As4Me

Sharing My Efforts to Apply God's Word to My Life as Mom. Wisdom Is the Principal Thing.

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More Than I Can Handle, Part 1

Once upon a time, I prayed, “I’m at the end of my rope. I don’t know what to do or if I can continue. Please help.”

  1. What would God’s answer look like?
  2. What exactly am I asking for him to do?
  3. Does God ever give me “more than I can handle”?

Reader, number 3 is a trick question, and the reason I am writing today.

God’s Heart is Kind and Not Indifferent

Saying “Of course God gives us more than we can handle” is often a reaction to someone who says “God doesn’t give you anything you can’t handle.” We might have good intentions to fix imprecision, but end up replacing words with something more calloused and no more precise. In fact, both statements are incomplete. Both can be given glibly in the midst of great suffering. Instead, for clarity and love, let’s go back to more fundamental truths of God’s nature before we say something we might regret!

Whenever I have prayed for help, I’ve found that God always provides it. I’ve grown pretty confident in his safety net. “And my God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:19). I still need this reassurance, though. Sometimes God does intervene speedily, and my situation improves. Sometimes he doesn’t. I may not know how God will respond to my cry, but I still find great comfort knowing that God’s very nature cares about my physical needs: “But whoever has this world’s goods, and sees his brother in need, and shuts up his heart from him, how does the love of God abide in him?” (1 John 3:17) I don’t have to minimize my trouble, or my friends’ troubles when I come to him with my burden. His love encompasses my needs.

Knowing God’s nature has been crucial, whether I’m asking God to intervene when my dad needed a lung transplant, or didn’t know what to do when my marriage needed help, or when my children had needs that were beyond my ability to fix. Asaph wrote a poem about God’s nature that has a line I love: “Call upon Me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you shall glorify Me” (Psalm 50:15). I love this one. No matter whether we seek to encourage ourselves or people we love who are suffering, we should remember God’s heart delights to hear from us when we are troubled. He doesn’t accuse us of only coming to him with problems; those problems remind us of how much we need him at all times.

So then, if it is in God’s nature to care for us when we are in trouble, what should we do when we call upon God in the day of trouble, and nothing seems to happen? Does God limit his help to extreme needs, and is his silence subtly telling me to stop coming to him with problems that are mere wants? Is this verse untrue? or merely true in the spiritual sense? Behind all my nervous questions, is the reality that sometimes, very bad things happen in spite of a person’s prayer. Is God trustworthy at all? I have come to believe that we need to hold tight to the anchor of God’s goodness, think carefully before drawing conclusions, and broaden our understanding of God’s deliverance and wisdom.

When I don’t see an answer to my plea, I realize that I’m missing something. Because God’s nature is constant, the only other conclusion I have is that my perceptions need an adjustment. I remind myself God promises that he will never leave me; he is not indifferent or busy with other responsibilities. Just like a parent allows his infant child to struggle and fall while learning to walk, our heavenly Father is near while we learn to walk by faith. He will never leave us or forsake us, and this truth shapes our expectation as we pray and move forward.

In Part 2, we talk about what wisdom looks like when I’ve prayed for help, don’t know what to do next, but have to move forward anyway!

Have I not commanded you?
Be strong and of good courage; 
do not be afraid, nor be dismayed,
for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.
Joshua 1:9

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First World Problems Are Important to God

Today I worked in the preschool nursery for church. The four year old children were all interested in a toy that was stuck deep in the cylinder of a shelf leg. I started to go into teacher mode– “What have you done to solve the problem? Will that work? Why not?” I was mostly trying to engage their minds, because children who are problem solving aren’t usually getting into trouble. Then I realized that God had provided a problem that would make a good lesson. Instead of teaching the Bible story, I got my Bible and opened to 1 Peter 5:7– Casting all your care on the Lord, because he cares for you. It was a short lesson. I told the kids that we had a problem. We had all used our minds to solve the problem without success, and now we were going to pray about it.

