empty

I was talking to a friend about burdens. We talked about how sometimes you can have these heavy burdens—emotional burdens, financial burdens, spiritual burdens—and you can shift them around, but you can't get rid of them. I said what about if you're made to carry a heavy burden but instead you carry a burden of emptiness: loss or rejection or abandonment? And then my friend says this:

Emptiness is a heavier burden than fullness.

Wow.

I think about Frodo carrying the One Ring that gets heavier and heavier with each step he takes towards Mount Doom. When Frodo puts it on, he sees the eye of Sauron and a voice speaks from the shadow and flame, "There is no life in the void." It's such a great image because the purpose of the ring is actually to take away life—to steal, kill, and destroy. Later Frodo tells Sam, "You must understand, the Ring is my burden. It will destroy you, Sam." So the ringbearer feels this great weight of emptiness.

I think about Jesus who warned against the empty religion of his day where the leaders "bind heavy burdens...on men’s shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers." But of himself he said, "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest...for I am gentle and humble in heart...and my burden is light." His burden is not heavy or grievous to bear. In fact, it is light because it is full rather than empty. "The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full."

Emptiness is a heavier burden than fullness.