Burdens and Baggage

I read a story this week about a dad who was on a hike with his daughter. She was tired and wanted to go home and was begging him to carry her bucket of rocks.

Evidently, they had been hiking for a while. She had been picking up rocks and twigs and dumping them into a little pink plastic bucket. Now, however, she wanted to go home. She was too tired to walk and carry the bucket. So, she was crying and asking her dad to carry the bucket for her. He told her, “No.” He could see how tired she was, but he could also see something she could not. He knew she needed someone to do something more than merely carry her bucket.

So, he knelt down, and asked her to carry the bucket while he picked her up and carried her on his shoulders. She began to cry. She did not want to carry the bucket, but he lifted her up anyway. He hoisted her with her bucket on his shoulders and started to walk away. And as he carried her she rested the pink bucket of rocks on his head.

In Matthew 11:28 Jesus says, “Come to me all who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.”

I have preached the sermons before on what we need to lay down, and that is true to an extent. There is baggage in our lives that we carry with us that we need to lay down. There are past experiences and regrets that we need to lay down. There are habits and hang-ups that we need to lay down at the feet of Jesus and walk away from.

And for those things, that baggage needs to be given to God so that we can be free of them. We weren’t ever meant to carry those.

But then there are some burdens which we can’t lay down. There are some things that are affecting our lives right now, or the lives of our loved ones, that are heavy and tiresome, but are just part of life right now. We can’t lay them down and walk away because they are right here with us.

That’s where the picture of the dad and his daughter I think is helpful. Maybe there are some things which we just have to carry right now, in this season of our lives. But how do we do that when we just want God to carry them for us? What about the burden? I think the answer is in the yoke.

It’s an interesting picture, especially as we think about our freedom we celebrated just a week ago. The apostle Paul said that we are free in Christ and should never again be bound by the yoke of slavery. Throw the yoke off, I am free!

And yet Jesus says, “Take my yoke upon you and learn from me”.

A yoke was a wooden crosspiece that was normally fastened around the necks of two animals to pull a plow or a cart.

The yoke does not alleviate the burden, but the yoke does share the burden. And Jesus’ offer here is not necessarily to take it all away, but to submit to a different kind of yoke. To work in partnership with Christ. And you will find rest for your souls.

I believe we all need some soul rest, especially right now. May you find it today, yoked to Jesus Christ our Lord to carry the burdens of today, knowing that God is with you.