Our Burden-Bearer

BEAR in the Bible has at least three meanings, just as it does in English. One is the animal. Another is to bear or produce, as in bear fruit. Another is to bear testimony as supporting evidence for a truth or event. The fourth one describes God’s nature in an assuring way: “to bear or endure something unpleasant or difficult whether on one’s own behalf or on behalf of someone else” or simply to carry a heavy load or burden.

This burden-bearing can be for His own self, such as when people are disobeying His good plan for their lives. He bears their rejection:

Many years you bore with them and warned them by your Spirit through your prophets. Yet they would not give ear. Therefore you gave them into the hand of the peoples of the lands. (Nehemiah 9:30)

However, many passages describe God bearing our burdens, ranging from the problems of life to the greatest burden — sin.

Blessed be the Lord, who daily bears us up; God is our salvation. Selah (Psalm 68:19)

“Listen to me, O house of Jacob, all the remnant of the house of Israel, who have been borne by me from before your birth, carried from the womb; even to your old age I am he, and to gray hairs I will carry you. I have made, and I will bear; I will carry and will save.” (Isaiah 46:3–4)

Surely he (Jesus) has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. (Isaiah 53:4)

In the time of Jesus, demonic oppression and sickness were large burdens. Jesus showed the love of God by bearing or carrying away those burdens:

That evening they brought to him many who were oppressed by demons, and he cast out the spirits with a word and healed all who were sick. This was to fulfill what was spoken by the prophet Isaiah: “He took our illnesses and bore our diseases.” (Matthew 8:16–17)

All the time He was at work, the Holy Spirit was also bearing witness to their inner conscience that Jesus was God with them and telling the truth. This happened before the crucifixion and then afterward as believers needed that inner assurance:

The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, (Romans 8:16)

I am speaking the truth in Christ—I am not lying; my conscience bears me witness in the Holy Spirit— (Romans 9:1)

This helped His people know that He was with them and to remember how to live as He wanted them to live: “Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.” (1 Peter 5:6–7) They did not have the full canon of Scripture with that reminder so the power of the Holy Spirit to bear witness to their spirit was vital in those early days.

Yet this is still a vital truth for us. I can get so burdened about something that I forget God is the one who carries my load. I can forget to take my cares to Him — and need the Holy Spirit to put reminders into my mind. He does this because of the biggest burden carried for me — my guilt and load of sin.

For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified. And the Holy Spirit also bears witness to us; for after saying, “This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my laws on their hearts, and write them on their minds,” then he adds, “I will remember their sins and their lawless deeds no more.” (Hebrews 10:14–17)

That God bore my sin happened because “God so loved the world.” He cares about me; His love endures.

GAZE INTO HIS GLORY. As I think about that enduring love, it becomes easier to love others with the same endurance. He says, “Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things” (1 Corinthians 13:7) and tells me to love Him and those around me with that same kind of love, a love that is willing to give up my desires and plans, maybe even to carry things too heavy for others. If God had not done it, I would not even think of doing it, let alone have His Spirit to enable such burden-bearing.