I didn’t sit down; I just fell back into the thick grass on the hillside with my backpack cushioning the fall. Then I slid out of the pack straps with a big sigh. “A-a-h-h-h-h-h. I didn’t think we were ever going to stop!” We were on a “search and destroy” mission in the Que Son mountains of South Vietnam, searching for a North Vietnamese Army (NVA) base camp.

Our normal packs were heavy enough as they were. Typically, most of what you owned was in your pack. A change of clothes, extra socks, toiletry items, and two or three days of canned C-rations. Did I mention they were cans and not the dehydrated Long Range Patrol (LRP) rations the reconnaissance teams were issued for long missions?

Because it was the monsoon season and resupply was often impossible, we divided up a significant amount of ordnance and ammo. We carried 60mm mortar rounds, extra 7.62mm ammo for the M-60 machine guns, smoke grenades, illumination flares, extra hand grenades, and several extra bandoliers of M-16 magazines. Oh, and several grenades for the squad M-79 grenade launcher stuffed into our utility trouser pockets.

You can hump that pack for a while, but it will slow you down considerably, as well as make it hard to effectively engage the enemy.

In our spiritual life, there are two types of packs (or loads) that we find ourselves carrying. There is one load that is a standard load, and then there is another that is an “overload.”

The Apostle Paul addressed these different “packs” in his epistle to the Galatians. “For each will have to bear his own load” (Galatians 6:5, ESV). The Greek word phortion is translated “load” in the ESV and “burden” in the KJV. We get our word “portion” from it. It is defined as “something carried” and as “that which will be the result, at the Judgement-seat of Christ, of each believer’s work” (Vine’s Dictionary).

Our pack is the assignment given to us by God to “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” (Matthew 28:19).

By the way, our “pack” has every God-given item we need to accomplish the mission!

Paul tells us there is another burden, one too heavy for us to carry, and because of that, we are to “Bear one another’s burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ” (Galatians 6:2). Vine’s Dictionary tells us this Greek word is baros, defined as “a weight, anything pressing on one physically … or that makes a demand on one’s resources, whether material … or spiritual.”

Most of us have experienced those crushing loads at some point in our journey. It may come as an illness, the death of a loved one, a broken relationship, or any other number of life experiences that can overwhelm us. When that happens, we need to “blow the trumpet”! When Nehemiah was rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem, the enemy threatened to attack, so he told them, “In the place where you hear the sound of the trumpet, rally to us there. Our God will fight for us” (Nehemiah 4:20).

If you need help, blow the trumpet and call for help. I’m going to be Captain Obvious here: When you do this, you have to be in community with other believers. Otherwise, who will hear your call? But when they come to your aid, God will be in it, because He has promised to fight for us.

So, bear your pack as you serve God and be ready to respond when you hear the trumpet call of a believer in need of assistance. Our love for one another is what distinguishes Christians from those in the world around us.

What say ye, Man of Valor?
Semper Fidelis!