Next Level Growth

I’ve the last couple of weeks I’ve heard different people say that God gives His toughest battles to His strongest soldiers. Another phrase I’ve heard quite a bit is that God will never give you more than you can bear. At first they sound great, but the more I think about them, neither are biblical. God does give battles to people to prove their strength. He allows us to go through tough times to create endurance and to build strength. Also, if He only gave us what we could handle, there would be no need for dependence on Him. He knows what is ahead and what preparations we need now for it. Tough times increase our strength, endurance, character, faith and more. That’s why James says we should count it all joy.

In Genesis we read the story of Joseph. He was a teenager when God gave him a dream of the future. He was not one of God’s toughest soldiers when his brothers threw him into a pit and sold him into slavery. He wasn’t the strongest when he was wrongfully accused and thrown into prison. Being forgotten there for years might have been more than he could bear. What we do know is that God used that period of time as a training ground to produce the person he needed to be in order to handle the mantle of leadership. He went from spoiled brat to understanding God’s plan in that period. He learned his lesson and grew so much that he didn’t seek revenge on his brothers. Instead He saw God’s providence.

Deuteronomy 8:3 says, “He made you go hungry, and then he gave you manna to eat, food that you and your ancestors had never eaten before. He did this to teach you that you must not depend on bread alone to sustain you, but on everything that the Lord says” (GNT). God’s desire for us is that we would learn to trust Him instead of ourselves in every situation. He is our source and our sustainer. It is His strength that is perfect in our weakness. It is His grace that is sufficient for what we are going through. If you’re going through a hard time, it’s not because you’re His toughest soldier. It’s because there is more that He’s leading you to, more that He’s going to accomplish through you and another level for you to get to. Trust in His strength and not yours for that next level growth.

Photo by Tobias Rademacher on Unsplash