Celebrate Hope: Looking Back Stepping UpНамуна

Celebrate Hope: Looking Back Stepping Up

DAY 6 OF 28

My Neighbor’s Keeper

Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ. -Galatians 6:2

Every year, my cousin would travel from Chicago to Alabama to spend the summer with Mom, Dad, and me. Mom raised me to be responsible for my cousin, though I’m only a year older. If he got in trouble, I got in trouble. I felt we were independent individuals. However, I loved him and cared for his wellbeing, so I knew I had to, in a sense, be my cousin’s keeper. 

In God’s family, we’re to share in the care of fellow believers in Jesus (Galatians 6:2). That includes holding one another accountable for our actions. We’re called to be our neighbor’s keeper. Imagine if I had dismissed my cousin and let him fall into turmoil. I would have committed a wrong—a sin—failing to love God by failing to love my cousin. God calls on Christian believers to love Him and love others. Even when we come across someone misbehaving, we are to “restore” in a spirit of gentleness (v. 1). Scripture warns believers to be keepers of themselves, too, when carrying the burdens of others—to not succumb to temptation. 

When we come across someone struggling, whether it be money problems, addiction, depression, or hopelessness, we can approach them with empathy—not contempt. Helping and guiding others as best as we can, helping them carry their burdens even as we consider our own, pleases God and blesses us. —Aja N. Bell

How can you carry the burden of your neighbor without falling into temptation?

God, please allow me the capacity for empathy and love for others. In Your name, I pray, amen. 

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About this Plan

Celebrate Hope: Looking Back Stepping Up

Celebrate Hope: Looking Back, Stepping Up is an invitation to find where God has been present with us in difficult days long past and where God is present with us now. Certainly God has been our help in ‘ages past,’ and God remains ‘our hope for years to come.’ Celebrate Hope provides us with this needed reminder and offers us the strength to carry on.

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