Go Ahead - Drop Your Pack

After I was commissioned a 2nd Lieutenant in the Marine Corps, I attended a 6-month course at Quantico, Virginia, known as TBS or The Basic School.

My TBS company staff, when planning our training schedule, anticipated lots of weather cancellations.  And we actually finished all our graded events well ahead of our graduation date.

After our last graded event, many of my fellow lieutenants were now saying that we could "drop our packs."  "Dropping your pack" was said somewhat in relief as "I made it" but was also a reality.  

Professional behavior and performance standards slacked-off during our "dropping your pack" days.

I didn't like it, and I just didn't get it, thinking it was never okay to drop your pack.

Until...

I was sitting in a Bible class recently, and Pastor showed the visual, By God's Grace, a picture of a person leaving a bundle at the cross.  He said that the cross was a "Baggage Drop-off."  

And I immediately remembered "dropping your pack."   

As sinful people, living in a sinful world, we carry around a lot of heavy "junk."  

We know that our hearts aren't right.

We have guilt from our own sin and our own inadequacies.  

We struggle to do good works, in an effort to prove to others and to ourselves that we matter.

We feel shamed and hurt from being sinned against.

We mess up our relationships.  

And on and on... 

It tears us down, it wears us out, trying to deal with it, make sense of it, make it lighter.  

And we resist "letting it go" preferring to wallow in blame, guilt, and self-justification.  

But Jesus...

Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed.  All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned—every one—to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all. Isaiah 53:4-6 

Living among us, Jesus was humble, vulnerable, and exposed.  He took our shame, guilt, and junk to the cross.  

And at the cross, He said, "It is finished."

So go ahead, drop your pack...stop worrying about trying to be perfect, to figure it all out.  It's been taken care of, and now...

Live as people who are free, not using your freedom as a cover-up for evil, but living as servants of God.  1 Peter 2:16