IT SIMPLY DOES NOT EXIST

I have heard quite a number of people use it and I have used it quite a number of times to encourage fellow believers. But the phrase: "God will not give us anything we can't handle" simply does not exist anywhere in the Bible. 1 Corinthians 10:13 says:

"No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. 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 stand up under it."

This verse has been misquoted so much that we have arrived at the new verse "God will not give us anything we can't handle". But rather than preach the wrong thing, I feel that it is necessary that we begin to understand the difference in the actual verse and what we have finally come up with.

God NEVER said that He will not give us a situation we cannot handle; rather He said that He will not allow us to be tempted beyond what we can bear for even in our temptations, He will provide a way for us to flee or stand up to the temptation. You see, in this verse, God is telling us that as Christians, there is no excuse for us to stand before Him and say that "There was nothing I could do; the lie was necessary" or "Father, I had to steal the money; how else am I to survive" because He has given us a way out, no matter how dire and hopeless our situation may be. He wants us to understand that we can indeed live without sin, because, Jesus Christ, whom we are being conformed into His likeness (2 Cor. 3:18), lived as a man, without sin. This is what Paul was teaching us in 1 Cor. 10:13.

Although God will not tempt us beyond what we can bear, He will certainly give us more than we can handle. Not because He is a wicked God, but because He wants us to understand that His weakness is stronger than any man's strength and His foolishness is wiser than any man's wisdom (1 Cor. 1:25). God places us in situations where we WILL be overwhelmed because He wants us to realize that leaning on our own strength is futile, but when we commit our ways into His hands, He will make our paths straight (Prov. 16:3). In those situations where we feel hard-pressed and hopeless and down, that is the moment where God decides to show Himself strong and lift us up out of the slimy pit and the mud and mire and set our feet upon a rock and give us a firm place to stand (Ps. 40:2). This is the same message Paul gives us in 2 Cor 1:8-9.

Our loving Father wants us to know that He loves us so very much and that in every hopeless situation, He is there to lift us up. Do not rely on your own strength in whatever you are going through, but look to Jesus and He will lift you up!

God bless you and continue to live for Christ!!!