There’s a saying: as a person, one should know how to pick up and lay aside.

This is even more so for Christians. Picking things up is easier than putting it down. Since it wasn’t easy to pick it up, how can you lay it aside easily? People feel laying aside things is difficult because it’s losing it. But laying aside may not necessarily be a loss. Because only when you lay things aside can you pick up other things; only then can you obtain true freedom. When you hold on tightly to something, you can’t use your hands to do other things.

We need to learn to lay things aside. There’re of course some things that we shouldn’t lay aside. But there’re some things that is better to lay aside so we can lead easier lives and better our faith.

What are some things we should lay aside?

1. Lay aside every weight Heb 12:1 The writer exhorts us to lay aside every weight. This doesn’t mean to do nothing. Rather, this means to lay aside things that hinders us from moving forward. Laying aside such things allows us to move forward further and run the race before us. Let’s not talk about running, sometimes even walking in our life of faith is difficult. A possible reason is because we can’t lay aside the weight that ensnares us, inhibiting us from running freely. In life we have different weights. For our work and future, we have to constantly learn new things and upgrade. It’s not easy to find work. Life forces us to continue learning and pursue new skills and knowledge. To make our lives better, we put in so much; some take on an extra job or work over time to sustain their livelihood. For our families, we are willing to work silently like an ox bearing a heavy burden. But is the blissfulness we hope to get and so suffer for really blissful? As we suffer for this, will we lose ourselves (especially the direction of our faith), straying from the correct path?

Like King Solomon. He was the wisest person and wanted to study what was most beautiful on earth. But everyone views what’s most beautiful differently. What’s best is if you can have all the beautiful things. You’ll need greater resources and time to gain them. Solomon was able because he was wisest, richest and most powerful. His position and power enabled him to gain all the beautiful things. He was able to enjoy all of them and can be said to be the happiest person. But death made him reflect on the vanity of all these. Because you can’t enjoy all these beautiful things when you’re dead. Which is why he wrote the book of Ecclesiastes to remind us that the most important thing in life is to fear God and keep His commandments; a God fearing life won’t lead us to emptiness and vanity, but to eternal life.

If we have everything in our lives but don’t have God, it’ll come to zero in the end. A life that has everything is very good. Without God, it’s zero. If you remove ‘God’ from the word ‘good’, only a zero is left lol. If you have zero in your life and add ‘God’ to your life, your life will be ‘Good’. God in your life will make it good.

Lazarus was such a pitiful person. Lazarus means ‘God helps’. But one cannot see how God helps him. He was poor and covered in sores. Only the dogs stay with him to lick his sores. What supported him that allowed him to face life courageously? Others saw him as having nothing. But to him, because he had God, his life was beautiful. After he dies, he can receive what is truly good.

If our life is like that of a rich man, enjoying ourselves everyday, how long can we enjoy ourselves for? After death, we can’t enjoy ourselves and all comes to zero. When the rich man died, it was too late for regrets.

Now we still have a choice. We have made good choices that has allowed us to enjoy what we have now. But how long can all these good things last? There’re many kinds of good: good, best, better than the best! But what is truly good is eternal. How good can good that’s not eternal be? If it only belongs to you temporarily, how good is it?

Our lives are not very long. So we have to make the correct choice and let our lives be eternally beautiful.

Matt 11:28-30 Jesus gives Man the most important promise. He knows the labour and toil of life. Therefore He says, “Come to Me all you who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest.” Where is this rest? Jesus says He has prepared a place. After He has prepared it, He will receive us. In the past we didn’t know the path to there, now we do. In the past we didn’t know Jesus, now we know Jesus is the only truth and way. If we want to go to Him, there’s no other way but repenting and believing in Jesus. So that where the Lord is, there we will be also. “Take My yoke upon you” Jesus continues to say. Strange. At first He says He’ll give us rest and then tells us to take on a load. When Jesus tells us to take His yoke upon us, this means we have to bear the same burden as the Lord. The yoke is to be borne by 2 animals. The master would usually arrange for a stronger animal to be paired with a weaker one to help it. So the stronger one can carry more of the burden and the weaker will be able to handle its load. He will help us to bear what our strength is unable. What we bear is within our ability so our yoke won’t be too heavy and unable to handle. “My yoke is easy to bear.” Easy doesn’t mean there’s no burden at all. But the Lord will help us carry this burden.

