I’m going to see my sister in Iowa. You’d think I was traveling halfway around the world based on the amount of stuff in my back seat. It took forever to pack and I’m getting off to a late start—again.

If I could pay someone to pack for me, believe me, I would.

At the very least, I wish I had someone who would sit there and say, “Pack this and this.

Nah, you don’t need that or that or that. And while you’re at it, forget that, too.”

“And the second duffel. Don’t bother with that, you’ll be just fine.”

Instead, I schlogged through tracking down overnight bags and pulling together every single item I could possibly need.

Clothes that would hold me for the 80 degree and the 35 degree days that are set to smack up against each other this last week of October. Shirts, jeans, socks, earrings, belts and shoes. A sweatshirt. A coat. Pajamas.

Blow dryer, band-aids, vitamins. Tooth brush, tooth paste, dental floss. Flash drive, phone charger, umbrella. Bible, camera and laptop. And that’s just for starters.

Preparing for a trip means trudging up and down stairs copious times.  Staying up way too late the night before I’m due to leave. And getting up at the crack of dawn but still not getting out of the driveway on-time.

Somehow I’ve managed once again to fill the car with just about everything but the snake-bite kit, snorkeling gear and map of the constellations of the northern hemisphere.

I imagine the only trip when I’ll travel light will be when the trump shall sound and I rise up to meet Him in the air.

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I think about all the stuff I’ve packed and hauled down the stairs and out to the car. Schwew. But in just five hours I’ll haul it all into my sister’s house and clear up the stairs to the guestroom. Then it won’t be long till I pack it all up, lug it down to the car and bring it all back home. Sigh. How much of it do I really need any way?

It’s a lot like those occasions when I wrestle with what I want to fix, finish, finagle, be freed of or just plain forget. When He wants me to just walk through it all with Him.

Why do I endure the anguish of carrying it around on my mind before I’ll stop, drop and roll into the arms of the One who promises to carry my burdens?

Sitting here in my driveway, I pause for prayer before heading out on the open road. A line from an old hymn comes to mind:

“Are you weak and heavy laden, cumbered with a load of care?”

“O what peace we often forfeit, O what needless pain we bear,
All because we do not carry everything to God in prayer.”

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Cumbered much? He’s calling you, too.

“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.
Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
—Matthew 11:28-30     NIV

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Scriven & Converse’s “What a Friend We Have in Jesus” ~ above image
from Hymns for the Family of God, Paragon Associates, Nashville, TN