The blessing of a burden

The blessing of a burden

Sometimes wisdom doesn't need extravagant words in poetic lines. Sometimes it doesn’t need the illustrations of examples or the colors of creative writing.
Sometimes wisdom is beautiful enough to be its own masterpiece.
 So let me share with you one of the eye-openers I received while staring in the eyes of Wisdom.

Every blessing has a burden and every burden has a blessing.
Every revelation has a responsibility and every responsibility has a revelation.

Let me unpack this gift of two sentences for you. Every blessing has a burden, because every blessing needs to be stewarded, used for the right purpose and protected in order to keep it. We often long for the blessings, but are not willing or able to take up the burdens. We often received blessings, but neglected the attached burdens by not using it as it was meant to be. A lot of blessings give us the ability to help others, so with an increase of blessing we also experience an increase of the demand for help. Add to that the responsibility of stewarding a blessing. Stewarding a blessing can look like being thankful for it, protecting it, treasuring it, sharing it or recording it. Are we willing to bear the burden of a blessing?

Every burden has a blessing, because the burden releases the blessing attached to it. Most people are not willing to carry any burden of people because they fail to see the blessing that’s attached to it. For example, intercession is a way of carrying someone’s burden, because you pray for a problem that’s not directly affecting you. The breakthroughs of the people we prayed for, are also written down on our account as our ‘fruit’ or ‘harvest’, as we call it in beautiful Christianees. When we would really realize this, we would be more willing to bear burdens. I don’t say that the reward should be your first motive, because there’s just something beautiful in sharing a burden with someone, because you look like the One who took the whole world on His shoulders only for the sake of Love. But I do say that there’s a reward of carrying burdens together with people. 

In the Christmas break, God put on my heart to pray for the students of my school that they won’t sit down and take ‘a break from God’ while they were at home, but would keep running after more of Him. While I was praying for this, He showed me that every student who gets up and started running again because of my prayer, will give me personally extra speed and strength to run even harder in my own life. This is just an example of the blessing of bearing a burden. Another one could be in the area of finances. I always had a hard time asking people for money, especially because I’m used to taking care of myself. But since I’m dependent on the donations of people for my mission trip, I learned that I’m robbing others from their opportunity of being blessed by not asking to carry my financial burden with them. Read that sentence again. You rob people of their opportunity of sharing in your blessing by not asking them for help in bearing your burden. I’ve been amazingly privileged with this chance of going to Nicaragua to love on the poorest of the poor. This trip will have a harvest that many others would love to see in their own lives, but they don’t have a chance to go. But like Bill Johnson says: “If you can’t go, send”. By giving people the chance of sending me, I let them be a part of my trip and it will make the harvest of my trip also a harvest of their lives! This new perspective on giving has both stirred up a humility to ask for help and a generosity to give in my heart, both two things that I was rather unfamiliar with before.

I can’t write about burdens without quoting Wisdom Himself: “My burden is light and my yoke is easy.” Burdens given by God are never heavier than we can carry. Yokes were always carried by two oxen, and the strongest ox carried the heaviest part. That’s why Jesus’ burden is light, because He’s carrying it with us and is actually carrying the heaviest part. It’s a privilege to share His burden, because it gives us direction on our path and a deeper level of friendship as we work together. The only burden we are meant to carry with Him is the burden of love. Let’s never refuse a blessing because we’re afraid of the burden, because every burden comes with the blessing of an increase in strength to develop the ability to carry it.

Every revelation has a responsibility, because being aware of something makes you accountable for your response. If you are walking over a bridge and there’s someone almost drowning underneath it, are you responsible for it? That depends on whether or not you’ve seen or heard the person drown. If not, than it was not your responsibility, because the problem was not revealed to you. But if you did hear that person cry out for help and you chose to ignore it, you are responsible for the cause. It’s the same with spiritual revelations. If you have a revelation that something is wrong and you still do it, you’re responsible for it. When you did the exact same thing before you knew it was wrong, it was not your fault, but a consequence of lack of knowledge of truth. There for, knowledge is somewhat dangerous and wisdom somewhat demanding, because you’re responsible to act according to what you know and experienced. But both knowledge and wisdom are priceless treasures whose value goes far beyond the price that is paid for it. In every revelation lays the wisdom in how to deal with the responsibility.

Every responsibility has a revelation, because when you choose to make yourself responsible for something, you position yourself to be given the revelations you need in order to take care of your responsibility. The same principle as the burdens and the blessings applies here. The President of the United States gets insight into the most important cases of the country and meets with the most influential leaders all around the world, because he embraced his responsibility to take care of America. Doors are opened to the people who are taking the risk to enter the hallway of responsibility.

Burdens and blessings, responsibilities and revelations. I’m absolutely not trying to communicate that you should never ask for a blessing or revelation anymore, because of the burdens and responsibilities that are attached to it. Just like I said, any blessing always outweighs the attached burden. I want to help you receive those blessings and revelations, because I’ve seen in both my life and in the lives of people around me two big hindrances for receive blessings. The first is a lack of knowledge about the preparations and stewardship that are asked of you when receiving a blessing. The second is a fear of bearing any burden, which hinders a lot of blessings to come. 

Let me end with the truth that is more true than anything that I just wrote: blessings and revelations are gifts of a good Daddy God, which can’t be earned, but are given in grace. There’s no striving into blessing. A teachable spirit always keeps learning and a childlike heart always keeps receiving.

©ElineMillenaar