Five Secrets of a God Girl
Here’s my basket of rocks that illustrate how I have been trying to carry too much. Too many burdens I was not meant or asked to carry.
They are big and small and not mine.
Why do I keep piling on the burdens I was not meant to carry? What is it going to take for me to stop being everyone’s ‘need meeter’? What is it in me that makes me want to be ‘necessary’ in everyone’s lives?
Gave a talk at our Women’s Retreat about 5 Secrets of a God Girl. Here they are:
Secret One: We Need Each Other
We needed you when our little Brooklyn Claire was born at 1 pound 4 ounces and in the NICU for over four months.
Secret Two: We Are To Carry Burdens
The law of Christian love is to love others as ourselves and to show love to others. Scripture instructs us to:
Carry one another’s burdens and in this way you will fulfill…[the law of Christian love].
Galatians 6:2 AMP
But…the word burdens here in this passage means to lighten someone’s load and that is key to understanding how to live out this passage so that we aren’t carrying too many burdens we were not meant to carry.
You all lightened our load through your prayers, your love, through meeting our physical needs and through your support of our family.
Secret Three: We Are Carrying Too Much
But…our burden was not your burden to carry.
When we take on that role we are thwarting the person’s spiritual growth and picking their spiritual fruit.
It’s wrong for me to expect someone else to be the mother in my family. That is a privilege and burden that God gave me to bear. Taking on burdens I am not meant to carry is like being someone else’s momma that God didn’t mean for me to be!
God did not create us to be the need-meeter in someone else’s life!
Why? Because then that person does not need God.
Secret Four: How Do We Carry Burdens?
So then if we are to carry one another’s burden, how do we come alongside others to lighten their load and not carry their burden?
We have to make an internal shift in our brains to not solve their problem for them, but to involve them to solve their own problems. Listening, asking open-ended questions and giving encouragement are how we lighten their load. Involving them to solve their own issue or burden will not rob them of the spiritual fruit that God has for them as they are going through their burden.
And we have to point them to Jesus. The one who says to come to Him.
Secret Five: There is Only One Savior and He is Enough!
“Come to Me all who are weary and burdened and I will give you rest.”
Matthew 11:28 HCSB
This is our invitation to come. It is open to all of us who are burdened down and exhausted from trying to carry too much.
When we come to Christ by faith, He gives us rest.
When we submit to Christ, we are yoked to Him.
For my yoke is easy and my burden is light
Matthew 11:30 ESV
He has just the yoke that is tailor made for our lives and our needs…and the burden of doing His will is not a heavy one!
We have to resist the temptation to be the Savior to another person!
Our neediness/co-dependency or whatever you want to call it to be someone else’s ‘need-meeter’ has to stop.
And, we have to stop making ourselves necessary in someone else’s life! For their sake and ours.
Lay down your burdens and let Jesus carry you!
He knows, He knows
Let your burdens come undone
Lift your eyes up to the one
Who knows, He knows
He Knows, Jeremy Camp 2015
I appreciated your talk at the retreat and this was a good refresher as trials come and I want to fix everything. I am asking the Lord how I can lighten the load for others but leaving the worrying, fixing, and all the rest with Jesus!
So glad you came to the retreat! As I said that night, I have to learn how to do this myself and I am thankful, too, for the reminder to come to Jesus for His rest.