Just Too Heavy
Here's an old one worth recalling:
A lecturer, when explaining stress management to an audience, raised a glass of water and asked, "How heavy is this glass of water?"
Answers called out ranging from 2 to 5 pounds.
The lecturer replied, "The absolute weight doesn't matter. It depends on how long you try to hold it."
He continued, "If I hold it for a minute, that's not a problem. If I hold it for an hour, I'll have an ache in my right arm. If I hold it for a day, you'll have to call an ambulance. In each case, it's the same weight. But the longer I hold it, the heavier it becomes.
"And that's the same way it is with handling stress. If we carry our burdens all the time, sooner or later, as the burden becomes increasingly heavy, we won't be able to carry on. As with the glass of water, you have to put it down."
Every one of us has, is, or will face stressful times that tempt us to call a time-out ... or the paramedics. If I asked you to name the stressors in your life, most can reel off a parade of people and situations that cause you heartburn. You know the feeling: A tenseness in your chest, faster heartbeat, maybe a sense of foreboding, and even a bit of sweat seeping out. As a part of life with others, stressors seem to broadly fall into one of four baskets: Physical, mental, relational, or spiritual.
So, whether it's a loner out in the puckerbrush, or an apartment dweller in the city, stress will come knocking. I asked Dr. Google signs of stress and here's a list.
If you are stressed, you might feel:
Irritable, angry, impatient, or wound up
Over-burdened or overwhelmed
Anxious, nervous, or afraid
Like your thoughts are racing and you can't switch them off
Unable to enjoy yourself
Depressed
Uninterested in life
Like you've lost your sense of humor
Seems to describe a lot of folks I run into these post-pandemic days. So, if stress is part of life, what does God have to say about it?
Jesus in Matthew 11 dives right into this:
Then Jesus said, "Come unto me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy to bear, and the burden I give you is light."
And Peter echoes this at the end of his first letter.
Humble yourselves under God's strong hand, and in his own good time he will lift you up. You can throw the whole weight of your anxieties upon him, for you are his personal concern.
Look at the verbs directed to the audience in these verses. Choice is a large piece of the way out of stress-filled living.
"Come" What an invitation! We are welcomed into the presence of Jesus anytime, but especially when we are hard pressed by life, and he guarantees the gift of rest.
"Take" Then we get to choose which life to live: Ours or his. To get this rest we must lay down our ownership of life and take on his yoke, his way of life.
"Humble" Here's the rub: This calls for us to let go of the need to fix, to negotiate, to orchestrate, and choose the Jesus way through humility and gentleness, imitating his life.
"Throw" By a repeated act of the will, we move. Peter puts it plainly when he says we can shot-put the whole of my stress on Jesus and trust that he is Immanuel, God with us, in the midst of our mess.
You might be reading this and can identify with the person holding the stress of life in an outstretched hand for way too long. What in reality is a small weight wears you down, and all you can think about is how hard it is to carry what you have a minute more. You aren't built for this. You and I are, as Peter says, "his personal concern", so doesn't it make sense to follow God out of our stresses?
Even a quick look to the interweb will yield baskets full of strategies to better handle life's stressors. But for us as believers, consider beginning with Jesus. This morning, as you hold out the glass of water that seems more weighty than it should be, ponder what it might look like to take the verbs from the verses above and weave them into the fabric of your life today.
Give it a try on just one of your stressors. Imagine coming in and sitting with Jesus and talking over what you carry. Intentionally take on his way of doing life, whether it is letting go or forgiving or confronting those things that bring on your stressful feelings. Release yourself from the need to solve every issue, and with humility make room for God to work. Then visualize casting, throwing the weight you carry onto him who cares for you. Then do it all again tomorrow.
Weary folks lugging heavy burdens looking for a respite are just the kinds of people Jesus invites to join him. Consider that today.
Music time!
Jokes are good for you...
A young American tourist goes on a guided tour of a creepy old European castle.
At the end of the tour the guide asks her how she enjoyed it.
She admits to being a bit worried about seeing a ghost in some of the dark cobwebby rooms and passages.
"Don't worry," says the guide. "I've never seen a ghost all the time I've been here"
"How long is that?" asks the girl.
"About three hundred years..."
__________
Once there was a millionaire who collected live alligators. He kept them in the pool in back of his mansion. The millionaire also had a beautiful single daughter.
So one day he decides to throw a huge party, and during the party he announces: "My dear guests, I have a proposition to every man here. I will give one million dollars or my daughter to the man who can swim across this pool full of alligators and emerge unharmed!"
As soon as he finished his last word there was the sound of a large SPLASH! One guy was in the pool, swimming as fast as he could, with the crowd was cheering him on. Finally he made it to the other side, miraculously unharmed.
The millionaire was impressed. "My boy that was incredible! Fantastic! I didn't think it could be done! Well I must keep my end of the bargain. Which do you want: my daughter or the one million dollars?"
The guy says, "Listen, I don't want your money! And I don't want your daughter! I just want the name of the idiot who pushed me into that pool!"