Lay Down Your Burdens

I went for a 3 mile jaunt this morning around the track at our local YMCA.  It was dark when I started and actually quite nice temperature wise.  I dressed in my usual running garb and my IPOD shuffle newly charged with inspirational music minus the ear muff headphones was securely attached to my waist.  I was plugged in and on my way.  One of the first songs I heard was a song about “Laying down Your Burdens.”

When I was a youngster, my family would go to my Aunt Ruth’s house every year for New Year’s Day dinner.  She and my Uncle lived about 45 minutes from our home.  Mom, Dad, and my sisters, Janet, Marion and Nancy and I would climb into our car, in the matching outfits Aunt Ruth had given us for Christmas and go on our way.  Aunt Ruth and Uncle Howard were not able to have children of their own, but they really blessed us!  Aunt Ruth was/is an easy laugher and very fun loving.  She and my Uncle always seemed to have a twinkle in their eye. (Might have been the Scotch they drank neat!)  We would watch one football game after the other on New Year’s Day and then we’d have the fresh ham dinner with sauerkraut that was the tradition for our heritage.  At the end of dinner, the adults would sit around the table talking and we girls would drag ourselves sated and tired out to the kitchen and start doing the dishes.  She still doesn’t have a dishwasher and she is now 93!  When the dishes were done, we’d go look at the gifts that they had received and then we’d call it a night.  Dad would go out and warm up the car (we lived in the suburbs of Philadelphia) because it was always cold at that time of year.  As with any car trip, we would “call out” our seats.  I have window….I have the other window, I have middle between Mom and Dad or the unlucky one was the middle of the backseat.  As we rode back home we would be lulled into sleep because of our full bellies and the warmth of the car.  When we would finally reach home, most if not all were asleep.  The poor sibling in the middle of the back seat could only hope that on either side, one of us would have let her slump against us.  There were many a time I would feign sleep, just so that my Dad would have to carry me inside the house.  All I wanted to do, was get right into bed, without undressing or brushing my teeth, because I just wanted to stay enveloped in that warmth and security.

When I hear the song “Lay down Your Burdens” I think of these car rides.  The song goes on with the line….lay down your burdens, I will carry you.  See why the reference, why I think like I do?  As we walk through life, we encounter many situations that we can’t handle alone.  I was just reading Matthew 16.  The following verses 24-26 are from “The Message” Jesus, is talking with his disciples.  "Anyone who intends to come with me has to let me lead. You're not in the driver's seat; I am. Don't run from suffering; embrace it. Follow me and I'll show you how. Self-help is no help at all. Self-sacrifice is the way, my way, to finding yourself, your true self. What kind of deal is it to get everything you want but lose yourself? What could you ever trade your soul for?

Anyone who knows me well knows that I use to be the queen of the self-help section of the bookstore.  I love psychology, not enough to study it, in college (I dropped it the first time, but didn’t do it correctly so I got an F and when I took it again I only got a C).  My interest wasn’t in Freud, it was in dealing with human emotion, originally my own!  Upon reading this scripture from “The Message” I see now that all the self-help in the world won’t “fix” what needs fixing!

This scripture begs us to hold our hands out to the One who is there, waiting with His hand out to help us!  Our Father in heaven is willing to wrap us in the warmth of His embrace and carry us through the storms of life, securely wrapped in His strong arms.  Unfortunately too often we run away to our antidote of choice – alcohol, drugs, work, etc. thinking if we can hide long enough, the “burden” will somehow cease to exist.  There are no pat answers in life, and I am not trying to minimize what people, including myself, are going through.  In fact, one of the things mentioned is “embracing suffering”…..that’s a really tough one and I don’t do that one well at all!

I will say though, I am learning and when I have laid down my concerns and have left them at His feet, meaning not picking them back up again, I am slowly finding that by faith, things are being resolved and in ways that make me marvel.  I have been unemployed for 3 years now, a whole other story, I’ve gone back to school to get my license to be a CNA and I’m still not finding work.  Thing is, last week, if I had been “working” I would not have been available for a dear friend when she needed me.  There isn’t anywhere I’d rather have been at that time, other than wishing the reason hadn’t occurred!

My nephew just returned from a mission trip to Ethiopia.  His comment was that over there “they are a people with very little hope and yet they are a people with all the hope, joy and faith in Christ!  The Ethiopian Christians LIVE the words of the Bible.”  We have so many more opportunities over here and we need to simply “trust” and reach out our hands to God.  Take whatever burdens you feel you have (not selfish wants, but legit needs) and lay them down.  Vow to allow God to use you and don’t dwell on things.  If you give it up and expect Him to take care of it, every time you go and pick it back up, you are in essence saying “God, you can’t do this or aren’t doing this!”  I imagine His response is, “why should I, you keep thinking you can do it better and won’t leave it for Me to do.”

At church, I see more and more people worshipping with raised hands, during the musical portion of the service.  The music moves me so much but I am still inhibited in my response.  Oh to be free to worship with that type of joy.  I use to think it was just a southern thing, now I know it is really people free enough in their worship experience to be able to reach up and out to God and willing to take His hands!  But in the privacy of my car…..I guess I shouldn’t let on that I’ve gotten quite good at driving with my knees!!!

Looking up!~ Barb