Ask the Lord to help us to lay aside the weights that ensnares us, so we can run to the Lord.

1. Lay aside our wrath Eph 4:26 Lay aside our wrath. Don’t let wrath enter our hearts, especially after the sun has gone down. When the day passes, so should our wrath. The man God created will become angry. Being angry is normal. Because God created Man that is just. When you feel things are unfair, we’ll feel indignant and get angry. Just like how God gets angry with righteous anger. Righteous anger is good and necessary. Unfortunately, we often don’t dare to have this righteous anger. Instead we display selfish anger. Selfish anger often causes us to sin. We need to learn how to lay aside our selfish anger.

In a forum, a mother said she didn’t know how to handle her child when he gets angry. A professional advised her, “Let your child kick the sofa when he’s angry. If you don’t let him release his anger, he’ll store it in him and it won’t be good for him or others. If he keeps storing it he’ll explode.”

Sounds like good advice. But when he grows up, when he gets angry he’ll still kick the sofa. What’s worse is if he kicks cats and dogs, or his children and his wife!

Why not teach the child to manage his anger instead? Paul tells us to control our anger and not let our anger control us. 怒气: the first Chinese character for angry is a ‘slave’ above the word ‘heart’. If you continue to be angry, your heart will become a slave to anger.

Psa 37:7-8 We must cease from anger. This means to control our anger and not let it burst out. It’s not a sin to become angry. But if we don’t cease it, it’ll cause us to sin. So when some people become angry, they start cursing, throw things and even hit others.

But merely ceasing from anger is not a solution either. Because if we store anger, we hurt our hearts. By storing anger, we don’t act out sin. But storing our anger make us broody. It may cause our thoughts to be twisted. It may cause psychological mental illness which is even worse. Which is why when the Bible tells us to cease from anger, forsake wrath and not to fret.

Controlling our anger is the first step. The second step is to forsake this wrath.

Paul says we shouldn’t be angry when the sun goes down. This saying is very empathetic/人情味. The speaker was very strict/严格 with his siblings when he was young in the hopes of them being good Christians. There was not much of a human touch. When he scolded them and beat them, they cried. When they cried, he scolded them, “Why’re you crying when you did wrong? If you cry more I’ll beat you some more.” His siblings knew he would be true to his word, so they controlled themselves. The speaker feels he was too strict and lacked a human touch. If it were us, how would we feel?

Paul gives us time to disperse the anger in our hearts. He knows we can’t get rid of it immediately. Controlling ourselves to not beat or scold others is already very good. When we see our family member or spouse has a black face, we shouldn’t ask,” Oi why is your face so black huh?!” We should be thankful he has a black face. It shows he’s controlling himself. We need time. We aren’t face changing experts. Paul gives us until the sun comes down. As the day comes to an end, so should our anger. Don’t harbour wrath in our hearts.

How can we forsake our wrath? If it’s wrath where we’re at fault, it’s easy to get rid of because we know we’re responsible. But there’re some kinds of wrath that’re really very difficult to get rid of. We feel like we’ve been bullied or wrong. But for the sake of the word we bear with it, albeit bitterly. This kind of wrath is difficult to lay aside; we really don’t want to lay it aside. We want to take revenge, but we can’t because we want to keep God’s word. We undergo a spiritual struggle. “Rest in the Lord and wait patiently for Him.”

