Lift Someone’s Load and Lighten Yours

Series Title

A Sermon By Jim Hammond from Text

   Karl Menninger, the [late] psychiatrist, was asked what someone should do who feels on the verge of a nervous breakdown.  His advice?  "Lock your house, go across the railroad tracks, find someone in need and do something for him."  [1]

In other words… “Lift Someone’s Load and Lighten Yours”

·       Have you ever experienced this?  …You lifted someone else’s load and it lightened yours.

·       [Donkey Slide] This title reminds me of a picture someone sent me recently.  (I showed the audience a picture of a donkey hanging suspended in the air from a cart that was loaded too heavy for it). 

Focus:  Carry each other's burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.

Up to this point in the letter to the Galatians what Paul says has to do with the Judaizing legalism controversy.   It is a bit of a puzzle given the context of Galatians as to why Paul says what he says in chapter 6.  Why does he turn now to these practical exhortations?

Galatians 6:1-5

    Brothers, if someone is caught in a sin, you who are spiritual should restore him gently. But watch yourself, or you also may be tempted. [2] Carry each other's burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ. [3] If anyone thinks he is something when he is nothing, he deceives himself. [4] Each one should test his own actions. Then he can take pride in himself, without comparing himself to somebody else, [5] for each one should carry his own load.

Are these thoughts unrelated to the Judaizing conflict or related? 

Consider the words of Jesus in the context of the Pharisees.

Matthew 23:4  They tie up heavy loads and put them on men's shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to lift a finger to move them.

Jesus was a load lifter.  Some of you need a load lifted today, and others of you need to lift a load for someone else.  The paradox is that while we feel loaded down, helping someone else actually lightens the load.  Why?  In the community of Christ, love is experienced.  In the community of Christ a supernatural lift is experienced through these very practical expressions of love.  So whether you need a lift, or you need to off load, or you need community, there is much to learn from this passage.  Let’s get practical about it.

I.  Look For A Load To Lift

 [2] Carry each other's burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.

A.  Fulfill the Law of Christ – Love

WHAT IS “THE Law of Christ”?

John 13:34 (NIV)  "A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.

A.  Fulfill the Law of Christ (Love)

What’s new about loving one another?  That’s the second greatest commandment of the Old Testament right?  What is new is the second qualifying sentence.  As I have loved you, so you must love one another. 

Our culture is confused about Love.

Some marriages were motivated by mere lust, but mere lust is felt even by fleas and lice. Love begins when we wish to serve others.

Citation: Martin Luther. "Martin Luther--The Later Years and Legacy," Christian History, Issue 39.

People came early one Christmas Eve for the 11 P.M. service at Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church, New York City. Among them was a recovering alcoholic, six months sober, who slipped into the eleventh row. This was his first Christmas since having lost his family. A family of four sat down two rows in front of him. Seeing them together was crushing. He decided he couldn't handle it—he had to have a drink.

As he moved from the sanctuary to the narthex, he ran into Pastor Thomas Tewell. "Jim, where are you going?" the pastor asked.

"Oh, I'm just going out for a Scotch," Jim replied.

"Jim, you can't do that," the pastor responded. He knew that Jim was a recovering alcoholic. "Is your sponsor available?"

Jim replied, "It's Christmas Eve. My sponsor is in Minnesota. There's nobody who can help me. I just came tonight for a word of hope, and I ended up sitting behind this family. If I had my life together, I'd be here with my wife and kids too."

Pastor Tewell took Jim into the vestry to talk with a couple of other pastors. Then he slipped into the auditorium, having no idea what to do. He whispered a prayer: "O God, could you give me a word of hope for Jim?" He welcomed everyone and told them about the church. Then he said, "I have one final announcement. If anyone here tonight is a friend of Bill Wilson—and if you are, you'll know it—could you step out for a moment and meet me in the vestry?" Bill Wilson, better known as Bill W., is a cofounder of Alcoholics Anonymous.

From all over the sanctuary, women, men, and college students arose and made their way out. "And there while I was preaching in the sanctuary about incarnation," said Pastor Tewell, "the Word was becoming flesh in the vestry. Someone was experiencing hope."

Citation: Adapted from Dr. Thomas Tewell, The Communicator's Companion (3-21-02)

Some loads ought to be lifted by teams of people

Teamwork Saves Lives

Three thousand frightening feet above the ground, Soviet sport parachutist Yuri Belenko realized he was in trouble. His main chute had malfunctioned, and his reserve chute "barber poled" around the main, rendering them both useless.

