The lie... God won't give you more than you can handle

I used have this, what I realize now is absurd, expectation of life that if you do everything the right way that everything will work out just fine. That if you follow the rules, you meet all of the expectations, you don’t do anything that steps outside of the “line” that my life will unfold in the way in which I expected it to. I think maybe some of this transpired from being raised in the church, and don’t get me wrong I am SO thankful for all of the love, all of the lessons, the values and the deep relationship with God that was nurtured and encouraged, but I also think it taught me to fall deeply into the box of working to fit the expectation of what everyone else thought I should be. That there is this magical list of how my life “should” look or how others think my life “should” look and I better make sure to check all of those boxes, or else.  Always being in some form of leadership role, constantly managing the way people would see me, or attempting to manage people's perceptions of me…. because somewhere along the line I took on the idea that if you follow all the rules, you do everything right, that everything would be fine.  It’s what I thought was expected of me.

And OH BOY, let me tell you how VERY wrong I was. That just because I did all of the “right” things does not mean that everything will work out fine, it does not mean that God won't give me way more than I can handle. It’s like I totally neglected where Jesus said in John 16 “In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”... for someone who really doesn’t like math I love the equation that if I do everything right that everything will be fine. But I wasn’t ever promised that, in fact I was promised the exact opposite of that...I don't know about you but that is a really hard concept to grasp. I want God to give me only good things, great things, that I want him to give me what I think my life should look like. I have been wrestling over the past couple of years that God’s version of good and mine are very different but that doesn’t mean that it's not good. God has used some really really difficult situations to show me some really wonderful truths about myself and about him, to break me out of the perfectionist mold, to show me that my brokenness is a WAY better bridge to people than my having it all togetherness is. I would like to think that God is a God that won’t give me more than I can handle...because I am a fix it and make it right type girl,  but I don’t think that's how he really works. It's not about striving to have all the answers and figure it all out it’s about learning to need him, to lean on him, to have a desperate need for him to intervene on our behalf. I can honestly say that I have personally watched God move and intervene in the past few years in ways that only he can. That life has been WAY more than I can handle a lot of the times but, you know what, he has met me every time, graciously reminding me that he sees me, he knows me, he sees my wants and desires and only because of his amazing grace am I able to survive this life, that at times is very scary and really not kind.

I don’t write all this in the “God’s got it” sort of way because, let's be real, sometimes when people offer that sweet little comment in the midst of a reality that seems to be falling apart… I want to literally punch them in the face… not really, but you know what I mean. Haha I write this from a place of desperately needing God to intervene on my behalf, of life not just being broken but shattered to what seemed like dust and no clue where to begin to pick up the pieces. But my friend here is what I know, it's not my job to put things back together, it's not my job to figure it all out, it's not my job to just put a smiling face on and act like life is grand all the time. It's my job to quit striving to meet everyone else's expectations of me, to work hard at the things I know I am called to work at, to receive grace to know that I don’t have to have it all together all the time, to need Jesus to intervene on my behalf every day. When life feels like it is more than you can handle it probably is because it is more than you can handle.  We weren't created to do this alone so lean on him today, let Jesus be the one who holds you, who carries you, who puts the pieces back together. It’s not always pretty, it definitely doesn’t always feel good but it’s so worth it.