We must think of God. “I do think of God what!” Think further. Think of what God said “I’m a just God. Vengeance is Mine. I will repay.” Paul used these words to encourage believers to cease from their wrath. If we truly feel like we’ve been bullied and wronged, we must understand God understands we have been wronged and treated unjustly. One day God will take vengeance for you. “Vengeance is Mine. I will repay.” God is watching. He sees how we have been bullied by others. He also sees how we deal with such matters. Do we repay an eye for an eye, evil for evil? Or trusting and entrusting to God? “Rest in the Lord. Wait patiently for Him.”

Psa 37:9 Those who wait on the Lord will inherit the earth. Think also of Jesus. Are the wrongs we bear worse than the wrongs Jesus bore? Is the shame we bear worse than the shame Jesus bore? Jesus was able to bear these. Should we not also bear it then?

1. Lay aside all our cares 1 Pet 5:7 Lay aside all our cares. It’s inevitable in life that we have many cares. They’re like burdens that press down on us such that we suffer. Which is why Peter tells us to cast all our cares on God. If we tell our cares to our friends, they can only sigh with you because they too have their unsolvable cares. Why not tell it to God who cares for us?

Psa 68:19 We usually say God is one who will bear our burdens. The Chinese version of this verse says that God bears our burdens DAILY. Do we really have that many burdens? We must understand God isn’t bearing our work and family burdens daily. Those we ourselves should bear daily. They’re burdens but they’re not that heavy. The true burden is our fears and worries towards work and family. We have a job, a good working environment, we’re treated well, we’re going to receive a double bonus. But why’re we so worried? We worry we’ll lose the job, that our standards don’t meet what our boss requires, that accidents will happen. They may not happen, but they could. Originally happy, thinking of this causes us to worry and for dark clouds to darken our mind.

At work, there may be some problems, but we can resolve these with some time. But the worries we have cannot be easily resolved.

At home, children are hardworking, and the couple is loving. A standard blissful family. But worries cloud your mind because you don’t know when something/accidents will happen to your family. When will a doctor say, “Mr X, I’m sorry to tell you…” All these things haven’t happened, but it keeps playing in our minds. You never know when disaster will strike you and your family, and that gets you worried.

Household chores are not so burdensome even though we may complain sometimes, but for the sake of our children we don’t mind doing it. But worries and fears of disaster striking our family is something we cannot bear. Jesus bears this for us. We have these fears and worries every day, and He bears these for us everyday. Just that we may not realise or may not be willing to lay aside these worries and fears to God.

A woman saw it was raining and became sorrowful. When there was good weather, she also was sorrowful. Her good friend was puzzled and asked her, “Aren’t you sorrowful everyday then?!” “You’re right. When it rains, I think of my son who sells herbal tea. Who will buy his tea in rainy weather? When his business is bad his life will be bad. When it’s sunny, I think of my daughter who sells umbrellas. Who will buy umbrellas in good weather? When her business is bad her life will be bad.”

Her good friend laughed. “Actually, it’s simple to resolve your problem. When it’s sunny, think of your son who sells herbal tea. When his business is good, you won’t be sorrowful! When it’s raining, think of your daughter who sells umbrellas. When her business is good, you won’t be sorrowful!”

Sometimes with just a change in perspective, we can put aside all these worries.

Phil 4:4-6 It’s not that Christians have no cares. In fact, Christians have more cares than others. Because we don’t just care about the physical but also the spiritual. We don’t just care about our children’s studies but also their faith.

But Paul tells us to be anxious for nothing but in everything bring in prayer to God. If we tell ourselves not to fear, we’ll still tremble. But if we tell God, He’ll give us peace in our hearts. “My peace I give to you.” This is our true reliance, so we can be comforted and have strength to carry on.

“Let your gentleness be known to all men. The Lord is at hand.” The Lord is at hand. Why care so much about the things in the world? The Lord may not come so quickly but we may at any moment go meet the Lord. So why be so calculative? Lay aside our worries and fully rely on Him and grow stronger in our faith in Him.