Kicking his feet to slow the natural spiral caused by the noisy whipping canopies above, Belenko yelled down to fellow jumpers on the ground. His jump buddies sprang immediately into action, grabbed a packing mat, and sprinted toward the impact point.

All the way down Belenko yelled and tugged furiously at the static lines in a vain attempt to clear the two tangled chutes. Below, his friends stretched the mat taught…and waited.

Belenko plummeted into the canvas at bone-crushing speed, ripping the tarp from his rescuers' hands, and knocking them to the ground. When the dust cleared, Belenko lay gasping for breath and complaining of a sprained ankle. In addition to the injured leg, he suffered a few bruises.

His jump buddies were there for Belenko at the moment he needed them most.

This is a picture of what God wants people in the body of Christ to do for others in need.

Citation: Bud Sellick, The Wild, Wonderful World of Parachutes and Parachutists (Prentice-Hall, 1981), p.38; submitted by Clark Cothern, Tecumseh, Michigan

This is a parable with profound truths.  Sometimes we cannot be the only ones helping someone.  It takes a team to help people who are plummeting.  I realize there are many who I cannot help, but a team can.  Are you willing to respond like this team?

I have used a ball of yarn as a creative communication group learning activity.  The way it works is the group sits in a circle and holds on to the end of the yarn while throwing the ball of yarn to another person in the group after telling the group something about themselves.  The one receiving the yarn tells something also then passes the ball to another person.  This continues until a web of yarn is created between the group.  We talk about the yarn and the strength of communication.  That web can form a strong enough network that it can eventually even hold up a person.  This is part of the communication and trust building dynamic that can be created over time in a group.  We also talk about what could destroy the strength of that network.

In the animated movie Ice Age, when saber-tooth tigers attack a tribe of nomads, a mother and her baby attempt to outrun the man-eating beasts but are cornered at a raging waterfall. With no other option available, the mother jumps, securely cradling her baby. She is mortally injured in the fall but survives long enough to deposit her newborn on the riverbank. The little boy is discovered by a wooly mammoth named Manfred, a sloth name Sid, and a saber-tooth tiger named Diego. These three unlikely companions unite on a common mission to return the baby to his father.

As the trio treks through a mountainous terrain of ice and snow carrying the baby, at one point the mammoth, sloth, and tiger realize they're on an erupting volcano. The heat of the lava melts the glacier bridges atop the ice fields, separating Diego from the others. Isolated on a quickly melting island of ice, Diego jumps to reach the others, but falls short. Dangling from the edge of the ice field, his grip falters, and he falls. Manfred, unwilling to let Diego perish, leaps into a chasm after him and tosses the tiger upwards to safety. Diego, realizing the danger involved in the rescue, is moved by Manfred's compassion, courage, and sacrifice.

"Why did you do that?" he asks. "You could have died trying to save me."

Humbly, the mammoth responds, "That's what you do when you're part of a herd. You look after each other."

Amazed at the convergence of circumstances that has brought these three together, Sid muses aloud. "I don't know about you guys, but we are one strange herd."

Content: Rated PG

Elapsed time: Measured from the beginning of the opening credit, this scene begins at 53:29 and lasts about 2 minutes.

Citation: Ice Age (Twentieth-Century Fox, 2002), rated PG, written by Peter Ackerman, directed by Chris Wedge

The Apostle Paul was a great burden bearer

·        He was regularly taking up collections for churches which were in financial difficulty.

·        He was writing letters of personal counsel and theological advice.

·        He lifted the loads of other people, quite indisputably.

We do not so often recognize that the apostle was also a great burden sharer.

·        He did not hesitated to articulate his need to others:

o       He gave to them what is perhaps the most costly gift that any of us have to give: the gift of our vulnerability.

o       Now I think this is a particularly hard truth for us as American Christians to learn. We've been raised in a kind of stoic tradition, which honors the rugged individualist, the woman or man able to lift herself or himself by the bootstraps. We do not so often recognize that the rugged individualist often ends up as a ragged individualist.

Illustration: I've been caught by Keith Miller's story of a woman who was Christmas shopping, and, involved in what she was doing, she didn't notice her little girl who became bored and got down on the floor and began to play in the dust. A man walking down the aisle of this department store, not expecting a child to be in such a place, stepped right on the child's hand. She let out a terrible cry. Her mother bent down and scooped her up and said, "Don't cry where all these people can see you."

