Casting Our Burdens on God

I have a friend with whom I've been talking online recently who I believe is struggling with what he has been taught. He has been chatting with me and with others for months about Bible things, and there has never been a hint of unpleasantness in our conversations. The tone changed recently though, when he tried to introduce a couple of unbiblical doctrines into the mix. No one was unkind to him or told him he was a knucklehead or anything, but he was disagreed with, and given reason to see his error. That seemed to upset him.

One of the teachings he holds to is that if you have enough faith, you will not get sick. Therefore if you are sick, you don't have enough faith. There are a significant number of people who have been taught that by pastors who are either misled themselves or that are purposely misleading others. There is a long list of 'big' named pastors in the Word of Faith movement who have suffered or are suffering illnesses at this time. Some have died despite medical treatment and some are receiving treatment now. This somehow seems to escape the notice of their followers.

There is an entire book of the Bible that refutes this doctrine. Job was a righteous guy. Job had horrific trials which God allowed. Job got very sick. God allowed that. One of Job's friends even tried to explain Job's illness and other problems in much the same way that the Word/Faith movement does. Christians get sick. Christians have trials, some unto death. Unless the Lord comes to take us home, we will all die. The statistic on death is still 100%, and we will all die of natural causes, which amounts to a disease or we die of a physical trauma of some sort.

I've heard other Christians say that God never gives us more than we can handle, or that He won't "put on us" more than we can bear. I believe that's true, and I think that that idea might have a little bit of Biblical support, particularly from 1st Corinthians 10:13, but we have to remember that there is a necessary balance between what God allows in His sovereignty, His wisdom and purpose, and what we as believers are responsible for, which is to trust in Him and walk ever closer with Him.

Proverbs 3:5 & 6 are a couple of my favorite verses.

5 Trust in the LORD with all your heart,And lean not on your own understanding; 6 In all your ways acknowledge Him,And He shall direct your paths.
Psalm 55:22 tells us to "cast our burdens onto the Lord," and that He will sustain us. And in Psalm 68, we are told that the Lord daily bears our burdens. In Matthew 11, Jesus told the weary and heavy-laden to come to Him for rest , and in 1 Peter 5 we are told by the Apostle that we are to humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt us at the proper time, "7 casting all your anxiety on Him, because He cares for you." In this context, and I believe the context of the whole of Scripture, the casting of our burdens onto Him is His gracious and loving incentive to humble ourselves before His sovereign purposes and work.

Just as the Lord told Paul, the Bible tells us that His grace is sufficient for us through all of our trials if we rest in Him. He is our Sabbath. In Him we have our rest, when we rest from all our works, and cast our burdens on Him.