The conversation has become an all too familiar one.  The hurt, frustrations and tears came to the surface with four simple words spoken softly as I hugged her:

I can’t get pregnant.

Having walked the road of infertility, I could identify with her feelings of hopelessness, heartache, and anger.  How can something that seems so natural be so difficult to achieve?  Why is (seemingly) everyone else pregnant?  What is God trying to teach me?  Why is it so hard?

But what stuck in my mind is something she repeated a couple times: I know God won’t give me more than I can handle, but today I feel like I just can’t handle it.

It was too much.

Haven’t we all been there?  That place where it all just feels like too much?  Too much fear of the unknown.  Too much of a challenge.  Too much heartache.  Too much pain.  Too much to endure.  Simply too much.

When we reach that place of too much, we often remind ourselves that God won’t give us more than we can handle, which leaves us feeling like maybe we just have to suck it up a bit more because these challenging circumstances, this life, should be well within our limits.

Do you realize that “God won’t give you more than you can handle” isn’t even in the Bible?  Seriously, it’s not.  I dare say, God DOES give us more than we can handle.  It happens all the time in big and small ways, doesn’t it?

Demanding toddlers.

Job uncertainty.

Infertility.

Job loss.

Death of a child…or parent…or spouse.

A failed adoption.

A terminally ill spouse.

A stillborn child.

A job transfer.

An unexpected diagnosis.

Isn’t it all just too much for us to handle?

I can think back to some hard stuff in my life.  The struggles with infertility.  The 11 month wait that stretched into an almost 4 year wait to adopt.  The big detour in our adoption from China.  Tackling an independent international adoption.  It was all too much for ME to handle.
I don’t like change
or the unknown
or uncertainty
or waiting.
But GOD?  God could handle it…and HE did…although it was often only in hindsight that I could see how he worked things out.  It may not always be the ending to the story that I may have envisioned, but I can see his hand at work.  I can see how HE got me through.  (And I am grateful that HE is the one writing the story of my life.)
My job (although I failed miserably at this at times) was to depend on HIM, lean on HIM, cry out to HIM.  Doing my best to walk in obedience, and trust what I knew in my head to be true, even when my heart couldn’t feel it.

It is about depending on HIM intentionally hour-by-hour or even minute-by-minute saying, “I can’t do this God. Please give me strength for the next half hour.” (Or the next procedure. Or the next ovulation test. Or the next family gathering. Or the next paperwork gliche.  Or the next interview.)

Years ago, as I sat in a parking lot collecting myself before heading in to see the fertility doctor for diagnostic testing that would predict our likelihood of ever conceiving, I put my head in my hands and prayed, “I just can’t do this.  I can’t walk in those doors.  I can’t smile at the receptionist.  I can’t hear what the doctor will likely tell me.”  And as clearly as if it were spoken aloud, I heard in my heart: My strength is made perfect in your weakness. 

Now THAT is biblical.  His strength is made perfect in {my} weakness. 

“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.

2 Corinthians 12:9

Because of HIM, I walked through those doors and learned that our chances of conceiving were dismal at best.
Because of HIM, we somehow made it through an adoption trip full of surprises and heartache.
Because of HIM, we were able to complete an independent international adoption that most would have never attempted.
Because of HIM, we are able.  Not because He won’t give us more than we can handle, but because when He does give us more than we can handle, HE is able.  HE equips.  HE sustains.  HE directs.
HIS power is made perfect in OUR weakness.

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18 years in the classroom as a teacher is nothing compared to parenting three little ones at home full-time. Through their three daughters, God has revealed Himself most clearly to them. He not only worked a miracle in giving them their biological daughter, He continued to show Himself in mighty ways throughout adoption journeys in China and Bhutan that were anything but normal. You can read more about their family on their personal blog We Are Family.