Cast Your Burdens

Life of the Church

Good morning everyone, and happy Sunday. It’s good to see you brave the weather and be here for worship this morning.

I do have a few announcements I’d like to mention as we begin.

The men’s group will meet tonight at 6:30. All men are invited to attend. And there will be a men’s prayer breakfast next Sunday the 28th.

I’ll remind you about pictures for our new church directory. Those will be taken on October 2nd from 9 to 1, and we’ll have more details about that as we get closer to that date.

We’re still collecting items for Stump Elementary’s WRE program. You’ll see a list of things needed there in your bulletins, and you can leave them in Randal’s Sunday school classroom or you can see Della.

Deacon elections will be held next week. You’ll see a list of current deacons in your bulletins. Those are people you can’t vote for, but everyone else is fair game. Please be in prayer about who you’d like to see in this service to the church. We need 7 new deacons. And please, if you’re chosen, please consider serving this very important role.

George, do you have an announcement this morning?

Also, please be in prayer for Twila. Her uncle passed last week, and her mom keeps falling. Twila won’t be here for the first few days of this week as she’s taking care of all that, so please remember her and keep her family in your prayers.

Sue, do you have anything?

Opening Prayer

Father God, we gather here today under your care and protection. Thank you for your lovingkindness that never fails us. Thank you for those with us, that you would guide our thoughts and actions to bring you glory. Strengthen us with your peace. May we love and serve each other as Jesus has shown us. Fill us with the Holy Spirit to do your good work on earth. For it’s in Jesus’s name we pray, Amen.

Sermon

Finish this sentence for me: Life is like ____. There are all kinds of ways people have finished that sentence in order to put an image to the meaning of life.

Some people say that life is like a camera: we can capture the good times, develop from the negatives, and if things don’t work out, just take another shot. What do you think about that one?

Or how about this one: Life is like a book: it’s told one page at a time, and you can’t start the next chapter until you finish the one you’re on right now. That’s not so bad.

Then there’s this one: life is like a journey, not a destination. I know you’ve heard that one. Of all those cute little sayings about what life is like, that’s the one I dislike most. I can’t stand that one.

Life’s a journey, not a destination? But the whole point of a journey is the destination. And a journey is only as good as the place where you end up. No, that one’s never worked for me at all.

So what’s life like, then? What’s a picture you can carry around in your mind of what your life exactly is?

We’re going to start out today by looking at that, and we’re going to turn to the book of Hebrews, chapter 12. Following along with the first two verses:

Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

And this is God’s word.

Traditionally it was thought that Paul was the author of Hebrews, and maybe that’s the case, but scholars are divided on that. Regardless, one thing’s for certain — to the author of this book, and to God Himself, life is not like a camera, or a book, or a journey. Life is like a race.

Now if you’re like me and of a certain age, thinking of life as a race maybe doesn’t settle so well. Because some of us feel a little too old and a little too tired to be running any kind of race at all. Our days of running are over. Right now, we’re happy just to be walking.

But let’s take a minute and talk about what the image of a race means, and what makes it the perfect way to describe the Christian life.

If God says you’re supposed to think about your life like you’re running a race, then what’s happening? First of all, you’re not holding still, are you? You’re in constant motion, and that motion is always forward.

You’re never looking back, you’re looking ahead. We’re going to talk a lot about that more in a little bit, but I want to include it now because that’s one of the most important parts about running a race — where your eyes are.

So if God says you have to treat your life like you’re running a race, the first thing you need to make sure you’re doing is moving forward.

The second idea is this — if you’re running a race, you’re giving it your all. It’s that idea of effort.

The problem with thinking that life’s about the journey is that you start to think of yourself as just a traveler. If you’re not giving it every ounce of your strength and effort, then you’re just passing through.

So maybe you’ll take a break for a while and sit under some shade. Maybe you’ll wander off from the path you’re on and take a different way that looks like it might give you a different view.

But God says no, don’t ever do that. He says you’re running a race whether you think you are or not, and just passing through this life is the surest way to lose. The second you take a break from this race you’re running, the moment you leave your path, everything in your life is going to fall apart.

