In the cross of Christ I glory,
Towering o’er the wrecks of time;
All the light of sacred story
Gathers round its head sublime.
I have a story to tell you. Several times a year Mike, a pilot with Mission Aviation Fellowship, approaches a jungle airstrip in Ecuador. He circles the field and looks down to see a young man carrying his father on his back. Close behind, someone else is pushing an empty wheelchair. The man being carried on his son’s back is Humberto. A tree fell on him years ago and paralyzed his legs. Now he must push himself through the snaking paths of the jungle in a wheelchair. If the trail gets too rough, his son carries him on his back.
Humberto never complains. Somehow, I don’t think his son does either. Humberto has a mission. He’s helping to translate the Old Testament into his native language so his people can read God’s Word. This means every few months Mike flies Humberto to the village of Makuma, forty-two miles away, where MAF has a base of operations. There, Humberto sits next to a missionary, and together they painstakingly feed Humberto’s revisions into a computer.
Some would look at that man in his wheelchair and think, “Humberto is carrying an awfully heavy cross… God should lighten His load; after all, he’s on a noble mission.” But Humberto would say “No.” As one writer put it, “The cross God sends is a cross that He understood with His divine mind, tested with His wise justice, and weighed with His own hands to see that it be not one inch too large and not one ounce too heavy for the person to whom He has given it.”
Mark 8:34 says, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.” What about your cross? In what ways has it contributed to those around you? How has God used it to advance his kingdom through you? Whatever cross you are bearing, remember that God has weighed it, God has measured it, with His own hands – it’s not too heavy. Trust Him. He who bore His own cross should know how heavy yours is.
Used by permission of
JONI AND FRIENDS
P.O. Box 3333
Agoura Hills, CA 93176
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