Blessed be the Lord! Day after day he bears our burdens; God is our salvation. Psalms 68:19 CSB

Come to me, all of you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Matthew 11:28 CSB

Carry one another’s burdens; in this way you fulfill the law of Christ. Galatians 6:2 CSB

When our kids were young, we did a lot of family hikes. North Carolina parks and trails offered us lots of choices. Everyone carried their own backpack for the hike. Although dad’s pack was usually the heaviest! Things like raincoats, snacks, water, first aid kit, extra socks, and whatever else was needed for that day’s hike. The backpacks could get heavy and burdensome. Even our dog had his own backpack to carry his water dish and food for the day. As we all got more experienced, we learned to lighten the load and carry only essentials.

Sometimes our burdens aren’t the physical loads that we carry, they are the worries and cares that we can’t seem to lay down. For some it’s the grief of a lost loved one, or the pain of an illness, or the shame from the past. And even though we know that God is with us always and forgives us, we have to remember that He also invites us to lay our burdens on Him. God is our burden bearer! We can leave our burdens with Him and lighten our load.

In Matthew, Jesus also bids us to come to Him with our burdens that we are weary of carrying and He will give us rest. And in Galatians, Paul invites us to carry each other’s burdens. When God lightens our load, we can then lighten the burdens of others by offering compassion and understanding, especially when we have been through similar situations.

This week, lighten your load by giving your burdens to the Lord. Leave your worries, cares, grief, pain, shame, and any other burdens on Him, our burden bearer. And if you have the opportunity, lighten someone else’s load.

I thank God for each of you! And I thank you for joining me this week as we give our burdens to our amazing “burden bearer” and lighten our loads. Thank you, Lord!

Blessing and joy and lighter loads!