This life, your spiritual life in this world, isn’t a sprint. It’s a marathon. It’s a long race that lasts all the years of your life. To get through that demands a special grace, and that’s given at the end of verse 1: “let us run with endurance.”

Endurance. That’s what we need. What does it mean to run with endurance? That’s a neat little word in the Greek called “hypomone” (hy-Pom-o-nee), and it’s a special kind of endurance that’s defined by two things.

One is that it’s a way of enduring that’s active. You’re not just sitting around, and you are never giving up. You’re always pushing forward, always straining ahead.

You understand that the way won’t always be easy and that sometimes you’ll stumble, but you trust that God is with you and will see you through. That’s the first thing that defines this Biblical idea of enduring your race.

The second thing about this endurance, though, is that it’s cheerful. It’s hopeful. Now this can be a tough one, because let’s face it — life doesn’t always make you happy, does it?

Life doesn’t always fill you with hope. In fact, life can be downright hard and heartbreaking sometimes. We learned that the past few weeks with Mary and Martha and Lazarus, didn’t we? And even with Jesus. They all wept.

How can we endure when life gets like that, and we’re just tired of running our race? The endurance that verse 1 says we we need gives us the key, because it’s a word that combines two things: faith and patience.

It’s your faith that allows you to run with endurance. It’s your faith that allows you to be patient when you’re running up those steep hills of your life. Remember, it’s your faith that Jesus wants to increase more than anything. Because that’s how you endure.

And because it’s a long race that lasts your whole life, the way you know you’re doing okay is if you’re making steady progress. Every day, you’re getting closer to your goal. And the only way you can make steady progress is if you’re always giving an effort.

But now this is the important part: You might understand that you’re in a race, and you might be enduring, and you might be giving it all you got, but none of it will matter if the prize at the end isn’t worth it.

Because that’s the whole point of a race, isn’t it? To claim the prize at the end. But what kind of prizes are we running after?

Some people will say, “I’m living to make money.” Others will say, “I’m living for my family.” “I’m living for retirement.” “I’m living for my job.” But what has God told us time and time again? Those are terrible prizes to run after, because none of them are going to last.

We’re all running after something. It’s human nature. In fact, God himself put that in you.

You are built to worship. You are built to chase something. You don’t have a choice in that, but you do have a choice in what you worship and chase. And unless the thing you’re worshipping and chasing is God, one day you’re going to reach the end of your race and realize one horrible, terrible thing: you’ve wasted your entire life. All of it.

But as a Christian, what’s the prize we’re racing toward? What’s waiting for us at the end of our race if we patiently endure with faith? It’s heaven. It’s our crown. We’re spending our whole lives running right into the arms of Jesus.

Part of what makes some people think Paul wrote this book is that the imagery here of life as a race is something he writes a lot about elsewhere. All through his letters, Paul’s comparing your spiritual life to the Greek and Roman games.

He talks about how the competitors have to be so disciplined in their training. How the struggles and competitions are so intense. How there are rewards and a righteous judge. And he speaks of the crowds of spectators. All of those things are here in verse 1 of Hebrews 12. Especially that crowd.

Here in verse 1, that crowd is called “a great cloud of witnesses.” I want to touch on this, because it’s important. Who is this great cloud of witnesses that surround us?

Verse 1 picks up right after the writer of Hebrews spends all of chapter 11 detailing a long list of people. These are the people that all of heaven regards with the highest esteem. These are the heroes.

And why are they mentioned? What makes them so special? Not because of how good they were. Not because of how brave they were. No, they’re remembered as heroes because of their faith.

There it is again, isn’t it? Faith. That great cloud of witnesses are the people of great faith, people of patient endurance, people who have already run their races, and even now they’re watching you and cheering you on as you run and give all of our effort.

And what are these heroes of our faith saying to us? What are your loved ones who have gone on before us shouting as we run toward heaven to join them? What does God himself say to you in all of your effort?

“Look to Jesus.”

Verse 2. “Looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.”

Look to Jesus. If you want to make sure you stay on the path you’re supposed to be on, look to Jesus. If you need encouragement and strength to keep going and not give up, look to Jesus. Because he’s the one waiting for you at the end of your race. He’s the prize.

