Bear ye one another's burdens,
and so you shall fulfil the law of Christ.
—Epistle of the Day.
The law of Christ, dear brethren, is essentially a law of charity. "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole soul and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind, and thy neighbor as thyself." This is the whole law of Christ summed up, and it is plain that this is a law of love. But the Apostle bids us bear one another's burdens that we may fulfil this law, which, as is evident from the text just quoted, imposes upon us the love of our God and of our neighbor. How, then, will the bearing of others burdens help us to serve God better?
That we have burdens, and some of us rather heavy ones, is clear enough; and that most of us are only too willing to have some one help us to carry them will be, I think, generally agreed to. Every one has his own difficulties; every one has something which he would like to get rid of if he could, because it interferes with his comfort. Now, I do not think the Apostle wished us to suppose from his words that God would have us free each other from all suffering, since that is not possible, as we know that hardship forms a necessary part of our probation. We must expect to have something to suffer always.
But what he would have us do, it seems to me, is to help each other by counsel and material aid, to make what otherwise might be almost unbearable easier to carry. "My yoke is sweet and my burden light." This is the spirit he wishes us to strive after. It is an unselfish spirit he desires for us, such as will make us forget our own sufferings in ministering to the wants of others. He wants us to cultivate charity; to look beyond ourselves and our own interests, and take up the troubles of our brethren.
But you say to me: "I do not see what advantage there is in all this; if I take another's burden, I am but adding to my own." It is just here that our really helping each other appears. It is by this very assistance we give our neighbor that we fulfil the law of Christ, which demands suffering of us. For by our sympathizing with others and sharing in their difficulties our own burdens become lighter. If we simply took care of ourselves and were forgetful of all the rest of the world, we would chafe beneath our load; we would be so wrapped up in ourselves that nothing could persuade us that our sufferings were the very best things that could befall us.
By helping our neighbor we help ourselves. We are led to be reconciled to our lot, to expect nothing more from God for ourselves than what we see others getting. We know that they have as just a claim upon him as we, yet they have their troubles as well as we. The road to heaven is open to all, but all must take what they get as they go along, and be thankful for it and make no comparisons. All get a goodly share of what is disagreeable to nature on the way; our own portion differs only in kind and quantity from that of others.
By helping our neighbor, too, we fulfil, as the Apostle tells us, the law of Christ, for the law of Christ is charity—love towards God, love towards our fellow-man. Our stooping to our neighbor's need fosters God's love in our souls no less than love of our neighbor. It makes us go to God as our Father and recognize his justice. We perceive the necessity of mortifying our rebellious appetites and placing ourselves entirely in God's hands. How much happier, how much better Christians we would be did we but bear each other's burdens! Then we would soon learn what now seems so hard: that the yoke of Christ is indeed sweet and his burden truly light.