Unleash Your BraveSample

When I was three, a playmate advised me to walk across the parking lot and ask my mom a question. Mom would understand. Well, she didn’t. I wasn’t supposed to be there, and I scared her half to death. Mom had quick reflexes which landed me in the Emergency Room with a lifelong scar.

Bad advice, for sure. 

If you and I are not cautious, we can encounter a worse fate than a few stitches and surface scarring from the advice we internalize. 

• Do what you love
• Follow your heart
• Choose your job over family
• Your college major doesn’t matter
• You’ll be happy when you are successful

Those might be easy to see through, but Mother Teresa is also guilty of leading us astray. Yes. Mother Teresa got it wrong when she said, “I know God won’t give me more than I can handle. I just wish He didn’t trust me so much.” We like to put that on the wall or social media. It’s just not biblical. God will give you more than you can handle. Just ask Paul.

We think you ought to know, dear brothers and sisters, about the trouble we went through in the province of Asia. We were crushed and overwhelmed beyond our ability to endure, and we thought we would never live through it. 2 Corinthians 1:8 

We need to stop telling ourselves there must be something wrong with us because we can’t get a grip. “God thinks I can do it. What’s wrong with me?” It’s just bad advice. In fact, it’s wrong theology. James calls us to a superhuman task.  To be successful, we must get our theology straight.

Notice what Paul writes in the very next verse:

Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead. 2 Corinthians 1:9

This is what God does! He knows your trial is beyond you. It’s too much. More than any person can bare. And for that, I am so very sorry. Let’s get our theology straight and go to God!

Look to Him who raises the dead! 

Let Him be faithful to His Word in your life. Call on Him to bring joy through your trouble. I can only imagine He is going to be more than amazing in the midst of your disaster.