Verse 1 says the only way you can run your race is with the sort of patience that only faith can provide, and Jesus is the author and perfecter of your faith. So because he is the one who begins your faith and brings it to perfection, you have to run the race with your eye fixed on him.

If you want to know how to run your race, look to Jesus. Look at his holy life. Look at how he faced his trials with patience and faith. Look at what he had to endure to obtain his crown. Look at how he triumphed. Sink all of those things into your heart, and know that you can do the same through him.

That’s the good news. Are you ready for the bad news?

The bad news is that you can understand that your life is a race. You can know the prize that’s waiting for you at the end. You can even keep your eyes fixed on Jesus. But you can still fail in both your faith and in your life, because you won’t give Jesus the one thing that he absolutely wants to take from you, and that’s your burdens.

Verse 1: “Let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely ... ”

Pay attention to how that verse is written and what it says. The only way you can run your race with that faithful patience is if you lay aside every weight, and the sin which clings so closely.

It’s the only way. If you want to run your race the way God calls you to, then you have to make yourself as light as possible. Any weight you carry is just going to slow you down and wear you out, and that’s exactly what a burden is. It’s a weight that’s going to wear you out.

It’s those earthly cares. It’s those fears that plague your mind. It’s the worry that you can’t stop doing. It’s the guilt you feel over the things you’ve done. It’s the shame of your sins and the anxiety of your life. It’s your failures. Your hurts. It’s your anger over life’s unfairness.

Here’s the picture that these two verses are painting: you’re running a race, you’re straining toward the finish line and a prize just for you, but your clothes don’t fit right. They’re either too tight, and you can’t move. Or they’re too loose, and you keep getting tripped up.

You can’t run. You’re spending so much energy just trying to keep standing that you can’t run at all, and all that clothing that’s choking you, that’s tripping you, that’s keeping you from running your race, are your burdens.

That’s Hebrews 12:1,2. God says you have to run your race well. But to do that means running with faithful patience. The only way you can do that is if you lay aside your burdens. And the only way you can lay aside your burdens is if you look to Jesus.

But now let’s be honest, that all seems a little too simple, doesn’t it? “Look to Jesus.” Okay, but how does that even work? How are we supposed to let go of our burdens?

Because really, don’t we all know as Christians that we’re supposed to look to Jesus? Sure we do. We know that. And don’t we all understand that things like fear and worry keep us from living our lives the way that God wants? Don’t we all know that we should have more faith and less burdens?

Of course we do. But here’s what we do: we’re weighted down with all of these worldly cares and still trying to run our race. We look to Jesus — which is exactly what we’re supposed to do — and he holds out his arms and he says, “I don’t want you carrying around all that stuff. You don’t need to do that. I want you to be free, so let me take your burdens.”

So what do we do? We hand it over, don’t we? We go, “Okay here, thank you,” and give it right to him. And then we say, “Oh my goodness, I feel so much better. So much lighter. This is amazing. Thank you so much, Jesus.”

And then we take a deep breath and say, “Okay, I think I’m good now. I’ll take my burdens back.”

Be honest, now — that’s exactly what you do, isn’t it? Every time.

You’re smart enough to know you’re in a race, and wise enough to know your burdens are keeping you from running free, and you have faith enough to hand your burdens to Jesus, but then you always take them back. Why? And how are we supposed to give him our burdens once and for all?

As it turns out, the answer comes from someone who had more burdens than all of us. Someone who, when it mattered the most, actually denied knowing his Lord and having anything to do with Jesus. I’m talking about Peter.

Turn with me to 1 Peter, chapter 5. We’re going to look at verses 6 and 7:

Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.

And this is God’s word.

Hebrews 12:1 says that we have to lay aside every weight, every burden, because those burdens wear us down. Hanging on to those burdens keeps us from being the people Christ wants us to be and having the blessings God wants to give us.

But surrendering them, letting them go, laying them down at his feet, brings us the part of salvation that we desperately crave, and that’s freedom.

All along the path of your race, there are altars set up where God says, “You have to sacrifice a little of yourself here, and then a little more, and a little more.”

With every step you take toward heaven, you have to lay down something of yourself and pick up something of Christ. You have to understand in your heart that all you can do is make a mess of your life, and he’s the only one who can fix it.

