Hey…and yes…I should be asleep. But I’m not! So, continue reading…..
Mmmkay…..I carry a rather large purse…like, a luggage sized bag (almost, maybe a nice sized carry on….don’t judge). Yes, I own it…I love it…I put all kinds of stuff in there…ALL KINDS. It gets heavy sometimes, but I just kinda shift stuff around until I can comfortably carry it again. Well, earlier today (uh…yesterday), I was at Target (don’t ask) and I saw this smaller purse, like MUCH smaller. It was maybe 1/6 the size of my current bag. I thought it was kinda cute and I bought it (cause it was on clearance). I got home and began trying to narrow down what I would fit inside of this MUCH smaller bag. It got to the point where I couldn’t decide what would be left behind and what items would make the cut so, I did what any large purse toting lady would do…..I GAVE UP! I began putting my stuff back in my big purse, stuffed the paper back in that Target toy, and gave up!
As I sat on my bed, surrounded by my awesome items, I heard God say, “Do you REALLY NEED all of that STUFF???” Now, Him being God, I’m sure He’d already decided that I didn’t, but in my mind, I DO…..well, okay, I could potentially need any of those items at any given time. And you know what, He decided that wasn’t a good enough answer. Now, I knew in H
What does my extra crap problem have to do with you??? Well you see, often, we carry around STUFF “just in case” we need it, and not necessarily because we actually will. We carry around guilt in case we need to apologize AGAIN. We carry around our wall, in case we need to keep somebody out of our lives. We even carry around hate, in case someone does us wrong, AGAIN. We carry around envy, in case someone gets that thing we wanted after we’ve already “prayed” about it.
Unnecessary burdens fill our bags and we carry them around like a badge of honor, explaining to people why we ‘are the way we are’ and can’t change. Some of the “stuff” we carry around, we don’t even notice is there for weeks, months, even years at a time, until someone does something that reminds us that it’s there, in the left zipper compartment behind the button. We write it off as “it’s just who I am” and expect others to do the same. So many times, we get to the place where this weight gets TOO HEAVY, but we just kinda shift it around until we can carry without “noticing” it again. This is definitely NOT what God intended for us to do. So much stuff we hold on to isn’t ours to carry around.
We must learn when enough is enough and too much is just TOO MUCH! Those things that you are holding on to are burdens. Hate, guilt, envy, are things that we allow to burden us and hold on to us. Psalms 55:22 says, “Cast thy burden upon the Lord, and he shall sustain thee: he shall never suffer the righteous to be moved.” In the NLT Bible, it says, “Give your burdens to the Lord, and he will take care of you. He will not permit the godly to slip and fall.” These weights cause us to fall! We fall into depression, temptation, and other things that are not pleasing to God. In Matthew 11:28, Jesus tells us to “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” He wants us to rest in Him and allow Him the opp