HEALING AN INJURED HEART

Read: Matthew 18:21-35
“Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.” Ephesians 4:31-32 ESV
Earlier this week, I injured my Achilles tendon (the small tendon on the back of the ankle) while on an early morning run. In one fell swoop, my intense weekly running schedule was brought to a grinding halt.
After a couple of days of no running, and feeling pain free this morning, I tried a light morning jog this morning. Just like that, the pain in the tendon returned, along with some mounting frustration. The frustration comes from the knowledge that I have an injury that will take time and patience to heal, and it is one I cannot just “push through” without the risk of severe long term damage.
The injury right now is relatively minor, but to try to ignore the pain and fight through like nothing has happened would put my long-term health in much greater jeopardy. What it will take, instead, is time to rest and exercises to strengthen the tendon before I return to where I was prior to the injury.
An injured heart is much the same way – healing takes time.
When it comes to the heart, the wound can take so many forms – harsh words from a spouse or a parent, betrayal by a friend or family member, the tragic loss of a loved one, bullying or harassment by a classmate or coworker - the heart is a fragile place and can be pierced and broken in so many ways.
And when the heart is wounded, it’s not something we can just ignore and “push through”.
Instead, it’s crucial to acknowledge the hurt and do what is necessary to begin helping the wound heal.
The first, and most important step, to healing an injured heart, is forgiveness. Like me resting a running injury, it’s probably also the most difficult to take. Because forgiveness is not ignoring the one who injured you, burying the pain, and holding a grudge.
Forgiveness is consciously letting go of the hurt, looking past the fear and anger, and making the choice to pursue love and healing instead.
But forgiveness is not something we do once. Like a nagging injury requiring long-term recovery, we have to embrace forgiveness anew every single day. When our hearts have been that deeply shattered, the pain does not just go away.
It’s something we often have to deal with for weeks, months, or even years. To truly heal, we need to make the choice to forgive on a daily basis. And if we don’t a small injury can turn quickly into a lifetime of bitterness and despair. The damage can be long-lasting.
And it is not just others we need to forgive. To heal fully often means we have to first forgive ourselves – let go of all our failures, all the times we have stumbled, and embraced the healing found in the cross of Jesus Christ.
So, whatever injuries your heart is facing today, don’t run from it or run through it. Confront it, deal with it, forgive, and help the healing process begin.

Prayer: Help me not to bury or run from the hurt in my heart, but to confront it with love and forgiveness, instead. Whatever the hurt, help the healing process begin with me.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

FINDING LIGHT IN THE DARKNESS - RACE REFLECTIONS

It is amazing sometimes how God's plan can so vastly differ from my own. In the past couple of days, I have begun to reflect on my experiences at the Run for the Rocks Half Marathon, and the aftermath thereof. A week ago, I was approaching it with no real concrete goal in mind. I planned to take it easy, and run little more than a relaxed (for me), leisurely pace - a chance to recover after a difficult, but fulfilling, summer of racing. But somewhere about three days before the race, I started to feel like God's plans for this race were far different than my own. On His leading, I decided to run the race to support and represent Prodigal Ministries of Kansas, a small men's transitional shelter I have been involved with on several levels for nearly a decade. It felt like a calling to be a voice of light for a ministry that, on so many levels, changed my life and my heart many years ago when I was in a dark, dark place. With this renewed focus put on the race I was r...
Read more

HELP CARRY THE BURDEN

Read: 2 Corinthians 1:3-11 As I sat on the couch in my Fort Collins, CO apartment on the morning of September 11, 2001, watching the tragic events of the morning unfold, New York City and Washington, DC seemed like a world away. While I was as angered and grief-stricken as millions of others at the senseless loss of life, I never thought I imagined I would have a truly personal connection to the tragedy. Fast forward a decade and a half. Through my involvement in various running organizations, I got to know and become good friends with someone who had volunteered at Ground Zero in the weeks and months following the terrorist attacks. For sake of a dear friend’s privacy, I don’t want to say too much more about their identity. Through my friend, though, I came to know far more about the far-reaching effects of the tragedy than I ever could imagine. Even today, survivors and first responders who worked at Ground Zero continue to deal with serious health effects from dust and chemi...
Read more

NOTHING TO FEAR

A million thoughts are racing through my head right now, very few of them good ones. I have an appointment with a specialist in a couple of hours to get a prostate problem checked out. Though my rational mind says it’s more than likely a small, benign issue, the more worry-prone, less rational side cannot help but imagine the worst possibilities that could come of this. At 37 years old, I feel like I am too young to even be having to entertain these ideas, but the twinges of dread linger in the dark corners of my mind nonetheless. What if it is serious? After a long family history of cancer, the fear lingers that I could be the next to battle it – again, I know not necessarily rational, and maybe a needless concern, but it is amazing what our minds and hearts consider when fear invades. I have a beautiful wife that I want to have many more years with, and a treasured daughter that I want to be there for as a father as she grows. Even the most remote possibility of not being a...
Read more