Whats in your Back Pack?
I want to relate a story to you that was once told to me and I hope I do it justice. It turned on a light bulb for me and made a difference in the problems I choose to do battle with. Actually I believe I heard it on a Paula White TV Broadcast years ago. So that is where I will give credit to. I'll pray I'm right and that she doesn't mind. It's too good not to be retold.
Each day all of us have a certain number of things that we must do. We have a certain number of problems or situations we must navigate through. Picture if you will, that as you begin your day you are outfitted with a strong backpack, laced securely around your shoulders in which you will carry the days events, problems and responsibilities. Now imagine that each of your daily responsibilities are small bricks that weigh about a half pound each.
For everything you must do or deal with today we will add a brick to the back pack.
We'll add a brick to represent the everyday tasks, of just getting up and around, getting ready for work and seeing to the breakfast, clothes, ect that prepare you for your day. Add another brick of responsibility for that job you have to go to, and that includes the job of "just being a Mom"! In fact I would probably add a couple extra bricks for that one!
Pretty light so far. You can handle that and carry your back pack without any trouble. Add now more bricks for the school that calls and you are elected, probably without your knowledge to head up the class fund raiser, head the PTA, or supervise the next field trip. If your at work, I'm sure you will recognize a whole stack of bricks that represent many problems that come at you from every direction. The boss makes demands, your co-workers make demands ect. All new problems that you take on wheat her they are your responsibility or not.
It's storming outside and the traffic is horrendous. Your running late now and the kids are waiting to be picked up. Who's doing dinner? It's fast food again? How can we afford this. The TV blew! Where's the money coming from? Bills to pay, stops to make. Your phone rings how many times a day with those requests for "little favors" from dear friends and loved ones. Are you getting the picture? Your picking up bricks faster than you can toss em in the sack now. And it's getting heavier.
Your growing tired and a little bent over now from the weight, but if your anything like me, you haven't even started yet. Your husband/wife come in and has had a horrible day. They are in a bad mood, dumping on you and adding more bricks of stress to your already crowded sack.
Your child got in trouble at school today and tosses you the suspension note.... Another brick or maybe several drops in your sack and your no longer the only one tossing in those bricks. Worse, we often turn around to find that someone has just tossed their whole back sack onto your shoulders and disappeared while your knees are buckling under the weight.
I won't go any further, I hope your getting the picture here. Take a look at your own sack. How many of the bricks in there belong to you? How many of them could be given up to God, or back to the person that put them in there to start with? Should someone else's's anger be your stress to carry? Are you really responsible to carry the brick of consequence for even your own child's choices?
Trying to carry your own bricks, as well as everyone else's, will eventually break your back. Many of those bricks probably representing a large number of problems or situations that you can't solve or change anyway, even if you wanted to, so why do we collapse under the weight of what does not belong to us in the first place?
Everyone of course has their own back sack to carry and their own daily load of bricks to put in it. One of my favorite things to say anymore is...... "Not my brick or not my back sack!" In my own personal life it has consisted mostly of forcing my children to carry their own bricks! Probably not too much different than most Mom's, we tend to want to lighten their load so much that we break under the wieght of both our own and theirs. And truth be said, in the end we haven't done them any favors by taking on what rightfully belongs to them.
All that said, there are certainly times when we do need to help others carry especially heavy bricks. We are in fact instructed by God to reach out and help our sisters and brothers in Christ. However, helping to carry a heavy load for a short while is not something that will break your back. It is the bricks that are left with you, for you alone to deal with that will bring you to your knees.
These kinds of bricks are most often only carried for a short while with the goal being to make the load light enough that the owner can again carry the sack themselves.
Go over the bricks in your sack and determine:
Is it truely your brick to carry?
Does this brick rightfully belong to someone else? Your mate, your child, your friend, or family member?
Is this a brick that only God can handle and therefore shouldn't be in anyone's sack to start with?
Start dividing your bricks, and refusing bricks that aren't yours and you'll find your load much easier to bear!
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