Now get the picture: here's this little girl looking at her crushed and swelling hand, and her mother says to her, "Don't cry where all these people can see you." That's the American way. Never cry where anybody can see you.

ILLUST:  Counseling:   "Oh, I'm very sorry, Pastor. I guess I was beside myself."  In point of fact, for the first time the person was not beside herself but was actually being herself.

Being a part of the Spiritual Family of Christ means that no Christian needs to be load lifting all alone

"By this will all men know that you are my disciples when you have love one for the other." And loving means sharing and bearing.

I will be precise enough to say this: everyone of us as a Christian ought to have at least one person with whom we share the WHOLE LOAD. And it's out of that load sharing that real load bearing comes.

B.  Restore Others gently,

 [1] Brothers, if someone is caught in a sin, you who are spiritual should restore him gently. But watch yourself, or you also may be tempted.

A single man in our congregation was behaving inappropriately toward women. He badgered some women with unwanted phone calls. His conversations were reportedly marked with sexual suggestiveness. The situation required rebuke, and, if that was not effective, discipline. I asked this man to meet with me.

"I have been made aware," I said, "that a number of women in our congregation are offended—some quite angered—by things you have been doing. Let me be specific. You have raised inappropriate sexual subjects in conversation. Women have reported that you have phoned them in a manner they consider harassment. I'll be glad to give specific examples if you feel you need them."

The man cautiously admitted there was substantial truth to the reports. Then I went on. "I want you to hear me very carefully so there is no misunderstanding between us. I have thought about this for several days. I have asked God to give me wisdom, and I want to speak in Christian love and respect to you.

"But I want you to know I am one who has a responsibility for the spiritual leadership of this congregation. Your behavior has been unacceptable according to Scripture and according to the covenantal life of this church. People have been hurt, and you have lost your credibility in their eyes.

"Christian men do not, as they say, 'hit' on women. They treat them with respect and honor. And if you do not understand how this is done, I will be happy to team you up with a man who can provide instruction for you.

"If there is one more instance of inappropriate behavior of this kind, I will immediately bring your name before the board of elders and ask them to put you under discipline. Have I made myself clear?"

The man assured me that he understood. I concluded our meeting with prayer, acknowledging God's presence in the conversation.

Later he took me up on my offer to connect him with a mature man who could provide guidance that he clearly had not received from other sources. I never got another adverse report about him.

Citation: Gordon MacDonald, "The Gift of Rebuke," Leadership (Fall 2002), p. 77

C.  But watch Yourself, Guard Against Pride

 [3] If anyone thinks he is something when he is nothing, he deceives himself.

Don’t think you are really something carrying someone’s load.

Satan promotes his lies in the world by encouraging us to self-deception. We deceive ourselves when we think of ourselves more highly than we ought to think. "But I know who I am," you say. "I'm a child of God, I'm seated with Christ in the heavenlies, I can do all things through Him. That makes me pretty special." Yes, you are very special in the eyes of God. But you are what you are by the grace of God (1 Corinthians 15:10). The life you live, the talents you possess, and the gifts you have received are not personal accomplishments; they are expressions of God's grace. Never take credit for what God has provided; rather, take delight in accomplishing worthwhile deeds which glorify the Lord.

We are all Carried by Others:

Direct your critical comments to yourself

The greatest of faults, I should say, is to be conscious of none.

Citation: Thomas Carlyle, Leadership, Vol. 3, no. 1.

II.  Don’t Neglect Your Own Load

 [5] for each one should carry his own load.

 “Carry each other's burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.”

Measure yourself against Christ not somebody else.

 [4] Each one should test his own actions. Then he can take pride in himself, without comparing himself to somebody else,

ALL THE GOOD THINGS

By Sister Helen P. Mrosla

He was in the first third grade class I taught at Saint Mary's School in Morris, Minn. All 34 of my students were dear to me, but Mark Eklund was one in a million. Very neat in appearance, but had that happy-to-be-alive attitude that made even his occasional mischievousness delightful.

Mark talked incessantly. I had to remind him again and again that talking without permission was not acceptable. What impressed me so much, though, was his sincere response every time I had to correct him for misbehaving: "Thank you for correcting me, Sister!" I didn't know what to make of it at first, but before long I became accustomed to hearing it many times a day.

One morning my patience was growing thin when Mark talked once too often, and then I made a novice-teacher's mistake. I looked at him and said, "If you say one more word, I am going to tape your mouth shut!"

