Bear One Another's Burdens
Notes
Transcript
Text: Galatians 6:1–10
Over these past few weeks, we have been looking at those little words that appear again and again in the New Testament:
“One another.”
They remind us that Christianity was never designed to be lived in isolation. When Christ saves us, He brings us into a family and teaches us how to live with one another.
We began with Jesus’ command:
“Love one another.”
Love is the foundation.
Last week Romans 15 told us:
“Receive one another.”
Love makes room.
But today Paul takes us one step deeper:
“Bear one another’s burdens.”
Love gets underneath the load.
There are burdens you can carry for a while without anyone noticing. You can smile, shake hands, sing the songs, and say, “I’m doing fine,” while something inside you grows heavier by the day.
Eventually the grief becomes too deep, the temptation too strong, the diagnosis too frightening, the family crisis too complicated, or the loneliness too painful.
And when those moments come, Scripture does not tell us simply to grit our teeth and carry the weight alone.
God has given us one another.
That is one reason God gave us the church.
We do not just worship beside one another.
We walk with one another.
We do not just celebrate victories together.
We carry burdens together.
Galatians 6:2 says:
2 Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.
And as Paul explains what that looks like, he begins not with somebody carrying a physical burden, but with somebody who has fallen spiritually.
Listen to verse 1.
1 Brethren, if a man is overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness, considering yourself lest you also be tempted.
That gives us our first truth:
1. RESTORE THE FALLEN GENTLY
1. RESTORE THE FALLEN GENTLY
Paul begins with family language:
“Brethren.”
He is telling us what should happen when a brother or sister in Christ stumbles into sin.
The word “restore” was used for repairing something torn and even for setting a broken bone.
That picture matters.
If someone breaks an arm, the doctor does not walk into the room with a hammer and say, “Let me teach that bone a lesson.”
The goal is not further injury.
The goal is healing.
That is how restoration should work in the church.
Sin must still be called sin. Grace never means pretending sin does not matter.
But the purpose of confrontation is not humiliation.
It is restoration.
Paul says:
“You who are spiritual restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness.”
Spiritual maturity is not demonstrated by how harshly we can condemn someone who has fallen.
It is demonstrated by whether we can handle truth with tenderness.
Imagine someone falling into a ditch.
One person says, “You should have watched where you were going.”
Another says, “I knew this would happen.”
Another starts telling everybody how he ended up there.
But the one who acts like Christ kneels down, reaches out a hand, and says:
“Let me help you get back up.”
Now helping someone out of the ditch does not mean climbing into the ditch and staying there.
Restoration does not participate in sin.
It helps someone out of it.
Then Paul adds these sobering words:
“Considering yourself lest you also be tempted.”
Paul is reminding us of something we dare not forget:
The person helping someone back up is also capable of falling.
There are no Christians who have matured beyond temptation.
There are no believers who have walked with Christ so long that they no longer need to guard their hearts.
There are no pastors, teachers, deacons, or longtime church members who can safely say:
“That could never happen to me.”
The moment we begin thinking we are above falling is the moment we have stopped recognizing how desperately we still need the grace of God.
Paul says in 1 Corinthians 10:12:
12 Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall.
When we see a brother or sister overtaken by sin, we should never look down on them from a position of superiority.
We should look at them and remember:
I am made of the same flesh.
I face temptation too.
I am capable of making foolish choices.
I am capable of drifting if I stop watching my heart.
By God’s Grace Go I...
That changes the way we respond to another person’s failure.
Because there may come a day when the person who needs that restoring hand is you.
There may come a day when it is me.
That is why there is no room for spiritual pride in the family of God.
Proud people stand over fallen people.
God’s grace reaches down and picks them up.
And that leads naturally to something even broader.
Paul moves from the believer who has stumbled to the believer who is struggling.
Listen to what he says in verses 2 through 5:
2 Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.
3 For if anyone thinks himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself.
4 But let each one examine his own work, and then he will have rejoicing in himself alone, and not in another.
5 For each one shall bear his own load.
And here is the second truth:
2. CARRY THE HEAVY LOAD HUMBLY
2. CARRY THE HEAVY LOAD HUMBLY
The word Paul uses for burdens describes a heavy, crushing weight.
It is something too heavy for one person to carry comfortably alone.
And Paul says:
When the weight becomes too heavy, get underneath it with them.
We actually had a picture of that right here last week when we moved that piano from one side of the stage to the other.
One person was not going to walk over, pick up that piano, and casually carry it across the stage.
Why?
Because it was too heavy.
So what did we do?
Several people got around it.
One took this side.
Another took the other side.
Others helped guide and steady it.
The piano did not get lighter.
The load got shared.
That is what Paul is talking about.
Sometimes God does not immediately remove the burden.
Sometimes He sends somebody to help us carry it.
There are burdens of grief.
Illness.
Temptation.
Financial hardship.
Family trouble.
Caregiving.
Discouragement.
Loneliness.
We cannot always change the diagnosis.
But we can sit beside the person who received it.
We cannot always solve the family crisis.
But we can pray with the family walking through it.
We cannot remove every grief.
But we can refuse to let someone grieve alone.
Sometimes burden-bearing is a meal.
Sometimes it is a phone call.
Sometimes it is financial help.
Sometimes it is a hospital visit.
Sometimes it is praying again and again for the same need.
