Healing for the Brokenhearted

What does it mean to be brokenhearted?  Everyone experiences a broken heart in this lifetime.  Some people experience more pain than others.  In fact, some people's lives are marked with tragedy after tragedy.  They have suffered great loss, usually the loss of loved ones they were close to.  Others may have experienced the loss of their health, their hoped-for future, or job loss or other investments that led to financial ruin.  In this article, I’d like to talk not so much about loss and being brokenhearted, but about how we handle it.  Have you ever noticed that there are one of two ways that a person will handle their disappointments in life?  They will either become bitter and disillusioned, perhaps seek revenge and retribution, or they will find a way to make the most of it.  The latter will have chosen to have a thankful heart for all the other good things in life that they still have.  Like Job who lost everything, they most likely have chosen to trust God.

Put in another way, a person will either turn away from help and from God, or they will accept help and run to God for His presence, His comfort, and His guidance.  Their heart may be broken, but they have learned to trust in God.  A person who turns from God will be filled with self, and this will be evident through self-pity, pride, anger, and all the other emotions that flow out of a self-life rather than a life that has been redeemed from the self-life by Jesus and through His finished work on the cross.  

The Bible talks about the brokenhearted two-fold. One are those who have suffered great loss and need supernatural healing from the hand of God.  The Book of Job would deal with one who has suffered great loss.  The other talks about the brokenhearted in the context of a heart that recognizes its wretchedness, and has a sorrow for sin and is looking to be forgiven for sins.  

So let's talk about sorrow for sin.  The following two verses refer to it: 

Psa 34:18  The LORD is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart; and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit.

Psa 51:17  The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise.

David had Godly sorrow for his sin. In addition to the above verse (51:17), the following verses are also part of his prayer to God:

Psa 51:10  Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.

Psa 51:11  Cast me not away from thy presence; and take not thy holy spirit from me.

Psa 51:12  Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation; and uphold me with thy free spirit.

Everything seems to stem from the heart.  The Bible clearly defines the true state of our unregenerated heart before Jesus gets ahold of us:  

Jer 17:9  The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?

Gen 6:5  And GOD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.

Gen 6:6  And it repented the LORD that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart.

 We could say that the seat of the emotions dwell in our heart.  We are capable of extreme wickedness or extreme righteousness (only by being born again of the spirit). And we know that our heart is capable of great love, and so it can easily be broken.  People often say that you should follow your heart.  But in reality, the Bible or the Word of God is really the only source to trust because it is able to discern the thoughts and intents of the heart:

Heb 4:12  For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.

So this could explain why some people can overcome their broken life and broken heart and find healing and purpose, and why others remain bitter, unhappy and miserable.  Those that maintain a positive attitude have likely trusted in the Lord, while the latter have not.

When I first began this study and was thinking of Biblical references to those that are broken hearted, I immediately thought of the following passages of Scriptures, which are prophetic words referring to the coming of the Messiah, Jesus Christ:

Isa 61:1  The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me; because the LORD hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek; he hath sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound;

Isa 61:2  To proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all that mourn;

Isa 61:3  To appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that he might be glorified.

When I have read this in the past, I had thought that it referred to absolutely every human being, but I re-read verse 1:  the LORD hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek.

It occurred to me that Jesus came for the meek, not the proud and religious.  This message of good tidings is for those who want to hear, those who have a need of Him, and for those who will accept Him and His great message of salvation.  Realizing this was hugely significant for me since many times I will share my testimony and applicable verses in the Bible to an unbeliever who will fight everything I say, or they will quickly change the subject.  They are lost and they are troubled, but they are not brokenhearted in the sense that they are genuinely convicted and sorrowful for their sin.  They are not yet ready nor do they see a need of a Saviour in their lives.  

Those with a broken heart need healing.  When do people receive healing?  It seems ironic, but if a person's heart is not broken, they need it to be broken before healing takes place.  This is to say that people with a hardened heart of sin will not likely reach out for help, so they cannot get healed until their heart is broken.  And so, many times I will pray for someone who is lost that their hearts will be broken so that they can see their need of Jesus and get saved and healed all at the same time.

As Christians, we need to have a broken heart, not for ourselves, but for those who are hurting.  And when we ourselves are hurt or devastated or broken-hearted at the hands of someone else, true Christian love will bite the bullet for wrongs done, forgive the wrong action, and go the extra mile to love that person. That is what the Lord repeatedly teaches in His Word.

The brokenhearted spoken of in Isaiah have suffered great loss of some kind.  They need a redeemer to restore all things, and they know they need a redeemer.  Job suffered the loss of all things, and what did he say?  

Job 19:25  For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth: 

 

And in the New Testament, the Apostle Paul said something similar:

Php 3:7  But what things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ.

Php 3:8  Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ,

So when it comes to being broken hearted, there is always a choice.  We can reach out to Jesus for healing and deliverance as He promised He would give, or we can be bitter, unforgiving, angry and self-centered.  And If our hearts are hardened by our own choices to sin and remain in a sinful state, then we need our hearts broken so that we can experience true repentance, cleansing and a new heart that is clean and open to receive the new life and the love that God has been longing to give us.