Rest for Your Weary HeartSample

What Can You Lay Down Today?

“Sometimes it feels like too much,” I say to my friends sharing the table with me.

Have you found yourself saying the same? Perhaps it’s your to-do list, the news headlines, conflict with family, the laundry piling up on your closet floor, the worries pulling at your mind when you try to sleep at night.

One of my dear friends looks at me and says, “I have two questions for you. What is truly yours to hold? And what do you need to let go of?”

I didn’t have easy answers in that moment. But I took those questions to heart, and I’m slowly discovering what I have picked up that Jesus never asked me to carry. It might be a burdensome task, the well-being of a person I love, or a heavy “should” that’s landed on my shoulders.

I’m learning to pray, “God, I'm letting go of what was never mine to hold.” I imagine opening my hands and freeing whatever I’ve been trying to grasp, like a child releasing a firefly into the evening sky. This prayer leads me deeper into rest.

If something truly is mine to carry, then I can ask, “What will make this lighter?” Often the answer includes asking for help and not trying to do it all myself. Sometimes it means making sure I get the emotional support I need to sustain my strength, like I did with my friends. On some days it’s as simple as a nap. This is part of rest too.

Letting go of something feels vulnerable and sometimes I even worry that it means I’m weak. But we are not pack mules made to carry ever-heavier loads; we are beloved children made in the image of a God who longs for us to be free.

May we set down what’s heavy today, may we travel with the lightness of grace, may we trust how much we’re already loved.