That’s the only way you’ll ever get closer to your prize — less of you, more of Jesus. John the Baptist said, “He must become greater, I must become less.” That’s the Christian life in a sentence.

But when it comes to giving him your burdens, you hesitate. You’ll hand your burdens over to Christ, only to take them right back. Why?

I’ll give you a big reason — you think you deserve to carry them. Those are your burdens, after all. They’re your regrets. Your failures. Your sins. And since they’re yours, you think you have to be the one to deal with them, not Christ. You deserve that weight. Am I right?

Here’s another big reason, and I think this might be the biggest — the worst burdens can be your fears. Your worries. The things you dread happening.

It’s easy to wallow in burdens like that instead of handing them over to Christ because you think if you constantly worry about the thing you’re afraid of, and if you’re constantly afraid of the thing you’re worried about, it won’t happen.

Right? Think about it. Deep down you know that your burdens are more than you can bear. But you manage to convince yourself that as long as you worry about something happening, it won’t happen.

It’s one of Satan’s greatest tricks. Both God and the devil agree that carrying around your burdens keeps you from a life of peace and blessing.

God says, “I want you to give those burdens to me.” But the devil, he wants you to keep carrying those burdens around because he wants to see you hurt. He needs to keep you ineffective. So he’s constantly whispering into your ear to convince you that the burden Jesus calls you to hand over to him is instead that one thing you absolutely need to hang onto.

How do you fight that? Peter tells us right here in verse 6: you have to humble yourself. You think the only way you can keep your worries and fears from happening is if you keep worrying and being afraid? You think you’re strong enough to keep carrying the burden of your sins, all that guilt and shame, all that regret?

You can’t do any of that. You’re not that strong. You have to humble yourself and realize that you’re powerless to live the life Christ wants. You can’t do it. You can’t even take your next breath on your own, so stop thinking that you can.

The first part of letting go of your burdens once and for all is understanding how small and weak you are, and how big and mighty God is.

That is exactly why Peter says we should humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God. What is God’s mighty hand? Peter’s not talking about a judgmental God ready to smack you. He’s not talking about an angry God ready to wag his finger.

He’s talking about a God who loves you more than anything. Loves you so much that he sent his son to die for you. A God who pours out his love on you every moment. A God who wants nothing more than you right next to him, who wants nothing more than to bless and protect you. A God who can accomplish anything through you.

A mighty God. A God who will move heaven and earth to help you and heal you and bless you and keep you safe.

It is so important that you know who God is. That means reading your Bible and prayer. You have to sink yourself into just how deep and powerful and never-ending God’s love for you is.

Because you’re not going to hand over your burdens to someone you think will condemn you. You’re not going to hand over your burdens to someone you think will turn away from you, or someone you think won’t be able to handle the load.

You have to know God because knowing God means trusting him, and the root of all the worry and fear that weigh you down is a lack of trust. It’s too little faith in God and too much belief that you can handle your burdens better than he can. Both of those false beliefs disappear the more you know who God is.

You think the God who has seen you through every moment of every day of your entire life can’t be trusted? You think the creator of the universe can’t handle your burdens? You think his love for you is the same love as a person can give you? A love that can lessen and fade? A love that depends on what you do?

Do you know what you’re doing when you think like that? You are limiting a limitless Heavenly Father. You’re not looking to Jesus. You’re stumbling in your race.

So what do you do? How do you fix this once and for all? You do what Peter says in verse 7. You cast your burdens.

Don’t hand them over. Don’t place your burdens gently into Jesus’s hands. Cast them. Literally throw your burdens at him.

No matter what your burdens are, Jesus wants them. Whatever trial God allows you to endure, whatever cross you’re called to bear, all of your fears, all of your worries, your life itself, give it all to him.

Peter says you have to commit everything to Christ. You’re to give him everything of yourself. Aside from salvation itself, it’s your greatest gift from Christ. Cast it all on him, and he will give you grace and strength, and you can know that he can bear that load because he bore the cross.

And why should we cast our burdens? Because he cares for us.

Isaiah 49:

“Can a woman forget her nursing child, that she should have no compassion on the son of her womb? Even these may forget, yet I will not forget you. Behold, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands; your walls are continually before me.”

