A poker face, a robust sense of humor, and a securely restrained tongue.  These are the go-to tools in the caregiver’s toolbox.  Caregiving is not for the faint of heart.   It costs, big-time!   No day is ever what you expect.   Just when you think you have a routine, the unexpected occurs.  And the routine is shattered.  The feeling of always being ‘on’ is draining.  Even the small respites are rarely sufficient. 

Caregiving is a physical, emotional, and spiritual roller coaster.   Yet, we give care because we love someone.   Those we care for are never just “recipients.”  We care for them because we love them, or because they have loved us, or because we have compassion for their needs. 

Caregivers speak often of relational and professional boundaries.   And those are, of course, critical.  But the reality is that when you love someone, “boundaries” are hard to maintain, mirky and mutable.  At some tangible physical, spiritual, and emotional level their crisis becomes ours. Their pain becomes ours.   Their sorrow becomes ours.  Their grief becomes ours.  Their frailty becomes ours.   We own it.  We wear it.  And it wears on us.  Like Frodo’s burden, with every step it gets heavier.

But there is one who bears us as we bear our beloved burden.  The Lord who tells us to cast our cares upon Him for He cares for us.   The prophet Isaiah declares.

 “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

And in speaking of Christ, Isaiah goes on to write

Surely he has borne our griefs
    and carried our sorrows;
yet we esteemed him stricken,
    smitten by God, and afflicted.
But he was pierced for our transgressions;
    he was crushed for our iniquities;
upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,
    and with his wounds we are healed. -Isaiah 53:3-5

The weight of compassion and caregiving often seems unbearable, but how much more was the weight of our grief and sorrow and sin, upon the sinless Son of God, the Lord Jesus?  Yet he bore it all.  He carried every grief, sorrow and sin. 

Mark’s Gospel moves quickly.  Story after story is introduced with the word ‘immediately.’   The first chapter takes us from the ministry of John the Baptists, through Jesus’ baptism and temptation, the calling of the first disciples and the inauguration of his public ministry at Capernaum.  Demons are cast out, the sick are healed, and the good news of the kingdom is proclaimed.   The King of Glory, the Lord strong and mighty, the Lord, mighty in battle has come in.  He is destroying the works of the devil.  He is binding the strong man.  He is liberating the captives of sin from the dominion of darkness and calling them into the kingdom of the beloved Son.

As Mark’s first chapter closes, we see Jesus working late into the night, exercising care and compassion for the people’s earthly griefs, sorrows and sicknesses.  Then we see him rise long before dawn for prayer.  The Lord Jesus’ care goes much further than broken fevers, silenced demons, and cleansed lepers.   As weighty and exhausting as Jesus’ caregiving appears in this passage, he is quick to remind us, along with his disciples, that He came not just to mitigate the symptoms of life in a fallen world, but to effect the cure.

We read in Matthew’s gospel.

Jesus went throughout all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom and healing every disease and every affliction. When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.  Matthew 9:35-37

As devastating as fevers, demons, and isolating contagion are, we all face a more disastrous condition.  The Fall plunged us into an estate of sin and misery which has stripped us of any original righteousness and corrupted our whole nature.  Consequently, we lost communion with God, are under His wrath and curse, and made liable to all the miseries of this life, to death itself and to the pains of hell forever. 

Yet the mighty One, the Lord Jesus, who with a word rebukes fevers, casts out demons, and cleanses what no physician would attempt, has come reverse the Fall and rescue us from sin, death, and hell.  And to give us abundant and eternal life!   That is good news indeed.  Have you heard it?  Have you believed it?  Have you received it?

Join us as we examine Mark 1:29-45 and consider how Jesus has come with compassion and authority to restore those who are harassed and helpless by the ravages of the Fall.  We meet Sundays at 10:30 am on the square in Pottsville, Arkansas right next to historic Potts’ Inn for worship.  Get directions here or contact us for more info.  Or join us on Facebook Live @PottsvilleARP or YouTube.