A burden too great

On a particularly hard day a couple of weeks ago, I saw on Facebook that one of our dear kids from the Monroe block had gotten shot in Rogers Park.  I was already processing one of our block teens finding out she was pregnant and another having been arrested.  I had tried several times to meet up with a different neighbor kid to enroll her in college classes and she hadn't shown up.   Now this.  I was so relieved to hear that the shot to his back did no permanent damage, but heartbroken to read that one of the kids he had been with was killed in the incident.

As I searched news articles to try and find out what exactly had happened, I stumbled across an article about the basketball coach from Marshall High School (across from our first house) that was also shot only a week or so earlier.  He was now paralyzed, having used his body to shield his 16 year old daughter as they drove to school.  What hit me like a knife to the heart was the article's picture of the 21 year old that had shot him - just a kid.  With blank eyes, it was as if he was reflecting his own paralyzed state back to me - a paralyzed heart.   I just held that picture to my chest and sobbed.  I cried for my kids, for the coach - and for this young man, who at such a young age had no regard for his own precious, God-given life.

Over a cup of coffee the next morning (quite puffy eyed), I revisited Genesis 1-3.  These are some of my favorite passages in the Bible and have been foundational in my faith and my understanding of God and our human state for some time now.  As I read, I felt God gently speaking comfort over me.   To Adam and Eve, the knowledge of good and evil was a tempting fruit but to God, it meant death.  "If you eat from it, you will surely die!" He declares to them early on.  It meant death because He knew it would give humanity a burden too great for them to bear.   They chose not to listen, and now this burden has been passed down since that very first sin, crushing people under its weight, generation after generation.  We are weak, and God knows that our response to evil will be evil, because sin has given us a tainted view, a tainted knowledge of good and evil.  God, however, can bear the burden, and is the only One that can respond to evil with good. The only time that Jesus asks us to be perfect "like our heavenly Father is perfect", is when He is asking us to love like God does.  Matthew 5:43-47 says "You have heard that it was said, 'Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven.  He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.  If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that?  And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect."  

When evil is done to us, we will naturally respond with evil, because we cannot bear the weight of the knowledge of good and evil that we have been given.  The young man who shot the coach - he was just responding to the weight of all the evil that had been done to him.  The poverty, violence, struggle. He was being crushed under a burden too great for him to bear.

This is why Christ came - to be the strength of God in us.  To give us a solution to the weight we carry and enable us to be perfect like our Heavenly Father is perfect...helping us repay good for evil, love for hatred, Light for Darkness.  Trading our burden for His.  "Come to me all you who are weary and burdened" He says "...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." 

and then, God...

gave me rest for my soul.  Thank you, Jesus.