Sometimes it is simply sitting quietly and saying:
“I am here.”
Paul says when we do that, we:
“Fulfill the law of Christ.”
What is the law of Christ?
Jesus said:
“Love one another; as I have loved you.”
Everything in this series will keep coming back to that command.
Love is the foundation.
Love makes room.
And now:
Love gets underneath the burden.
But Paul also says in verse 5:
“For each one shall bear his own load.”
That is not a contradiction.
Verse 2 describes a crushing burden.
Verse 5 describes the ordinary responsibility each person is expected to carry.
No one else can obey God for you.
No one else can repent for you.
No one else can pursue holiness for you.
So here is the balance:
We are responsible for our own walk, but we were never meant to walk alone.
There will be days when you are doing the carrying.
There will also be days when somebody has to help carry you.
That is not weakness.
That is the church.
But there is one danger in burden-bearing.
You can keep helping, keep serving, keep praying, keep giving—and eventually become tired.
So Paul does not just tell us how to begin doing good.
He tells us how to keep doing good when we are weary.
Listen to verses 7 through 10:
7 Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap.
8 For he who sows to his flesh will of the flesh reap corruption, but he who sows to the Spirit will of the Spirit reap everlasting life.
9 And let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart.
10 Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all, especially to those who are of the household of faith.
That leads us to the final truth:
3. KEEP DOING GOOD FAITHFULLY
3. KEEP DOING GOOD FAITHFULLY
Paul gives us the picture of a farmer.
A farmer understands the principle:
You reap what you sow.
He does not plant cotton and expect wheat.
The harvest is connected to the seed.
Spiritually, every day we are sowing.
Our choices are seeds.
Our habits are seeds.
Our words are seeds.
Our attitudes are seeds.
When we feed bitterness, we are sowing.
When we forgive, we are sowing.
When we gossip, we are sowing.
When we encourage, we are sowing.
The question is not:
“Am I sowing?”
You are.
The question is:
“What am I sowing?”
Then Paul says:
“Let us not grow weary while doing good.”
Because helping people can become tiring.
You pray and nothing seems to change.
You encourage and the person is still discouraged.
You serve and nobody notices.
You give and nobody says thank you.
And somewhere along the way you begin to wonder:
“Does any of this really matter?”
Paul says:
Do not quit.
A farmer does not plant seed on Monday and dig it up on Tuesday because nothing has appeared.
He plants.
He waters.
He waits.
He trusts that something is happening beneath the surface.
Some of you have been planting good seed for a long time.
You have prayed.
You have encouraged.
You have served.
And maybe you cannot see much happening.
Keep sowing.
A prayer is not wasted.
An encouraging word is not wasted.
A meal delivered to a hurting family is not wasted.
A visit to someone who is lonely is not wasted.
Paul says:
“In due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart.”
Then he says:
“As we have opportunity, let us do good to all, especially to those who are of the household of faith.”
Notice that phrase:
“As we have opportunity.”
Paul is saying that doing good is not just something we believe in—it is something we act upon whenever God places the opportunity in front of us.
The opportunity may be a brother who needs encouragement.
It may be a sister who needs prayer.
It may be someone grieving who needs your presence.
It may be a family carrying a burden that you can help lighten.
And many of those opportunities will never announce themselves.
Not every burden is obvious.
Some people wear casts on broken bones. Others wear smiles over broken hearts.
So part of bearing one another’s burdens is learning to see the opportunities God places around us.
Instead of coming to church thinking only about what I need, perhaps we should also be asking:
“Lord, is there someone here I can do good to today?”
“Is there someone I can encourage?”
“Is there someone I can pray with?”
“Is there a burden I can help carry?”
That is exactly where Paul has been leading us:
“As we have opportunity, let us do good…”
And notice especially where he tells us to look:
“Especially to those who are of the household of faith.”
There is the family again.
These are not simply people who happen to attend the same church service.
These are our brothers and sisters.
And when we begin seeing one another that way, opportunities to do good are no longer interruptions.
They are part of what it means to be the family of God.
CONCLUSION
CONCLUSION
Come back to verse 2:
2 Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.
There will be times when you are strong enough to carry someone else.
There will also be times when you need someone to help carry you.
But there is one burden-bearer we must not miss.
The greatest picture of burden-bearing in Scripture is Jesus Christ.
Isaiah says:
“Surely He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows.”
And 1 Peter says Jesus:
“Bore our sins in His own body on the tree.”
Jesus did more than sympathize with our greatest burden.
He carried it.
Our greatest burden was sin.
We were guilty before a holy God, and we could not remove that guilt ourselves.
So Jesus carried what we could never carry.
He bore our sin on the cross.
He took the judgment we deserved.
He died in the place of sinners.
He was buried.
And He rose again.
That is the gospel.
We do not bear one another’s burdens to earn God’s love.
We bear one another’s burdens because Christ has already loved us.
We do not carry one another so Christ will accept us.
We carry one another because Christ has already carried us.
So church, when someone falls:
Restore them gently.
When someone is crushed beneath a heavy load:
Carry it humbly.
And when doing good becomes tiring:
Keep doing it faithfully.
Love one another.
Welcome one another.
And now:
Bear one another’s burdens.
May The Ridge be a church where grace restores the fallen, humility carries the load, the hurting are seen, the weary are strengthened, and nobody has to carry the heaviest burdens alone.
“Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.”
