Not just another blister

Lee Iacocca once said, "Trouble shared is trouble halved."  I have to say "half of the trouble" is still way more trouble than I really want to bear at any given moment!  It is a nice sentiment to "share" my trouble so I am now only dealing with half the trouble, but it isn't the answer we really need or want. We most likely want someone to carry ALL the trouble away - like the old commercial said, "Calgon, take me away!" We want to "deal" with the trouble by turning it over to someone else entirely, thereby putting the burden to "deal with it" squarely on their shoulders!  Wilma Rudolph said, "When the sun is shining, I can do anything; no mountain is too high, no trouble too difficult to overcome."  I think the truth is really when the SON is shining deeply in our lives, given the right place of priority in our hearts, we CAN do anything - no mountain is grander than we can scale together, no trouble bigger than his ability to overcome.

Let every king on earth bow down before him and every nation be in his service. For he will rescue the needy when they ask for help!  He will save the burdened and come to the aid of those who have no other help.  He offers compassion to the weak and the poor; he will help and protect the lives of the needy!  (Psalm 72:11-13 VOICE)

I like what Teddy Roosevelt said:  "If you could kick the person on the pants responsible for most of your trouble, you wouldn't sit for a month."  There is quite a bit of truth to that one, my friends!  Our "trouble" isn't usually someone else's doing - it is rooted in something we were or weren't doing which brought upon us the trouble we are experiencing today.  Yes, there are times when trouble comes our way without us ever doing anything to "get ourselves into that trouble", but in most cases, we are walking right into it without even noticing!

As we make choices in life, decisions which sometimes err on the side of not being the best to those which clearly land in the court of "right on", we don't do it in a vacuum.  We impact the lives of many around us by each and every choice we make and those choices sometimes create a bit more trouble for the "other guy" than we'd like to admit.  The truth is that we ALL stand in need at one time or another - either because of the choices we made, or the impact of the choices of another.  We cannot escape "need" - it is part of living. The issue comes in admitting we "need" anyone else to deal with the issue at hand!

Pride often keeps us from "handing off" those things in life we weren't meant to bear alone.  We try and try again because we just cannot admit to our need.  The only problem with this stubborn determination to bear things all on our own is that we often don't realize the increasing pressure of the burden until it has done damage.  I wore sandals one time to walk around Disneyland.  Now, they were good sandals - the kind you can hike in.  I felt a little rubbing across the top of my foot as we walked and walked from one attraction to another.  I knew there was going to be a blister.  What I wasn't willing to do was admit I needed to shed those sandals!  So, by the end of the day, I was left not with a blister, but a crater of sorts in the top of my foot!

Take a lesson here - the more we "bear with" whatever it is giving us the "rub" in life, the more we are likely to be impacted by that thing!  There are things we just need to "shed" - to be rid of - in order to be free from their further impacting our lives in a negative way.  Those are things we likely call "burdensome" things.  It may be a task way too large for us to handle alone, or the mounting financial troubles we are experiencing.  It doesn't matter what it is, the way out from under the burden is not to "half" it!  It is to squarely rid ourselves of it by placing it on the shoulders of the one who wants to bear it on HIS shoulders.  I haven't worn those sandals again - but I still bear a faint mark as a reminder of wearing them way too long in the first place! Think on that one a little and you will realize we ALL bear things beyond the point we really should.  Just sayin!