What To Do With Your Burdens

What To Do With Your Burdens

Gal. 6:2-5

[Some burdens are meant to be SHARED, some burdens are meant to be SHOULDERED, and some burdens are meant to be SHED. Link included at bottom to formatted text version, handout, and PowerPoint Presentation.]

We all have burdens. Some have a physical handicap, chronic sickness, or some abnormality you cannot change.

Some have spiritual burdens. It may be that “Hurricane Satan” has struck your life and the surge of sin has soaked your soul, and now you are suffering spiritual consequences.

Some have emotional burdens like depression or anxiety, a heartache over some loss, or a financial reversal.

Ill.—Chinese woman lost her dear son/could not find comfort/went to wise old man and asked what to do/ “go to a home that has no sorrow or grief, and bring back a mustard seed, and I will restore your son” /several days went by, and she returned and said, “I have been so selfish in my grief…sorrow is common to every home.”

We all have problems and cares, and they weigh down upon us like a burden on the back.

We don’t all have wealth, but we all have burdens…

[health/talents/own home/children/hair!]

Every day of life here on earth brings to us it’s own assortment of burdens, and we will be blessed to study God’s answer to the question, “What do I do with my burdens?”

1. Some burdens are meant to be shared [by others]

v. 2 Examples of burdens to be shared:

•Faults and failures of others

v. 1 When a fellow believer stumbles and falls into sin [not those who CHOOSE to live in sin], rather than pointing accusing fingers or shooting our wounded, we should reach down and give them a helping hand to lift them up, and help them get back on track. We are supposed to encourage/strengthen one another when it comes to faults and failures.

v. 2-3 The only thing which will keep us from doing v. 2, is to think that you yourself are above ever needing this help. There are people like that…they feel they are God’s gift to the church and to humanity, and actually feel good about themselves when others fall…which is self-righteousness, or “value by comparison.” This is self-deception. We all need each other at times.

Joke—preacher was preaching on this theme, and asked if anyone had ever heard of a perfect person / man in back raised his hand / “I don’t know him, but I’ve heard a lot about him…my wife’s 1st husband!”

But truly, we are all “prone to wander”, and we all need each other.

•Sorrow and grief

At any given time at GBC we have someone under a heavy load of grief. We have had a lot of great services recently with a great spirit, but always there’s someone present going thru an awful time.

“Be kind to everyone for everyone has sorrow some kind.”

Tragedy, sorrow, disappointment, depression, and grief will eventually visit the house of every person.

Ruth 2:13

Then she said, Let me find favour in thy sight, my lord; for that thou hast comforted me, and for that thou hast spoken friendly unto thine handmaid, though I be not like unto one of thine handmaidens.

She was a stranger in a foreign land…an outcast. She expected to be ostracized, and to have to do without. But someone came into her life and comforted her.

Whom have you comforted recently? Who has comforted you?

This is 1 reason God allows sorrows to come to us…so we can be comforted, and then in turn comfort others in need once we’ve been thru it.

II Cor. 1:4

Who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God.

Ill.—George W. Truett, 1st Baptist of Dallas years ago told of a lady in his church who had a baby who died. He tried and tried but could not comfort the woman. Hours of counsel didn’t do it. But then he remembered another lady in the church who had been thru it before. He enlisted her help, and she did more in 5 minutes than he ever did.

Let’s not wallow in self-pity and allow our tragedies to be wasted…God wants to use them for good in others. Many of you have been thru things that uniquely qualify you to help others I cannot help!

And let’s be patient and kind, understanding that everyone has burdens.

Ill.—J. Vernon McGee tells of a church member criticizing him for “ignoring him” on the subway. This wasn’t his usual way, so he asked when it was. Then he remembered that day, and the very bad news he had heard, and the burden he was carrying. He apologized as he told the man the situation. The man’s heart broke as he empathized and realized his Pastor wasn’t perfect and had a life of his own, and didn’t exist merely for others at all times…and he apologized and became more patient and kind.