What more do you need than to know that God will never forget you? That you are always before him and always the object of his eternal love and protection? God never changes. When he says he loves you, he loves you forever. When he says he’ll watch over you and give you comfort, that means always and in every moment.

If Christ loves you enough to say, “Please cast your burdens onto me,” we should at the very least love him enough to do as he says.

So how do we do that? How do we actually cast our burdens onto him? Ready? Here we go.

First, casting your burdens means letting God be God. Remember, you’re running a race to the end. The end is ahead. You’re running forward. That means not dwelling on what’s behind you, but focusing on what’s ahead.

Yes, you’ve screwed up. You’ve screwed up badly. Yes, you’ll continue to screw up. You’ll screw up every day until the day you’re called home.

But you have to let God be God, and see your life through the grace that he gives us in Christ. That means you willingly choose to allow Jesus to carry whatever is weighing you down. Because if you don’t, you are missing out on one of the greatest blessings you can have, and that’s God’s peace.

But you have to let God be God. You have to choose it every day, moment by moment. It’s not a one-time thing, it’s an all-the-time thing. It’s constant, but the beauty is that no matter how much of your junk you give to Christ, he can bear every bit of it and more.

Next, casting your burdens onto the Lord means living in surrender. The goal of the Christian life is summed up in Galatians 2:20: “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”

That’s surrender. True surrender. It’s giving everything to God and putting your complete faith in him to work everything out for your good because you are following his will and not your own.

Surrender is a military term. It’s means giving up all of your own rights to the one who conquers you. Surrendering to God works exactly the same way. God has a plan for your life, and surrendering to him means setting aside your own plans to seek his.

And the best thing is that you cannot go wrong when you do that. God’s plan for you is always for your joy and your peace, and it’s always in your best interest.

Worldly enemies conquer to rule you. God conquers you to bless you. Once you understand that you can only make a mess of your life and only God can fix it, you are in a place where you can surrender to him.

Now the next step, and it’s a direct result of surrendering to Christ — casting your burdens means walking in obedience. This is not optional. When you let go and let God have his way, you have to be willing to obey whatever he tells you next. You cannot have the freedom of Christ without obeying Christ.

Saint Catherine of Siena was a woman who lived in the Middle Ages. She once had a vision of God, and in that vision God preached to her the world’s shortest sermon — just four words — but it summed up just about everything. He said, “I’m God; you’re not.”

It’s amazing how easy it is for us to forget that last part, isn’t it? But that’s exactly what surrender and obedience means.

Last, casting your burdens means living in repentance. A big part of our burdens is knowing that we miss the mark of God’s holiness every day. Sharing where you screwed up with Christ is the first step in knowing that we can give those burdens to him, because when we confess them we’re also reminded that we’re forgiven.

Jesus tells us in Matthew 3:8 to “bear fruit in keeping with repentance.” Living in surrender and walking in obedience will help you bear fruit that proves you know Jesus.

Letting go and letting God is a choice you have to make every day, all day long. Because the devil’s always working on you. He’s always trying to cloud your mind with worry and doubt and fear, because the more of those you have, the less room there is for faith.

But God’s mercies are new every morning. What happened yesterday, last year, or 20 years ago is completely gone.

So many times we’re looking at Jesus, but we put our cares between ourselves and him. That’s not what he wants. Put Jesus right in front of you and put your cares behind him, and what you’ll find is your cares won’t seem so big anymore.

That’s casting. Jesus can do all things but one. He can bear your burdens, he can carry them away, but he can’t take them. You have to invite him to take them. So do that, every day, trusting in his undying love for you.

Let’s pray:

Father every day life hands us something else to bear. We’re afraid of the future, worried of the present, and despairing of the past. But we thank you, Father, that those burdens aren’t ours to bear. We’re thankful that You not only can bear them for us, Your desire is to bear them for us. Your desire is to free us from their weight and their harm, and to have us rest in Your undying love and compassion. Help us, Father, to cast our burdens onto you. Give us the strength each day to surrender the things that weigh us down so that You can preserve us and lift us up. For it’s in Jesus’s name we pray, Amen.