Carrying Loads that seem to heavy – Thoughts from the Edges –

Carrying Loads
Pastor Calvin Cook
August 27, 2025
Psalm 55:22 Cast your burden on the Lord, and he will sustain you; he will never permit the righteous to be moved.

Thinking today about carrying loads, burdens, heaviness, and everything whether it be dealing with anxiety, disfunction, personalities, division, confrontations and everything else that we deal with on a daily basis.

All of us are carrying some type of a burden, whether it be our own or someone else. Regardless of whatever it may be. I recently was with one of my Amish friends looking over his Belgian horse. My friend was sharing the one particular horse was extra strong and did not hesitate even when the job or load was heavier. While the other horses seemed to struggle this one horse carried the load with ease. Maybe like horses sometimes, it is easy to put up that image that the load is easy and the burden is light.

Maybe there are times when the burden becomes so heavy that we give up, quit, or look for something to help us. The important part is what you will look to for help.

The hymn “What a Friend We Have In Jesus” is speaking to my heart this morning as I write these words. The first verse goes like this: “What a friend we have in Jesus, all our sins and griefs to bear! What a privilege to carry everything to God in prayer! O what peace we often forfeit, O what needless pain we bear, all because we do not carry everything to God in prayer!”

There are some things in life we can do nothing about. I admit that. But I also know how we deal with it will bring peace or anguish. I remember my 9th grade Civics teacher, that when a student raised their voice at him, he would just smile. Often you would see him later in deep conversation with the same person, and it seemed that the next day everything was OK between the two.

I believe that will be how it is when we carry our burdens to Jesus in prayer. Jesus will wrap His arms around us and say “It will be OK” but I also believe Jesus will gently remind us that we must change the situation that got us to that place of anguish or situation and never return. That is what redemption looks like.

I hope and pray that we can turn it all over to Jesus to seek the way out and find in the midst of the situation a new peace that is above and beyond all that we have ever known before.

For more on carrying burdens, being pursued, or feeling beat down, I would encourage you to read and pray through Psalm 55.