Weighty Matters

“Carry each other's burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.”- Galatians 6:2

Backpacks. You see them everywhere. Children trudge to school lugging them. Outdoorsmen carry them into the woods. College students pack them onto airplanes. Soldiers load them for battle. Young professionals prefer them to briefcases. Inside these carry-alls are books, MP3 players, makeup, snacks and other assorted personal stuff. For some homeless people their entire life is found inside.

Burdens are like those backpacks. We all lug around emotional baggage that weighs heavy on the heart. Regrets and repressions. Crises and conflicts. Failures and faults. Mistakes and mishaps. Accidents and incidents. Some packs are horrendously heavy with guilt, shame and anger.

That’s why Paul encouraged the Galatian church to carry burdens. Interesting idea, really. Don't just talk, walk. It’s a whole lot easier to converse about another’s weighty emotional baggage than to ease their load and lug it for them. On the other hand, pride often keeps many from even releasing their burdens to willing helpers.

Humility and helpfulness is key to fulfilling this law of Christ. Sometimes we need to pick up and pack the load for another. And sometimes we need to lend the emotional baggage to a friend.

Everyone has an emotional backpack. To lift a burden is Glory. To lighten a load is Peace. In between the two is Grace.


NOTABLE QUOTABLES ON CARRYING BURDENS:

“I would rather have a big burden and a strong back, than a weak back and a caddy to carry life's luggage” --Elbert Hubbard

“What makes loneliness an anguish is not that I have no one to share my burden, but this: I have only my own burden to bear.” --Dag Hammarskjold

“Do not free a camel of the burden of his hump; you may be freeing him from being a camel.” --G. K. Chesterton

“It is a time when one's spirit is subdued and sad, one knows not why; when the past seems a storm-swept desolation, life a vanity and a burden, and the future but a way to death.” --Mark Twain

“We can easily manage if we will only take, each day, the burden appointed to it. But the load will be too heavy for us if we carry yesterday's burden over again today, and then add the burden of the morrow before we are required to bear it.” --John Newton

Father, help us this day to carry the burden—whether it is ours to own or ours to release from another. Give us eyes to see the emotional baggage that people pack around. Give us ears to listen to the heartache, the fear and the shame. Give us hands and feet to help with humility. May the load we lighten today bring Peace and Hope. Amen.