WHEN OUR HEARTS BREAK

I once heard a wise priest say, in a meditation on gratitude, that we should be especially grateful for whatever breaks our hearts. Reflecting on God's promise to write "upon" our hearts rather than "within" them, he suggested that our own hearts are so hard that all God can do is write upon the surface (Jeremiah 31:33). It is only when our hearts break, that they break open: then the word of God can enter deeply, like a seed in a harrowed field.


-- Deborah Smith Douglas, from "Wounded and Healed" in WEAVINGS: A Journal of the Christian Spiritual Life, March/April 2000, published by The Upper Room, Nashville, TN.   Used with permission.




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