Bearing One Another's Burdens

The fellowship is not a contemplative gathering of friends discussing beautiful ideas. It is a community bound together by practices of mutual care.

Paul writes to the Galatians:

Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself, lest you too be tempted. Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ. (Galatians 6:1-2)

The fellowship is a place where we acknowledge our weakness and invite others to carry us.

This is counter to almost everything our culture teaches.

Our world celebrates self-reliance. We are told that needing help is a sign of weakness. We hide our struggles because we fear judgment. But the church is supposed to be different. It is a fellowship precisely because we do not pretend to be capable of managing life alone. We admit our struggles. We ask for help. We carry burdens that are not our own.

James asks the question directly.

What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him? If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, "Go in peace, be warmed and filled," without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that? So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead. (James 2:14-17)

The question is brutal and direct. If you see someone in your church suffering and do nothing, your faith is not behaving like genuine faith.

This care takes concrete forms.

Hospitality is a spiritual discipline in Scripture. The writer of Hebrews commands, "Let brotherly love continue. Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares" (Hebrews 13:1-2). To show hospitality is to recognize that the stranger might be Christ, that those in need are our brothers and sisters.

Service in the fellowship is not hierarchical. Jesus said that whoever wants to be great must become a servant. The pattern is set by Jesus Himself, who took off His outer clothes, wrapped a towel around His waist, and washed the disciples' feet. He was the Teacher, the Lord, the Master. And He served. He established a culture in which the highest honor belongs to the one who is willing to be lowest.

Care for the vulnerable is built into the church's earliest structure. When the apostles found themselves unable to distribute aid to widows because it was taking away from their ministry of prayer and teaching, they set apart seven men "full of the Spirit and of wisdom" to manage the relief work (Acts 6:1-6). This shows that caring for the vulnerable is not secondary to the gospel. It is an integral part of how the church embodies the gospel.

Romans 12 extends the call.

Contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality. Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them. Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep. Live in harmony with one another. Do not be haughty, but associate with the lowly. (Romans 12:13-16)

Notice the breadth. We are to share our resources. To open our homes. To weep with those who weep, not when it is convenient but as a spiritual practice.

When you participate in practices of hospitality and service, you are not merely being kind. You are enacting the gospel. You are showing what it means that Christ emptied Himself and became obedient unto death. You are demonstrating that the fellowship is not a social club for people who have it all together. It is a community bound together by grace, where the strong carry the weak and all of us look to Christ for strength.

A practical question.

Whose burden in your Mayflower family could you help carry this week? Who in your small group, your prayer chain, your row on Sunday morning, has a need you have heard about and not acted on?

A meal. A text. A ride. A visit. A real conversation. None of it is glamorous. All of it is the law of Christ.