Getting a toy unstuck is a pretty small thing, but God tells us to cast our cares on him. Why? The size of the problem is irrelevant. He cares for us. Those four year old mischief makers were engaged long enough to practice saying the verse a few times with me, and to pray for help with the toy. After we prayed, I asked them how they thought God would answer our prayer. We talked about “yes, no, wait.” We talked about whether God could make the toy fly out by itself. (He can do anything, but probably wouldn’t answer that way.) I asked why we prayed about our problem. (Because God cares about us and our problems.) Then I let them go play while my daughter and another helper spent about 15 minutes trying different ways to get the toy out. They got the toy out, we spent a few minutes saying thank you to God, and the class moved on. All afternoon I’ve been thinking about this class, thankful for a God who cares for young children and their problems. We make jokes about “first world problems” or feel guilty because our problem is nothing compared for other problems people have. The size of the problem is actually irrelevant. Our heavenly father tells us to cast our cares on him, not because it’s a worthy problem to bring to him, but because he cares for us. He cares about all our troubles, large or small. I’m thankful for that loving kindness this afternoon.

Casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you. 1 Peter 5:7

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How Should Christians Vote?

Therefore I exhort first of all that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks be made for all men, 2 for kings and all who are in authority, that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and reverence. 1 Timothy 2:1-2

While the Bible doesn’t tell Christians how to vote, it does tell us how to pray. I found this passage extremely helpful for me as I consider the perplexing situation that we find ourselves in the USA at this season.

Christians sometimes discuss the relationship of man’s responsibility and God’s provision in prayer:

We recognize that its silly to pray for wisdom but ignore the source of wisdom at our disposal. This is why the Timothy passage is helpful for me as I consider voting. My first priority in voting, is the same way I pray: for the candidate most likely to allow me to live a “quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and reverence.”

The early Christians in Timothy’s day didn’t have the ability to shape their own government like I do. To a great extent, I don’t use my ability directly. I’m not running for office; I’m not volunteering for my local government (although maybe I should). I can vote, though. At the end of the day, I’m not expecting unsaved people in the world to be like me. I don’t know which candidate would be better/ worse for running the country. However, I do think there is a difference in their attitudes toward my religious freedom, and I can vote for that.

I can’t see the future, so I’m going to cast my vote and then let God deal with the big picture. I’m praying, and I’m at peace. There is a here and now that is taking up more of my attention. Helping my daughter with math. Making dinner. Talking about loving God’s Word with my children.

How about you? What Bible passages give you peace when you consider the politics and government of your country? What are you sharing with your children? What are you talking about within earshot of your children?

 

 

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Teaching How to Pray

Strange to say, I don’t think I’ve ever thought about teaching my children to pray. I guess I’ve just assumed they would learn by listening to me pray with them.

That’s true to some extent, but since Jesus deliberately taught prayer lessons to his disciples, I think it’s worth thinking about how exactly I can teach my own children to pray.

What I’m doing now:

  • After we read the Bible together, I ask them to pray for something that we read about. Sometimes I give them a prompt “Help me to ________.” This is because I want them to see the connection between reading God’s Word and responding in prayer. (Read Psalm 119, and see how many times King David makes this connection!)
  • I will suggest things to pray for in their own personal lives. When a child has a burden, I’ll ask if they have talked with God about it. Whether they say yes or no matters not; I’m just planting the idea in their heads.
  • When God has blessed in a specific, tangible way, I will point it out. “This is a good thing to say thank you to God for.” If it’s my blessing, I pray outloud. For some reason, blessing discussions happen in the car a lot!
  • Talk about the difference between kid prayers and grown-up prayers. When I was a child, I was worried because I could never pray for an hour or more like I read about in Christian biographies. I was good with words, but I didn’t have words to pray. It wasn’t until I grew up that I learned two things: 1) most of my adult words for prayer come as I read the Bible and 2) kids pray shorter prayers because they are kids. It’s just normal, physical development. Maybe my kids are tired of me mentioning my misunderstandings, but I want to help them understand God loves short prayers just fine!
  • Encourage them to write down their prayers. “King David wrote down his prayers,” I told my daughter this week. She looked at me in surprise. Of course he did.
  • I regularly ask them how I can pray for them, and then I pray out loud for them. I started donut dates a few months ago (once a week, one child gets to go get a donut before school), and I’ve discovered they are pretty open when they know the question is coming, and when I ask it in private.

Most of these “suggestions” happen pretty infrequently, about once or twice a month I would say. Writing it down, trying them all at once would seems pretty pushy to me, and I think it would be if I made these comments too often.

And it came to pass, that, as he was praying in a certain place, when he ceased, one of his disciples said unto him, Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples. Luke 11:1

Notice that the grownups wanted to be taught to pray. Notice John taught his students to pray! Notice that Jesus answered the disciples’ request!

If you grew up in a Christian home, how did you learn to pray?

 

 

 

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