It wasn't ten seconds later when Chuck blurted out, "Mark is talking again." I hadn't asked any of the students to help me watch Mark, but since I had stated the punishment in front of the class, I had to act on it.

I remember the scene as if it had occurred this morning. I walked to my desk, very deliberately opened my drawer and took out a roll of masking tape. Without saying a word, I proceeded to Mark's desk, tore off two pieces of tape and made a big X with them over his mouth.

I then returned to the front of the room. As I glanced at Mark to see how he was doing he winked at me.

That did it! I started laughing. The class cheered as I walked back to Mark's desk, removed the tape and shrugged my shoulders. His first words were, "Thank you for correcting me, Sister."

At the end of the year I was asked to teach junior-high math. The years flew by, and before I knew it Mark was in my classroom again. He was more handsome than ever and just as polite. Since he had to listen carefully to my instructions in the "new math," he did not talk as much in ninth grade as he had in the third.

One Friday, things just didn't feel right. We had worked hard on a new concept all week, and I sensed that the students were frowning, frustrated with themselves--and edgy with one another. I had to stop this crankiness before it got out of hand. So I asked them to list the names of the other students in the room on two sheets of paper, leaving a space between each name. Then I told them to think of the nicest thing they could say about each of their classmates and write it down.

It took the remainder of the class period to finish the assignment, and as the students left the room, each one handed me the papers. Charlie smiled. Mark said, "Thank you for teaching me, Sister. Have a good weekend."

That Saturday, I wrote down the name of each student on a separate sheet of paper, and I listed what everyone else had said about that individual. On Monday I gave each student his or her list. Before long, the entire class was smiling. "Really?" I heard whispered. "I never knew that meant anything to anyone!" "I didn't know others liked me so much!"

No one ever mentioned those papers in class again. I never knew if they discussed them after class or with their parents, but it didn't matter. The exercise had accomplished its purpose. The students were happy with themselves and one another again.

That group of students moved on. Several years later, after I returned from vacation, my parents met me at the airport. As we were driving home, Mother asked me the usual questions about the trip--the weather, my experiences in general. There was a light lull in the conversation. Mother gave Dad a sideways glance and I simply said, "Dad?" My father cleared his throat as he usually did before something important. "The Eklunds called last night," he began.

"Really?" I said. "I haven't heard from them in years. I wonder how Mark is."

Dad responded quietly. "Mark was killed in Vietnam," he said. "The funeral is tomorrow, and his parents would like it if you could attend." To this day I can still point to the exact spot on I-494 where Dad told me about Mark.

I had never seen a serviceman in a military coffin before. Mark looked so handsome, so mature. All I could think at that moment was, Mark, I would give all the masking tape in the world if only you would talk to me.

The church was packed with Mark's friends. Chuck's sister sang "The Battle Hymn of the Republic." Why did it have to rain on the day of the funeral? It was difficult enough at the graveside. The pastor said the usual prayers, and the bugler played taps. One by one those who loved Mark took a last walk by the coffin and sprinkled it with holy water.

I was the last one to bless the coffin. As I stood there, one of the soldiers who had acted as pallbearer came up to me. "Were you Mark's math teacher?" he asked. I nodded as I continued to stare at the coffin. "Mark talked about you a lot," he said.

After the funeral, most of Mark's former classmates headed to Chuck's farmhouse for lunch. Mark's mother and father were there, obviously waiting for me. "We want to show you something," his father said, taking a wallet out of his pocket. "They found this on Mark when he was killed. We thought you might recognize it."

Opening the billfold, he carefully removed two worn pieces of notebook paper that had obviously been taped, folded, and refolded many times. I knew without looking that the papers were the ones on which I had listed all the good things each of Mark's classmates had said about him. "Thank you so much for doing that" Mark's mother said. "As you can see, Mark treasured it."

Mark's classmates started to gather around us. Charlie smiled rather sheepishly and said, "I still have my list. It's in the top drawer of my desk at home."

Chuck's wife said, "Chuck asked me to put this in our wedding album."

"I have mine too," Marilyn said. "It's in my diary."

Then Vicki, another classmate, reached into her pocketbook, took out her wallet, and showed her worn and frazzled list to the group. "I carry this with me at all times," Vicki said without batting an eyelash. "I think we all saved our lists."

That's when I finally sat down and cried. I cried for Mark and for all his friends who would never see him again.

Philippians 1:3: "Every time I think of you, I give thanks to my God."