season 1//episode 7: is God big enough to handle my problems?
Welcome back, friends! I am so glad you’re here and hope that whatever you’re doing today, that you are being filled with joy.
Today we are going to unpack this statement: God isn’t big enough to handle my problems.
A lot of people may not have said this statement before “God isn’t big enough to handle my problems,” but they have lived as though that were the reality. If they didn’t have the guts to admit that this is what they were thinking, they may have said something akin to this “If God were real, He wouldn’t have allowed ______ this to happen.” or “If God is real, then why does He allow sin and suffering?”
Right now, our family is reading through The Jesus Storybook Bible for Lent in preparation for Easter. If you start at the beginning, the 40 first stories will take you to the Easter story! As we read about the creation of the world and the fall of mankind, I was reminded of the perfection of the Garden of Eden. God gave Adam and Eve literally everything they needed and then some. They had no sin and suffering in the world and were naked and unashamed. They had a perfectly harmonious marriage and incredible food to eat and animals to commune with. And yet the lie that Satan came to them with is the same one he says to us today when he tempts us — “Did God really say?”
He asks them, “Did God really say you couldn’t eat of the tree?” And as he plants those seeds of doubt, they begin to wonder about the goodness of God and wonder if He truly loves them.
As we look at the circumstances of our lives, it is very tempting for us to see all of the things that we would change and the issues we face that feel overwhelming and think to ourselves—“Will God really come through? Is He really who He says He is? Will He really provide? Will He really be there for me?”
The answer to all of the above is a resounding yes. We know this in our heads, but sometimes it is hard to know it in our hearts.
Let’s take a look at the story of Gideon in the Bible. If you’re not familiar with Gideon, you can find his story in Judges 6-8.
At this time, the Israelites were in captivity because they had failed to worship and obey God as the one true God. When they could bear their self-inflicted poverty no longer, they cried out to God. God sent them a man named Gideon to be a prophet and a leader among them.
Let’s take a look at how God called Gideon to this position in Judges 6:11-24–
“The angel of the Lord came, and he sat under the oak that was in Ophrah, which belonged to Joash, the Abiezrite. His son Gideon was threshing wheat in the winepress in order to hide it from the Midianites. Then the angel of the Lord appeared to him and said, “The Lord is with you, valiant warrior.”
Look at where God finds Gideon—he is hiding from the Midianites and doing things under the cover of darkness because he is afraid. Yet God meets him right where he is. This picture of Gideon is not one of a valiant warrior. But God identifies him by what He sees in the Spirit, not in the flesh.
Gideon said to him, “Please, my Lord, if the Lord is with us, why has all this happened? And where are all his wonders that our ancestors told us about? They said, ‘Hasn’t the Lord brought us out of Egypt? ’ But now the Lord has abandoned us and handed us over to Midian.”
The Lord turned to him and said, “Go in the strength you have and deliver Israel from the grasp of Midian. I am sending you!”
Can you imagine all that is running through Gideon’s head right now? He is probably not thinking that he is very strong. He’s probably thinking “Go in what strength?!”
He said to him, “Please, Lord, how can I deliver Israel? Look, my family is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the youngest in my father’s family.”
Isn’t that just like us? To be given a calling from the Lord and a task to do that feels hard and overwhelming, so we just make excuses as to why He has the wrong girl?
“But I will be with you,” the Lord said to him. “You will strike Midian down as if it were one man.”
Here’s the kicker—the same power that conquered the grave lives in us. So for Gideon to be given this task meant that although he didn’t feel able, God was more than able.
Then he said to him, “If I have found favor with you, give me a sign that you are speaking with me. Please do not leave this place until I return to you. Let me bring my gift and set it before you.”
And he said, “I will stay until you return.”
So Gideon went and prepared a young goat and unleavened bread from a half bushel of flour. He placed the meat in a basket and the broth in a pot. He brought them out and offered them to him under the oak.
The angel of God said to him, “Take the meat with the unleavened bread, put it on this stone, and pour the broth on it.” So he did that.
The angel of the Lord extended the tip of the staff that was in his hand and touched the meat and the unleavened bread. Fire came up from the rock and consumed the meat and the unleavened bread. Then the angel of the Lord vanished from his sight.
When Gideon realized that he was the angel of the Lord, he said, “Oh no, Lord God! I have seen the angel of the Lord face to face!”
But the Lord said to him, “Peace to you. Don’t be afraid, for you will not die.” So Gideon built an altar to the Lord there and called it The Lord Is Peace. It is still in Ophrah of the Abiezrites today.”
After this scene, Gideon goes and takes down the altar Baal and the Asherah pole beside it that belong to his father. God is not messing around—He has given Gideon a task and He knows that there will be consequences for those who are closest to Him as well.
Gideon continues to ask God for signs to make sure that it is really Him who is speaking, and the Lord is so gracious and patient to affirm that it really is Him speaking to Gideon. There were many signs and many different adventures in weeding out those who would not be a part of the army, but the 300 men, did in fact, defeat Midian.
This was a feat of epic and supernatural proportions—God chose 300 men to kill 120,000 men. This is seemingly impossible. But not with God.
I think that oftentimes we don’t think that God is big enough to handle our problems because we are too busy thinking about how inadequate we are. And instead of a humble and reverent appreciation for His grandeur, we just stay stuck in projecting our inability onto Him. Because we are so keenly aware of our failures and the failures of those who have hurt us, we think that God will be just the same.
But God is not a man. God is not like us. Isaiah tells us that His ways are higher than ours and that His thoughts are not our thoughts. He is good and kind and wonderful and worthy of all our praise and adoration. So we can trust Him.
I remember when I was going to live in Mexico, this was during the Great Recession. I was a college grad who was going to have to raise support for my first job. This was terrifying, but I knew that God had called me and that He would supply all of my needs. I graduated in May and left for Mexico in August, so I had the whole summer to raise support. That summer I made a lot of phone calls and had a lot of meetings with people. It was interesting to me who said yes to supporting the work I would be doing. Those who I expected to support me because I knew (or perhaps presumed) they had the means to do so often said no. And then there were those who I didn’t even know all that well or who didn’t have much to give, but so generously gave to enable me to be on the field, doing what God had led me to do.
There were times when I was terrified that I wouldn’t have enough support coming in, but month after month, He met all of my needs. There were obviously many things I wanted that I didn’t have, but I had everything I needed.
When we say that God isn’t big enough to handle our problems, it is tied to a lack of unbelief. If you take a closer look at Gideon and read his whole story, you will find that in Judges 8, Gideon got prideful and strayed away from the Lord. This decision had grave consequences. He kept items from the plunder, and then made an ephod, which is a garment worn by Jewish priests, out of the items. Then, the Israelites began worshiping the ephod! They were so quick to forget that God was the One who delivered them that they fell into the sin of idolatry once again.
Verses 33-35 of chapter 8 say “When Gideon died, the Israelites turned and prostituted themselves by worshiping the Baals and made Baal-berith their god. The Israelites did not remember the Lord their God who had rescued them from the hand of the enemies around them. They did not show kindness to the house of Jerubbaal (that is, Gideon) for all the good he had done for Israel.”
So we see that just because God has done something incredible in the past for you, doesn’t mean that we can rest on our laurels and assume that we are good to go and don’t need to guard our hearts against the deception of the enemy in the present. We are quick to forget Him, which is why we have to stay in the Word and in community with others who will remind us of the truth and call us back to it when we stray.
I pray that you’ll remember that God is for you and that He is big enough for every single one of your problems, regardless of what your circumstances say.
I’ll talk to you next week, friends.
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