Broken Hearted

“The Lord is close to the broken hearted...” Psalm 34:18

“...those who are crushed in spirit He saves.” Now and again I see posts on Facebook from moms asking intercession for their teenagers who are wayward, taking drugs or too much alcohol. My sisters and I have been praying for a lawyer who has been missing for over a year. His bag was found a long way away from where he was last seen. Maria Ressa in her acceptance speech for the Nobel Peace Prize cited how many journalists have been killed in our country and other countries for “holding the line”. How many missing people are there in the world? How many children were killed in schools in the past year? How many kidnapped women and children are sold into sexual slavery? How many deal with recurring depression or debilitating disease? There is so much heartache in our world, so much sadness and pain. 

What can we do about it? Saint Teresa of Avila wrote this poignant poem: “Christ has no body but yours, No hands, no feet on earth but yours, Yours are the eyes with which he looks compassion on this world, Yours are the feet with which he walks to do good, Yours are the hands, with which he blesses all the world. Yours are the hands, yours are the feet, Yours are the eyes, you are his body... Christ has no body now on earth but yours.”

We have to look around with Christ’s eyes and love with His love so we can see the broken people around us. We need not be pessimistic or hopeless because God will always make a way where there is no way. God never wastes anything, much less pain. Let us always pray with hope, and do good, remembering that what we suffer now is nothing compared to the glory that will be revealed in us (Romans 8:18).