Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ. Galatians 6:2
“You won’t give up on me, will you? asked one young friend in particularly difficult circumstances. Over and over again, her fear of being abandoned surfaced. She worried that she had used up her chances and her friendships as she walked very slowly through a dark valley. She sensed that people were getting weary of her litanies of despair.
In fact, we do tend to expect people to get better, especially if we give them our attention and our help. We trust that they will honor our investment of time and energy by improving, and we often grow impatient if it doesn’t happen quickly. But as we walk alongside people with chronic or terminal illness or other disabling conditions learning the grace of accompaniment is an enormous gift.”
Christine D. Pohl in Living into Community: Cultivating Practices That Sustain Us (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2012) 106.
The grace of accompaniment is about carrying the burdens of those around us. It’s about not giving up on them when things don’t get better as quickly as we would like. Don’t try to be “Savior of the universe” or I suppose “Guardian of the galaxy” as both of those titles are taken (movie lovers will appreciate that one)! It means that our generosity seeks neither to enable others nor endure everything but to shoulder what we can by the grace of God.
If you are struggling today, don’t lose heart. If someone you know is discouraged, urge them to keep looking up. Our Father in heaven sees, knows, and gives grace upon grace both to the suffering and those who accompany them. Father in heaven, give us grace to carry the burdens of others, even when they don’t change or get better as quickly as we’d like. Thanks for loving us. Give us grace in our times of need we ask in the name of Jesus. Amen.