I could feel my heart grow heavier with each prayer request shared. This is what “bearing one another’s burdens feels like, I thought. We call them “burdens” for a reason – they are heavy. Prayer requests are not to be taken lightly. (pun intended) Burdens by definition are heavy – they weigh on us, they weigh us down and they wear us out. Unimaginable – the things people I know and love are going through on a daily basis. We are broken people living in a broken world. No wonder the journey is so hard. But there is hope for each and everyone of us. And as preposterously unlikely as it may sound, there is also joy in this journey. It just depends on who is journeying with you. Jesus said,

“Come to Me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.” (Matthew 11:28-30)

A light burden. Now that’s an oxymoron if ever there was one. Nevertheless, that’s what Jesus promised us when we come to Him with our burdens. We are invited to exchange the yoke of this world, which is heavy, harmful, confining, suffocating, disabling and deceiving and take His yoke instead, which Jesus said is “easy” and His burden “light.” Seems too good to be true but Jesus promised rest for our souls. That’s the kind of rest that this world just cannot give us. The world gives us chaos and conflict. Jesus offers us peace and the promise of His presence with us while we are experiencing trials.

Jesus was with His disciples in the boat during the storm. He was with Daniel’s three friends while they were in the king’s overheated furnace. He was with the Israelites during their desert wanderings. And Jesus is with you and me too, through each and every trial and trouble that we face. He is with us and He’s helping us carry our heavy loads.

“Praise be to the Lord, to God our Savior, who daily bears our burdens.” (Psalm 68:19)

Maybe that’s why Jesus said “My burden is light” – He’s the One doing the heavy lifting for me! And the pain and pressure He does allow into my life, He uses to accomplish His good purposes for me. Paul says –

“For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.” (2 Corinthians 4:17)

I am reminded of diamonds and pearls. Both are considered valuable and beautiful. But both of them are created out of intense pressure, pain and in the case of diamonds, intense heat. Difficult circumstances produce in us an eternal glory, conforming us more closely to the image of Christ. God uses the pains and pressures of this life to perfect us into the people He created us to be in the first place – people of infinite value and beauty – just like the diamonds and pearls He created from atoms of carbon and grains of sand.

Only God makes diamonds from carbon atoms and pearls from grains of sand. Beauty from ashes. Beauty from pain, pressure and intense heat. Beauty from bearing life’s burdens. These are God’s good and miraculous gifts.

“He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end.” (Ecclesiastes 3:11)

The journey from carbon to diamond or sand to pearl is a painful, slow-paced process, but in the end God brings forth something of beauty and value – diamonds and pearls – you and me! Job, the poster child for suffering, understood this truth of pain producing in us something both beautiful and valuable. Job said,

“But He (God) knows the way that I take; when He has tested me, I will come forth as gold.” (Job 23:10)

Job trusted God to eventually, in His perfect timing, bring beauty from the ashes that were all that was left of Job’s former life. You and I, dear readers, can trust God to do the same for us. God is turning each one of us into diamonds, pearls and gold as we follow after Him day after day, one day at a time.

“And the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will Himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast. To Him be the power for ever and ever. Amen.” (1 Peter 5:10-11)

sincerely, Grace Day