Bible Text: Jeremiah 32:27 | Speaker: Dr. Harold J. Sala | Series: Guidelines For Living | Behold, I am the Lord, the God of all flesh: is there anything too hard for Me? Jeremiah 32:27

What do you do when you get to the end of the rope? Do you drown your grief in tears? Look for an answer in the bottom of a bottle? Or consider suicide as the final escape? Are there no other answers? Are there no other possible solutions? There are times when you are cornered by the circumstances, and no matter which way you turn, it seems that there is no hope, no way out. When you face a situation such as this, you have just presented God with a splendid opportunity to show what He can do when you have exhausted your own resources. Well it has been said, “Man’s extremity is God’s opportunity….”

Perhaps you are thinking, “No, my problem is just too big for God. It will not work for me. I am not good enough. I’m just not that kind.” Wait just a minute. It may well be that God has engineered the circumstances confronting you right now to show you–number one, that you need Him, and number two, that He is sufficient to meet you at the bottom of your deepest need. It may well be that you have evaluated God by the circumstances rather than evaluating the circumstances by God.

If, of course, you shut the door on God, you are desperate and might well conclude that the only hope is suicide to escape. But if you can stop the trend of negative desperation for a moment, and take a good look at God and His power, the circumstances will look vastly different.

On three occasions, under three sets of circumstances, God asks a question of man, “Is there anything too hard for Me?” And the obvious answer is, “No!” The first time the question is asked, God has promised a baby to a woman 90 years of age. Yes, of course, women that age do not have children, but God had promised a son to her husband Abraham, and he was soon to see his 100th birthday.

The writer of Hebrews said that Abraham was as good as dead, and not only is the modern state of Israel a testimony to the truth of what God did, but also every Jew is a tribute to this fact, for God gave Sarah and Abraham a son, Isaac, who is the father of the Jewish people. “Is there anything too hard for the Lord?”

The second time the question is asked is when God told Jeremiah to go out and buy property, in spite of the fact that the nation was about to be overthrown. But God also promised that after 70 years of captivity He would bring them back into the land, and Jeremiah’s getting a corner on the real estate market was proof of his faith in God’s ability and faithfulness to perform what He promised. “Behold, I am the Lord, the God of all flesh: is there anything too hard for Me?” (Jeremiah 32:27).

The third occasion you will find the question is in the prophetic Book of Zechariah when God promises to re-establish His kingdom on earth. The question comes when God asks about human life, national life, and life for all mankind, when men shall beat their swords into plowshares and the King of Kings shall reign.

Now, thinking of the circumstances surrounding your life, may I ask that same question, “Is there anything too hard for the Lord?” Is there? You have tried and tried to play god yourself, and your best has ended in failure. As Oswald Chambers used to say, “It is time to let God engineer…” Do not measure God by the height of your circumstances; rather measure your circumstances by the height and width of His power.

Resource reading: Jeremiah 32