“Can anyone hide himself in a secret place that I shall not see him? Saith the Lord.” Jeremiah 23:34
I am so enjoying this beautiful sunny day! The sun is beaming and glistening, with skies of a brilliant blue and not a cloud in sight, unlike the last couple of weeks, with dark clouds, heavy rains, and very cold temperatures. I only left the house to work my two days those weeks. I determined many years ago that I’m not a winter person; I usually stay in and hibernate until spring. Too many days like that, and I tend to crawl into the dark hole.
The human experience oftentimes brings brokenness into our lives in some form or fashion. I dare to say not one person has been exempt from its grasp. Sometimes it’s our choices or other’s choices, and sometimes, because we live in a fallen world, terrible things can happen, including,
- debilitating accidents,
- chronic illnesses,
- heinous crimes,
- divorce,
- addiction,
- unexpected death,
- estranged family members, and
- the last two years brought a world pandemic.
These are faith-shaking hard times, which can leave us in a state of horrific grief and brokenness that we sometimes feel we can never rise above.
Did you know there is an actual medical term for a broken heart? I recently went into a medical website and read about it.
The medical term is “broken heart syndrome,” also known as “takotsubo cardiomyopathy,” which occurs when a person experiences sudden acute stress that can rapidly weaken the heart muscle. The surge of stress hormones can put in short-term heart failure. Strong negative emotions like fear, depression, and anger have been linked to heart disease.
I feel I have been a witness to several people in my life that have suffered from this. My dear mother-in-love lost her first child, her eight-year-old daughter, to spinal meningitis in 1930. Although I didn’t meet my mother-in-law until 1970, she still could not mention her name without sudden grief and tears filling her heart. She had her first stroke a few years later and died of another stroke in her sleep in 1985. She spent much of her life in so much grief that it breaks my heart today to think what she endured. I recall also knowing a precious older couple at one of our pastorates that lost their only son in a car wreck when he was young. They became reclusive, quit attending church, and turned to alcohol to try to drown their sorrow in their later years.
Two years, eight months, four days ago, we lost our precious and only son Zack at thirty-two years old to an overdose. I can tell you from my own broken heart that it is as real today as when the police officer knocked on my door around 10 pm to tell us the sad news. It is so raw sometimes that I lay in my recliner all day, I still cannot look at many pictures, I have videos of his childhood years that I tried once to watch, but the grief was so overwhelming that I have not tried to watch them anymore. I realize how vulnerable I am.
In the early days of his death, I can tell you that the Holy Spirit of God brought comfort that I had never experienced before in my life. I felt the prayers of the saints every day on our behalf. God strengthened Larry and me with ministering angels that encouraged us to know He would never leave us or forsake us and that, as the scripture states, “He is near to the brokenhearted.” As weeks passed, months, now two and a half years, I have come to realize this is not a sprint but a marathon.
A few days ago, I feel the Lord gave me a visual example of myself and my condition. I walked into the bathroom at our home and turned on the light when suddenly I saw a big bug crawling swiftly across the floor. By the time I got my shoe off to smack it, it had run under the crack of the baseboard, with half of its body hanging out. I started flogging the thing with my shoe.
I sat there and looked at that poor bug, who was only trying to take cover from being harmed, and God gave me a moment of stillness in my spirit. He whispered, “that’s what you do all the time.” When your pain is exposed, you take cover; you try to hide under the cracks of your brokenness.
As I sat there, I knew in my heart it was so true. My way of coping is busyness. If I can, I stay busy, do a new project at home, enjoy seasonal decorating, work in my flower beds -anything that will help me not have much time to think. Grief can be your constant companion if we allow it to.
The things I do to fill my time are not bad; I truly enjoy doing them. But if I’m not careful, the things that I need the most to heal me are the things I omit. I am reminded in Jeremiah 18:4 that “the vessel he made of clay was marred in the hand of the potter; so he made it again another vessel as seemed good to the potter to make.” I know this scripture is referring to be being born again, but I feel it also applies to the fact that being a Christian, we are being transformed day by day. There is a way to become stronger, and it is by the power of the Holy Spirit who can make a new thing in our life if we allow him to.
I don’t know if you do but, sometimes I hide from God’s Word. I hide from prayer and from praising God through worship. These are very things that help heal the broken heart. So often, we lay aside these helpful gifts from God and try to cover up with other things. We can’t hide the truth; sad things happen in our life. But we can change how we respond by following what the scriptures say to do to overcome in this life.
I fight within my own heart things that try to control my brokenness; regret, unforgiveness, failure, bitterness, resentment, depression, anger, anxiety, and even doubt. We come to realize, in life, some things cannot be fixed that are broken.
Have you ever broken a special vase, statue, or ornament? I’ve tried so many times to buy the strongest glue, salvage the many pieces, hold them in place, applying pressure with my best effort, but to no avail. Some of the pieces were so distorted, no matter what I did, they just wouldn’t go back together. Usually, I had to put it aside and just realize it was a loss.
I still remembered what it had been before, what joy it brought as I looked upon it. I remembered who gave it to me, and how special they were to me. This memory can bring a mixed cup of joy and remorse. But a lot of times, that broken piece was replaced with something new and beautiful that came from a source you never dreamed of. May we remember when the glue won’t hold, and the pieces don’t fit, that God is able to let us lay it aside and trust in him, the one that can make all things new. I want to share a few scriptures that will help us all as we press on.
2nd Corinthians 10:4-5 “For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds; casting down imaginations and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ.”
Psalm 34:18 “The Lord is nigh unto them that are a broken heart, and saveth such as be a contrite spirit.”
Psalm 147:3 “He healeth the broken in heart, and bindeth up their wounds.”
Psalms 17:8 “Keep me as the apple of thy eye, hide me under the shadows of thy wings.”
Romans 12:2 “But be ye transformed by the renewing your mind.”
Isaiah 26:3 “Thou will keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee: because he trusted in thee.”
One of my favorite chapters in the Bible is Psalm 91. We learn that there is a secret place to hide. It is under the shadow of the almighty. This chapter states that the Lord will cover us with His feathers, under His wings shall we trust, and that He will give His angels charge over us to keep us in all our ways. Do you think they could even keep us as we are experiencing brokenness? It also states that the angels shall bear us up and in their hands that we can call upon him in our trouble, and He will deliver us.
I am so thankful to say that throughout my life, the Lord has delivered me time and time again from my brokenness. I think this is a process in this thing called life that we will experience over and over till the Lord calls us home. What I know is that the joy of the Lord is my strength, my comforter, and my healer, and he desires for us to be overcomers in this life.
There’s an old song way back in the 1970s entitled Broken Pieces. It says:
” Pick up the broken pieces and bring them to the Lord, he will put them back together and make your life complete, just place the broken pieces at the Saviors feet.”
My prayer for you today is that we learn the only true place to hide is in the shelter of the Lord. I dedicate this blog to my family, who are mourning the loss of their loved ones, to Covid this year. In loving memory of:
Marty Upton
Lamar Upton
Jay Motley
Steven Mann
and Chris Grizzard
Diane Mann
Lean Into Jesus Ministries
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