Send me anywhere, only go with me.
Sever any tie but the one that binds me
To thy service and to thy heart,”
We all have our burdens. Of course they are not the same in all of us. Some are more evident than others. There are people whose burdens we all see. These get our compassion and our sympathy. We come up to them with love’s warmth and help. There are others; however, whose burdens are not visible or apparent. These seem to us to have no trouble, no struggle, and no load to carry. We envy their lot. But probably if we knew all about their condition that the angels know, our envy would change to sympathy. The burdens that the world cannot see are often the heaviest. The sorrows that wear no weeds of morning, and close no shutters, and hang no crape on the doorbell, are oftentimes the bitterest and the hardest to endure.
It is not wise for us to think that our load is greater than our neighbor’s is; perhaps theirs are greater than ours are, although to us they seem to have none at all. We sometimes wish we might change places with some other persons we know. We imagine our life would be a great deal easier if we could do this, and that we could live more sweetly and beautifully than we do, or more usefully and helpfully. But most likely we are mistaken. If we could change places with any one, the one of all we know who seems to have the most favored lot; if we could take this person’s place, with all its conditions, its circumstances, its cares, its responsibilities, there is little doubt that we should quickly cry out to God to give us back our own old burdens. It is because we do not know all, that we think our neighbor’s load lighter and more easily carried than our own. We all have our own burdens.
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