Bearing One Another’s Burdens

{written 4/20}

The other morning I was thinking/processing through all this and journaling about it. And a couple verses came to mind, which is where this post comes from. I was specifically thinking about what an amazing example my roommate had been of the verse about “bearing one another’s burdens”….but also about how I had taken advantage of that, and not been helping her bear her burden.

I looked up the verse, and was kind of surprised by what I found. It’s Galatians 6:2, but only the first half is the familiar line tossed about in the Christian community. The full verse reads “Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ” (NKJV). In my head, I’ve always thought of this verse as a way to help friends feel better about themselves, to help them carry their cares and sorrows.

But that’s not what the context says! The previous verse refers to a person “overtaken in trespass” who should be restored “in a spirit of gentleness,” and the following verses continue that theme of looking at one’s choices and actions.

The previous chapter also references this: “Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage” (5:1, emphasis mine). So the burdens Paul is referring to are not “merely” the burdens of daily sorrows and difficulties. Paul’s teaching here goes much deeper. Just this morning in church, one of the pastors was teaching about how the deepest darkest prison is the prison of SIN. And THAT is the yoke Paul was addressing!

My next post or two will be looking more at that…but I wanted to mention it here for the sake of context.

The idea of “bearing one another’s burdens” takes on a whole different light for me once I see the verse within the setting that Paul originally wrote it in! He is not simply calling us to sympathize with one another. No, instead he is instructing his readers to call one another out on habitual sins, to help one another live in the liberty of Christ! He’s talking about a process of discipleship and sanctification, not just someone to listen to the woes of your day.

I am so thankful for the people who God has placed in my life who He has also equipped to do both. I have been blessed with several good listeners who then also turn around and speak truth into me. Because very often I am venting to people when my perspective is off. When I’m not wanting to submit to God’s will, or when I’m just “stuck” in a certain view of a situation. And in all of the above, I often need to hear someone else tell me what I know with my head but what I’m not feeling in my heart.

But, as I wrote in my previous post, I must be careful that I do not look solely or even primarily to those people. And Paul addresses this too: “For if anyone thinks himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself” (Gal. 6:3). I’m not entirely positive if by this verse Paul is referring to the person in sin, or to the person trying to help him (vs. 1). I’m guessing it applies either way.

The person in sin would obviously be deceiving himself if he tried to proudly act like he didn’t need help and had it all together. But the person trying to help and disciple would also be deceiving himself if he tried to do so out of his own strength. And that’s the direction this verse took me in my musings the other day.

As I thought about the people who had helped me to bear my burdens, I knew they weren’t relying on themselves to do that. They weren’t listening to my burdened heart and then taking and carrying those heavy loads themselves. Instead, they were relying on God’s strength and truth. They were helping me to carry my burdens to Him.

So yes, we are to “bear one another’s burdens.” But that does not mean taking everything from everyone else onto ourselves and then continuing to carry it around with us. We are called to be free!