If you hear yourself say, or think, “I am such a burden,” you are in danger. Your mind will go to dark places, and you begin to develop immunity to the encouragement of other people and and even scripture. You won't believe others when they tell you that you're not a burden. After awhile, nothing anyone can say or do will convince you otherwise.
Those of us who live with pain have to be extra careful about what we allow ourselves to think and dwell on. We have to remember that the Lord has planted us where we are, and expects us to bloom where we've been planted; not shrivel up and die.
I remember when I first had that thought pop into my mind. I was of course, feeling sorry for myself at the time. I had forgotten what a huge pit we fall into when self pity enters the picture. Thankfully for me, having experienced that before, I recognized it and quickly turned to the Lord and His Truth and went to battle. I knew that I was fighting a spiritual battle, not a worldly one, and the only way to deal with that is the way our Lord did - with His Word. I asked the Lord for help, as that's always the first thing to do, and He immediately replied. In my heart I realized that I wasn't really feeling like I was a burden but rather reacting to the fact that I hated needing help period. Yes, truthfully, I was thinking of myself, not others.
Most of us hate needing help. After all, the world has taught us to be independent. They often quote the "God helps those who help themselves" not realizing that that isn't anywhere in the bible and is in fact the total opposite of what God tells us. God doesn't want us to be independent. He wants us to rely on Him and on other members of the body of Christ. Plus, He wants us to rely on Him and the body ALL the time, not just in times of crisis. That's really rare to see today though because it takes a lot of commitment both to the Lord and to the Body of Christ.
One of the first places the Lord asks us to practice this dependence is in our families, even when some members aren't saved. He showed me in His Word how He blesses those people who help others, and actually has special rewards for them in heaven. When I saw that, I realized that by not asking for help, I was keeping people from having the chance to get those rewards. Now that was sure a whole different way of looking at it! Not that any one can earn their salvation. We know that's not true. But we can earn rewards and the Lord wants us to strive for those rewards. So I wasn't helping them or myself by trying to remain independent and not ask for help!
He also reminded me that He uses the various situations we're in to help us grow in our faith. I think we're all aware of that, but what I wasn't looking at was that He would use the fact that I needed others to help me to grow those others faith too. So I was also denying them an opportunity to grow when I didn't ask for or accept help from others. Even worse, as I came to find out, by refusing help in the past, and saying things like, "it's ok, I can do it" or whatever, other people began to be afraid to offer to help because they knew that at best I'd turn it down, and at worst, I might get upset with them..
Part of the problem with needing help is that it tends to make us feel useless. That again is another one of Satan's lies though. We have to remember we're at war and those of us who live with pain are often on the front lines. You and I are far from useless! The Lord has a purpose for us, and we can be sure that purpose will bring Him glory. The problem again is that we tend to still think the way the world does, in that we think that useful people are those who can "do" things, which we can't do anymore. But, if we're honest with ourselves, even if our bodies were completely paralyzed, and we couldn't move at all, we'd still be able to do the most important things Jesus asks of us. The main thing that our Lord constantly spoke about was loving God and loving others, wasn't it?
There is nothing at all stopping us from doing that. In fact, because we've been wounded, we can probably love better then many other people can! No matter how much pain we're in or how sick we are, we can still tell someone we love them. We can still let them know we care. We can still sit or even lay on the couch and just listen while they tell us their troubles. How often people long for someone to do those two things and it never comes to pass, and yet we can do those things all day long! And those are two things the Lord wants us to do above all. Another thing we can always do is pray for others. We can pray aloud for them when they're with us, or just silently when we're alone and prayer is one of the most powerful weapons we have.
Jesus said, I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. (John 15:15) That means that we are guaranteed to bear fruit for the Lord as we rest in Him and love others in His name. You see, our job isn't to be worry about being a burden to others, it's to love them, and to love them the way Jesus loved us. That's one reason that praying for them is always a good place to start. The more love we show toward others, the better we're going to feel about ourselves and others.
Another thing we can do is give thanks no matter what's going on. I don't mean that we should necessarily give thanks for our pain, but rather we can give thanks for God's help and our salvation if nothing else. For God says, 1 Thessalonians 5:18 —give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus. *
Paul knew what it was like to need help too, and he knew all about being in pain, yet listen to what he tells us: 2 Corinthians 12:9 —But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. * Yes, my friends, we're weak, we need help, so let's be like Paul and boast in our weakness and let God's power shine through our lives!
It's also God's will for us that we each be sanctified (1 Thessalonians 4:3) and we are sanctified by His Truth -His Word is Truth. (John 17:17) which means simply that we need to spend time daily in His Word so we'll be able to stand firm against Satan's attacks as well as the attacks of the world and our flesh. That's how Jesus fought back and that's the way we need to as well. We can't do that if we don't know His Word though and if we haven't been renewed with it daily. Once again, even in pain we can still read our bibles, no one can stop us from doing that, and we can still talk to the Lord and think about Him and His Word during the day.
See, when we start thinking we're a burden, we're feeling useless because the world has taught us that our identity is tied up with what we do, but that again isn't true. We are no longer part of the world. Our identity is in Christ, not the world! And you can't get any better identity then to identify with the very Son of the One True God! The world also tells us that we get our identity from what others say about it, but as for us, our identity comes from what God says about us! He says we're clean by the Word He spoke to us. He says we're forgiven and dearly loved by Him. He says that He will complete the work He's begun in us and that we have nothing at all to worry about. Finally,He says that as long as we remain in a close relationship with Him, that He guarantees that we will produce plenty of fruit for God's Kingdom; fruit we produce just by loving Him and loving others the way He loves us. It just doesn't get any better then that! Lastly, the world tells us that our behavior tells us what to believe about ourselves, but God tells us that our thoughts determine our behavior and that we can be in control of our thoughts. Not only that we can be in control of them, but that we are supposed to be in control of them!
Our belief that we're a burden won't leave on its own. We need a
counter-offensive. We need to remind ourselves what God says about us and that we're exactly where we need to be right now. We need to start loving and remembering that God loves us and will help us every day. Yes, we're weak, so let's rejoice in our weakness for that's when God's strength and power are made perfect and can shine through us to the world! Let's stand firm together against that idea that we're a burden and remind ourselves and each other that we are sons and daughters of God, specifically chosen by Him, and made new by Him, and that He continues to work in us and in our lives every single day.
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