Now the race is on from now until the holiday season. Home decorating stores are already displaying Christmas supplies. My youngest and I went into such a store a month or so ago where we saw more stuff for December than for fall. He is only interested in the fall or Halloween decorations. My job today was to get out the boxes of fall colors to replace the patriotic fare. He also found his Halloween toys which are now active in his room. Even the arrival of a tropical system this week will not move him from his fall fixation. No one can ever accuse him of not understanding the calendar.

You often hear the comment that God will not give you more than you can handle. It's something that others said to me over the course of my journey. People mean well when they say it so it does not seem to be a bad thing to me. I just am not sure that is my position on the matter. Don't think that my view of God is one of Him just dumping stuff on us so we suffer. In my theology, there is no room for that idea. God has many facets to His character but just being randomly cruel is not one of them. You should also know that my view doesn't leave room for God to just let stuff happen. There are those who say or write that God perhaps turns away or closes His eyes to allow bad stuff to occur. My problem with that is how then does God make all things work for His good if He does not care enough prior to the crisis? I know that my opinion is a dangerous one. My view puts the weight of tragedy squarely on His shoulders. Perhaps this is one reason that I believe He may on occasion actually give us more than we can handle.

It seems to me that if all we get is what we can handle then why do we need to trust God? If tragedy is some cosmic random accident then where is the trust to get us through suffering? Remember that God operates from a perspective far more eternal than ours. My heart is not pleased to think of horrific incidents that scar people emotionally or in any other way. There is no joy to my idea that even my illness falls within the parameters of Him doing things that are painful to our human experience. But I need and want a God who is big enough to join me in this journey. I trust a God who even in scripture seemed to operate in very odd ways. My ego is honest enough to admit that there is much about my journey that is too much for me to handle by myself. A prayer of mine is that His strength would be made real in the midst of my weakness.

Sacrificing his son surely had to be more than Abraham could bear going up that mountain. His heart was breaking yet was still trusting God to do a miracle. God responds with a graciousness to outweigh the sorrow that Abraham experienced. Leading God's people seems like more than Moses could handle. In fact, this now celebrated leader kept trying to get out of this job by saying just that to God. Moses needed to know who God is more than he needed to keep a record of his faults. Even Jesus pours out His grief to the Father while praying in the garden. The Son of God finds eventual comfort within the will of God. Paul will write in his second letter to the Corinthian church that he and his group despaired even of their own lives. His answer will come later as he relates the visit from friends that offered him new encouragement.

I know there is no way to ask much less answer all of the questions to such an issue. This really is beyond the limit of this blog. My resting place remains in God's goodness even when it appears to be going terribly wrong in life. Those first disciples initially conceived as the cross as a colossal failure. In God's timing it would be only the beginning of a far greater blessing. Sure it is easy to focus on my physical limitations while dealing with my disease. But there are a whole bunch more issues to all of this than how I feel. Life is eternal. That is true for every person. How we respond to God when the wheels come off our life determines character. Do we just brush God aside to manage our circumstances? Or can you allow Him to be involved with your reactions even if His will seems to be contrary? Joseph said it best in the Old Testament. He told those mean brothers of his that everything they meant to be harmful to Joseph was something God meant for his good. This is where my attitude longs to be.

Bro. Trey