Fixing Christianity One dose at a time---Que the intro:
MUSIC INTRO
Welcome to Christian capsules Season 2 Capsule #7
Here we are Fixing Christianity One dose at a time.
All scripture is read from NASB 95 Edition.
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Problem:
Today we are talking about: People are carrying massive amounts of heavy weight around with them every day.
Problem Example.
Last week I saw a woman who was carrying around a massive weight around with her. It was weighing her down like a ton of bricks. It was written all over her face-her body, her mannerisms. It was clearly visible. She was angry, sad and very miserable.
She was carrying weight about her kids, her health, her job and her husband.
She had no outlet for her frustration. She had no one to help her carry her weight. It was very sad to see her that way. She was fighting with herself and me because of her burden. It appeared she had been this way for quite a while.
Real Talk- Real World
Isn’t the same with many of us? How many of us can admit that we are beaten down by the burdens of this world, of just living? I’m not even talking about homelessness or anything extreme like that (that’s another conversation for another day), I’m talking about just regular living everyday things that beat or weigh us down, because they are just too dang heavy.
Most of the time we don’t even realize that we are carrying such heavy burdens. We sometimes call it “just another day” “tis the season” or “Moody Monday’s (except sometimes Moody Mondays are everyday). Or sometimes we say, “it’s just life.” Isn’t that, right?
The Things we carry.
Let’s look at the things we carry around with us.
- Jobs: Stresses from jobs like bosses, or jerks at work, or maybe from layoffs, or missed promotions, not enough hours, too many hours, not enough pay etc.
- School stuff: Workload, choosing colleges, grades, people at school etc.
- Health Issues: Diagnosis shock or fear of, dealing with disease or infections, the burden of not being able to do what u used to do. The burden of being handicap in certain ways, lingering chance death from health issues, mental health problems
- Money/Economics: Never enough money, bills, all things that money problems bring.
- Relationship issues: Marriage issues, boy/girlfriend stuff, regular friend stuff, parent stuff, problems with children, sibling strife etc.
- Carrying other people’s burdens: Sharing burdens and worries of our loved ones that mirror the same problems I just listed.
These are just a sample set of the many of the common burdens that many of us carry daily. I didn’t even mention the unique burdens of: politics, war, missing people, death, racism, homelessness, widows, and Identity struggles-either gender or mental.
Carrying this weight around inside damages us and makes our soul unhealthy. These same weights not dealt with properly can often lead to devastating issues like addictions, anger and emotional issues, domestic violence depressions and ultimately death either by suicide or trauma from being beaten down by the weight of it all.
How did this happen?
Well to be brief, sin happened. Problems like this are the manifestations of the consequences of sin. Sin introduced into the world brought on a curse, sin in our lives have consequences, unrepented sin, habitual sin. Even if you repented of sin, you still have the fall-out and consequences of the sin committed before repentance.
And on top of this, add Satan to the mix and yeah; Burdens become numerous and extremely heavy, especially when trying to carry them our way.
What does God say about Burdens:
Psalm 55:22
Cast [a]your burden upon the Lord and He will sustain you;
He will never allow the righteous to [b]be shaken.
King David wrote this psalm, here he shares fears of violence from his friend betraying him, but at the same time He expresses his confidence in God. In this verse in particular, David is telling us in the spirit that even though our burdens put us on shaky ground, the Lord will hold us up and keep us sustained. David tells us to throw our burdens on God.
Psalm 68:19
Blessed be the Lord, who daily bears our burden,
The God who is our salvation.
Here again, the Lord bears our burden. That’s all nice and good. Sure, the Bible tells us to put our burden on God, but how do we do that? How does Jesus make it easier for us to bear our burdens.
Jesus helps us with our Burdens.
“Come to Me, all [a]who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. 29 Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For My yoke is [b]easy and My burden is light.”
Context for this verse is that Jesus has been preaching to various cities and performing miracles, but none is repenting. Jesus is telling them that He is the way to the Salvation and the way to get there is easier than the Pharisees and the Scribes way of dogma and tradition. We can read that in verses 28-30. That is what is called historical context. But because the Word of God is living, there is more to the verse than just the present context of Jesus talking to listeners in those cities. This is a three-prong meaning: In this verse, Jesus is referring to the two Psalm verses that I mentioned earlier (Psalm 55:22 and 68:19). Jesus is not just saying that he has easier way through him to salvation but is also insisting that he can help with your burden by bearing it for you, crucifixion notwithstanding.
How does Jesus help us:
Jesus says his yoke is easy and His burden is light. Let’s talk about the yoke for a second, I would hope that we understand that Jesus is not referring egg yolk. A yoke is a tool or device that is designed to pull or carry heavy loads. Usually, they are made for one or two oxen or donkeys to carry the load. However, the problem was that the oxen wanted to go in separate directions, and it was slow and sometimes the oxen wouldn’t even move because both the yoke and the load was heavy. It’s like us when we try to carry our load or use other means to carry our burden outside of God.
One Example would be us using alcohol as a yoke to drown out our problems with work or our marriage. This yoke is heavier and more problematic than the original load you were carrying. Jesus’ yoke is easier than that, its not problematic like that. You just have to come to Him in prayer and put your burdens on him, Because He is God, are burdens are light for Him.
When we trust Jesus to handle our burdens, then he will give us the wisdom, the strength and the hope to make it through whatever we face. We have to surrender to his way of doing things, its far easier and lighter than any scheme or way we can come up with to carry our burden. David attests to this Psalm 68:19
We do have a lot on our plate, but thankfully, we don’t have go at it alone. Go to the Lord humbly and earnestly and then relieve yourself of stress and trust in the Lord.
Some may want to recall the footprints in the sand poem. The last part is the most important:
“When you saw only one set of footprints,
It was then that I carried you."
My name is Jermaine Ferrell and I’ll talk to you next time.
Que the outro Music.