What's In Your Backpack?

Good Sunday to all. I share a piece of my soul in the Bread of Life section. Enjoy.

Bread of life today I want to talk about backpacks. It may sound random but it is something I go around and around about with my boys. It seems every day I find something outrageous in the backpacks they take to school. Sometimes it's a nice little toy or book that they want to share with their friends. Recently I started finding rocks. Yes. Rocks. Face loves them. He may be a future geologist. I'm not sure where the obsession started, but he will find a new treasure a stash it away in the back pocket of his backpack. I asked him this week, "Why would you put something so heavy in a pocket, as it would only make it so very heavy for you to carry? Why keep the rocks? They don't help you." His answer was simple. "Mom, they aren't that heavy...and they make me very happy."

Then the words Harry Emerson Fosdick said came to my thoughts. "Some Christians carry their religion on their backs. It is a packet of beliefs and practices which they bear. At times, it grows heavy and they would willingly lay it down, but that would mean a break with old traditions, so they shoulder it again. But real Christians do not carry their religion, their religion carries them. It is not weight; it is wings. It lifts them up, its sees them over hard places, it makes the universe seem friendly, life purposeful, hope real, sacrifice worthwhile. It sets them free of fear, futility, discouragement and sin--the great enslavers of men's souls. You can know a real Christian, when you see him, by his buoyancy. "(Twelve Tests of Character 1923, 87-88)

If you think of Christ as the Rock in your backpack, my thought is this...do you carry Him, or does He carry you? As Face said, ..."they aren't that heavy, they make me very happy."