps you craft the life that you need. Do something, do something what we just talked about. Maybe the thing you do is just throw out all the cheesy sayings in your mind that aren't true. We want to help each other to actually live the rest of the life that God wants for us. So that's what I got for you. We'll see you next time on "The Aggressive Life." (upbeat music) Thanks for joining us on this journey toward aggressive living. Find more resources, articles, past episodes, and more at brontome.com. My new book, "A 60 Day Devotional Called," the five marks for man, 60 days to a powerful life, along with all the other books in the five marks library, are open right now on Amazon. Be sure to leave us a rating and review wherever you listen to your podcast, then send an email to [email protected] to get a free aggressive life sticker. Find more on Instagram @brontome. The "Aggressive Life" is a production of Crossroads Church, Cincinnati, Ohio. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music)