One of my favorite all time albums is Abbey Road by the Beatles, especially the medley of songs that MUST be played all together whenever it is started. I remember in High School listening to it on headphones on my dad's record player (by that point it was a novelty, Tapes and CDs had taken over), and just closing my eyes and listening. At the time, I didn't know I was being drawn to Christ through some of the lyrics, especially "Boy, you're going to carry that weight a long time."
And I did. I was trying to have God on my own terms. I was defining good and evil for myself. and by the time I hit my mid early 20s, I was on the verge of taking my own life because the weight of what I was trying to carry was too great for me to bear. At the cliffside where I was going to attempt to take my own life, I was given a choice: bear the weight of my sin for all eternity, or give it to Christ, who had already paid for it. All my choices: sexual conquest, rebellion, anxiety, depression, every bit of it had to be completely and freely surrendered. I chose surrender.
While I am not perfect, I still sin and I still make many mistakes, I am free from the burden. I seek to be free of sin, though I still stumble in many ways, because I look to Christ who has made me free. I do not excuse my sin, and I seek to overcome through Christ who overcame for our sake. Loved ones, sin is a burden, one that crushes us to the point of death. It's why we're restless, it's why we struggle, it's why we don't have peace. But in Christ, there is peace. In Christ, He bears the weight because He is able, and He paid the penalty of it. In Christ, we're not free to sin, but we're free from it. It is for freedom that He has set us free, so let us walk in freedom!
Colossians 1:3-29
We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints, because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. Of this you have heard before in the word of the truth, the gospel, which has come to you, as indeed in the whole world it is bearing fruit and increasing—as it also does among you, since the day you heard it and understood the grace of God in truth, just as you learned it from Epaphras our beloved fellow servant. He is a faithful minister of Christ on your behalf and has made known to us your love in the Spirit.
And so, from the day we heard, we have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him: bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God; being strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy; giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light. He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.
He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.
And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him, if indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard, which has been proclaimed in all creation under heaven, and of which I, Paul, became a minister.
Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church, of which I became a minister according to the stewardship from God that was given to me for you, to make the word of God fully known, the mystery hidden for ages and generations but now revealed to his saints. To them God chose to make known how great among the Gentiles are the riches of the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ. For this I toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me.
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