Mar | 19 | The Burden & The Blessing of All That Extra Weight

Key Word:- OBEY

Title:- The Burden & The Blessing of All That Extra Weight

Matthew 5:41 And whoever compels you to go one mile, go with him two.

‘I pulled into Nazareth, I was feeling about half past dead;
I just needed some place where I can lay my head.
“Hey, mister, can you tell me where a man might find a bed?”
He just grinned and shook my hand, and 'No' was all he said.
Take a load off Fanny,
Take a load for free;
Take a load off Fanny,
And (and) (and) you put the load right on me.’

So goes the opening lines to Jaime ‘Robbie’ Robertson’s famous first song written for ‘The Big Pink Album’ entitled, ‘The Weight.’ Now friends, if you thought the opening lyrics are a bit weird you should have a listen to the rest of them! ‘The Weight,’ is one of those songs where only the writer can begin to unlock what on earth he is talking about! Honestly! It’s worse than deciphering one of Ezekiel’s visions. Fortunately, ‘James Vinney’ has posted some notes from an interview with Mr. Robertson himself, regarding the lyrics of the song where Robertson remarks:

‘When I wrote ‘The Weight’, the first song for ‘Music From Big Pink’, it had a kind of American mythology I was reinventing using my connection to the universal language. The Nazareth in ‘The Weight’ was Nazareth, Pennsylvania. It was a little off-handed - ‘I pulled into Nazareth’. Well I don’t know if the Nazareth that Jesus came from is the kind of place you just ‘pull into,’ but I do know that you pull into Nazareth, Pennsylvania! I’m experimenting with North American mythology. I didn’t mean to take sacred, precious things and turn them into humour. Buñuel did so many films on the impossibility of sainthood. People trying to be good in Viridiana and Nazarin, people trying to do their thing. In ‘The Weight’, it’s the same thing. ….. In Buñuel there were these people trying to be good and it’s impossible to be good. In ‘The Weight’, it was this very simple thing. Someone says, “Listen, would you do me this favour? When you get there will you say hello; to somebody or will you give somebody this or will you pick up one of these for me? Oh? You’re going to Nazareth, that’s where the Martin guitar factory is. Do me a favour when you’re there....” This is what it’s all about. So the guy goes and one thing leads to another and it’s like, ‘holy *!@#,’ what’s this turned into? I’ve only come here to say “hello” for somebody and I’ve got myself in this incredible predicament. It was very Buñuelish to me at the time’

He’s right you know! Helping people is a very risky business. Carry that soldiers load for a mile or two and blow me down, you might just get conscripted. Give that beggar some food and don’t you know it, he and all his mates are going to turn up, unannounced, with their empty bowls, on your doorstep, the very next day, just when your boss is coming round for dinner and you’re up for a promotion! Give $10 to that needy charity for kids with big bellies and even bigger brown eyes and they’re going to spend $150 dollars over the next 20 years emailing you, telephoning you and making your life hell with invitations to ‘further help the needy.’ Put a few ‘bob’ in an aids charity tin, get plastered with a ribbon sticker and have all your mates think you’re gay. Buy a poppy and get your chest punctured buy an old granny with a rusty needle and ‘Parkinson palms’ who’s missed your lapel and taken your fat neck as a button hole, and by the time you’ve wiped the blood away, apologized for shouting in her ear, it’s more time off work and up the local hospital for a tetanus jab! Yup! Helping people can be a very risky business. It's very demanding and once you’ve started, well you never really know when it’s going to stop.


Is helping people really worth all that hassle? Is helping people really worth all that extra burden? Is helping people really worth all that extra weight? Well Jesus says it is and Jesus says you must! When we do, I suppose it is both a burden and a blessing all at the same time. When you do, I suppose this helpful obedience becomes a burden and a blessing all at the same time.

Listen: - “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven; for He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. For if you love those who love you, what reward have you? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? And if you greet your brethren only, what do you do more than others? Do not even the tax collectors do so? Therefore you shall be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect. Matthew 5:43-48
 
Pray: Lord, help me not to draw back from the demands of other people’s needs. Lord, help me not to be overwhelmed in trying to meet those other people’s needs. Lord, give me the where-with-all of time and resources, of wisdom and of strength, of discernment and of decisiveness, to truly help with other people’s needs. In Your great name I ask it, amen!