Broken Heart Remedy

~~~ Wisdom 2:1A, 12-22 ~~~ Psalm 34 ~~~ 

~~~ John 7:1-2, 10, 25-30 ~~~

The Lord is close to the brokenhearted.

When you are in the brokenhearted realm

you may not be able to think clearly.

Merriam Webster defines brokenhearted:

filled with great sadness especially because 

someone has left you or died...

overwhelmed by grief or disappointment.

There really is medically something called

'broken heart syndrome'.

The Lord is close to the brokenhearted because

the physical, mental, emotional and spiritual effects are real.

The Lord cares for us on every level of our being.

Severe emotional pain can cause physical

 damage to the heart.

The emotional pain of a great loss maybe 

part of our natural survival instinct. 

The Lord is close to the brokenhearted...

 the pain is real, it is not imaginary.

During Lent we may encounter a sense 

of our distance from God through our sinfulness.

This can result in feelings of deep grief.

Jesus desires to heal us of our broken heart.

Jesus desires us to be fully whole in mind, body and soul.

He is with us in our time of need.

He is with us especially when we experience

a broken heart.

...those who are crushed in spirit he saves.

Do you find this verse as comforting as I do?

It is so important to reflect upon things of such importance 

before we actually find ourselves in the

 grasp of a devastating crisis.

We must reinforce our faith in God's presence

in the good times and in the times when we are suffering.

Lent is the perfect time to meditate

on just how great God is...

that his love for us is immense.

He never wants us to suffer from a broken heart...

He never wants our spirit to be crushed...

He wants us to come to him in our times of distress...

times of brokenness and crushed spirit.

Has your broken heart or crushed spirit

brought you closer to the Lord?

Come to the feet of Jesus

curl up in the hem of his garment.

The Lord is close to the brokenhearted...

the brokenhearted is invited to come to the Lord.

Blessings for the Brokenhearted.

~~~Peace~~~

The Waiting Room

~~~ Isaiah 30:19-21, 23-26 ~~~ Psalm 147 ~~~ Matthew 9:35-10:1, 5A, 6-8 ~~~

 Blessed are all who wait for the Lord.

Waiting is sometime a tedious task to undertake.
So many times we wait for news of medical tests filled with anxiety.
We wait for a return phone call with the test results.

Just this week I was waiting
 in the doctor's office with my mother.
The man sitting across was also waiting when his phone rang
cracking open the silence in the room.
The voice on the other end was a doctor informing him that his wife
of many years was being referred to hospice.
Hospice...not many people are waiting
to receive that kind of news.

The man initially listened intently
but soon his tense face gave way to tears.
His waiting was now becoming a very different type of waiting.
His waiting from that moment forward
was the waiting for his wife's last breath.

He would no longer be the witness to her pain, now his wait
was going to be one of letting go of the love of his life.
Letting go of the mother of his children.
Letting go of his lover.

This is not the joyful waiting of an infant birth
 this is the resigned waiting of the end.
This poor man whom we did not know
was waiting on the Lord
to accept his wife back to heaven.
This man was plunged into this period of waiting
 sitting in a roomful of strangers.

All I could do, as the tears ran down his cheeks,
was to offer him some tissues and express my sorrow for him.

He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.

His heart was broken...there were no
 thoughts of healing right now.
His only thoughts were I knew this was coming.
He did not know his time of waiting was over.
He no longer waited to hear if she would get better.
He no longer waited to hear the doctor say he had a cancer cure.

He no longer waited for their happy times together.

We wait for many different reasons;
sometimes we wait for good, happy things...
sometimes we wait to hear what we do not want to hear.

This man will now be waiting for God
to bind up his broken heart...
to bind up his wounds of loss.
This man will wait for God
to fill the emptiness within his heart.

Advent is a time of waiting.
Waiting is not as passive as we might expect.
Waiting is time we can use to pause...to take a long look inside.
Waiting in stillness
 relying on God because
nothing else really matters.

Waiting
precedes either joy or sorrow
Waiting.

Look for the Blessings as you wait.
May we wait in peace.