How does God bear your burdens?
Are you carrying any burdens today? Are you feeling weighed down, even crushed, by a need or problem, by a responsibility or worry? What would you give to have someone strong and loving enough to come alongside and help share your load!
That is precisely the nature of God’s love. In his love, he bears your burdens.
Psalm 68:19 says, “Praise be to the Lord, to God our Savior, who daily bears our burdens” (NIV).
God showed his burden-bearing love to the Israelites
When the Israelites were oppressed as slaves in Egypt, the Lord appeared to Moses in the burning bush and said, “I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters. I know their sufferings, and I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey…. And now, behold, the cry of the people of Israel has come to me, and I have also seen the oppression with which the Egyptians oppress them. Come, I will send you to Pharaoh that you may bring my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt” (Exodus 3:7–10, ESV).
Their burden was mud baked into bricks. Someone had to tread straw into mud, carry that mud in a basket, press that mud into molds, carry the molded mud into an oven, carry finished bricks to the job site, and cement the mud bricks into place. All under a hot Egyptian sun and cruel, whip-bearing Egyptian taskmasters. God saw their burden, and he cared enough to help.
There is a kind of friend or lover who will enjoy a relationship with you, seek your company, like your personality, be glad to see you, hang out with you, laugh with you, high-five with you—but when you have a heavy load, he or she will not be found. God is not that kind of friend, not that kind of love. When you have mud and bricks to carry under a blazing sun, he will help. His love is a burden-bearing love. He is willing to share crushing loads with you daily.
Bearing burdens and the meaning of love
True love and burden-bearing go together. The apostle Paul taught this on the human level, saying, “Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ” (Galatians 6:2). What is the law of Christ? It is of course the law of love. Jesus said, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Matthew 22:39), and “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another” (John 13:34). So, Jesus commanded his followers to love one another, and Paul said that we fulfill that law by bearing one another’s burdens. You could even say that bearing others’ burdens is at the heart of what it means to love truly.
10 ways God bears your burdens
So, how does God in reality bear your burdens? How does he make a difference? How does he lighten your load? In every way. In response to your prayers and trust, the Lord
- removes loads he does not want you to carry. (see Matthew 8:14–17)
- gives strength to carry the loads you must carry. (see Isaiah 41:10)
- imparts wisdom for how to solve problems and work successfully. (see James 1:5)
- grants supernatural peace. (see Philippians 4:6–7)
- sends people to help with your burden. (see Galatians 6:2; 2 Corinthians 7:6)
- provides for your every need. (see Philippians 4:19)
- manifests his presence so that you are not alone with your load, giving sympathy, compassion, affection, emotional support. (see Hebrews 13:5–6).
- cleanses of the sins that make your way hard. When your sin is what brings your burdens, he helps you repent of it. (see Luke 15:13–16; 1 Corinthians 6:11)
- delivers from Satanic oppression. (see Luke 13:11–13)
- gives purpose, so that you carry your load for him. He removes the sense of meaningless toil. You can bear any load when you have a sense of its lasting purpose. (see Romans 8:28; Philippians 2:13)
God really does bear our burdens in a way that changes everything, turning us from weakness to strength, from despair to confidence. When we learn to turn to God to help us with our burdens, we find that we can say with Paul, “I can do all things through him who strengthens me” (Philippians 4:13).
Our way and God’s way
Our way: As the Israelites showed in the desert, fallen people do not want to have to rely on God and trust him day by day.
God’s way: The Lord wants to help us with our burdens, if we will only let him.
Life principle: God bears our burdens as we follow his instructions. God cannot bear the burdens of those who are self-reliant, disobedient, and unbelieving.