Page 16 - LDBD Magazine - Issue 23 - Apr May Jun 2018

LDBD in every issue ◊ Relationships

Where Do Broken Hearts Go?

by Carla P. Tait, Life And Vision Connect LLC

Proverbs 4:2-3 ~ Above All Else give my heart to someone must not be on them but my trust must be in
guard your heart, for everything you God first. When we trust in God it will allow us to make the right decisions
do flows from it. in who we should give our hearts too. Love is powerful and so is our heart.
Where did you take your broken heart? Did you give it to a married man
How many times have we given our who cannot love you back the way you deserve? Did you give it to a mar-
hearts over to people we trusted? How ried woman who cannot love you back the way you deserve? Did you give
many times can we count that it was it to someone you trusted and they violated that trust? Your love is not
broken; gift wrapping our hearts in a limited to a male and female. Your heart can be broken by the loss of a
nice box with a perfect little bow. child, parent, spouse or a best friend. Love does not belong to one type of
Love is a beautiful gift God has given relationship, it's universal. Everyone desires it and everyone demands it.
us all. We should not be so quick to Our desire and motives for love must be pure and not selfish. We cannot
give that gift away. Our love is sup- trick people out of it and we shouldn't rob them of it either. So where is
posed to be shared with others who your heart today? God wants it and desires to repair it, if you are not strong
reciprocate. enough to guard your heart. Ask God to protect it. Watch him do it for you.
If you've had any prolonged exposure Allow me to share with you how God knows your broken heart.
to other human beings, chances are The Sacredness of Being Rejected
pretty good that somewhere along the
way you've had your heart broken. If The Old Testament is more than a historical narrative or a set of rules.
not, hang on—you will soon enough. Woven into the lining of each book, each story, is a common thread that
Maybe someone who promised to stick reads more like a romance novel: God pursues his chosen people; they
with you left with little warning. Maybe a close friend betrayed your trust or reject him and turn to less worthy loves; he keeps loving us anyway. Time
let you down when you needed her most. Or maybe you have that awful after time, He does whatever it takes to win his loved ones back.
feeling in your gut that the person you love just doesn't love you back. Ever since the beginning, we humans have been breaking God's heart.
When our hearts are broken, we limp along, wondering how we ended up Adam and Eve had the unparalleled opportunity to walk in unbroken close-
here and if we'll ever make it to the other side of the pain. And perhaps ness with God, yet they rejected the relationship he offered in exchange for
worst of all, we feel utterly and helplessly alone. a hollow promise (Genesis 3). Since then, people have continued to turn
So what do we do with the broken hearts, and where do broken hearts go? our backs on God's love and faithfulness. Jeremiah recounts the way God
Great questions; glad you asked. aches over our rejection of his love: "They broke that covenant, though I
loved them as a husband loves his wife" (Jeremiah 31:32). If anyone has
Whitney Houston’s well pinned song, Where Do Broken Hearts Go has a felt the sting of rejection, it's God. So God knows your heart very well.
powerful line that states, Where Do Broken Hearts go can they find their
way home back to the Open Arms of a love that's waiting there. Now you The Sacredness of Being Betrayed
can’t stop singing it I know I have been singing it for a while now. Our God is not a stranger to the pain of betrayal, either. In one of the most
heartbreaking illustrations recorded in the Bible, the prophet Hosea lived
What I've been noticing lately in Scripture is that we aren't alone in this. out a devastating parallel to God's relationship with his people. God in-
God himself—powerful and holy as He is—knows what it is to have his structed Hosea to marry Gomer, a woman who was compulsively unfaithful
heart broken. He isn't sitting up in the clouds somewhere, watching with to him. Time after time she betrayed him, yet he consistently took her
detached interest as if we're some daytime TV show. He's fully engaged back, loving her against all logic, and, no doubt, the advice of his friends.
with us, pouring out his love on us and longing for us to love Him back. God's message to his people was clear: By giving their affection to false
When He made us, He could have created beings who were automatically gods, they were breaking his heart. Their betrayal was a slap in the face of
loyal to Him, who robotically returned his affection. But instead, He de- his unconditional love and forgiveness. And perhaps we aren't so different
signed us with the will to decide how we'd respond to him, and in doing so, today. We flirt with less worthy loves and continually break God's heart
he opened his heart to profound love—and profound heartache. with our betrayal. And still he takes us back, his love as fierce as ever.
So when we endure these heartbreaks ourselves—rejection, betrayal, The Sacredness of Being Abandoned
abandonment—we don't walk through them alone. God has walked that
road himself. And in some mysterious way, when our hearts are broken, When we find ourselves left alone by someone we love, there's comfort in
we're given new insight into the very character of God. knowing that God has endured that kind of abandonment too. At the end of
Jesus' time on earth—arguably the darkest hour of his life—he was aban-
Let's look at the places broken hearts go. A broken person will find a way doned by his closest friends, the men he'd spent the bulk of the last three
to anesthetize their feelings. Your broken heart is like a magnet it's drawn years with. As he was pouring out his grief to God, they were off napping.
to things, places and people that will not allow you to love. You are drawn When he was being arrested, they were high-tailing it elsewhere to save
to things and places that will not allow you to love again for fear of being their own skin. And when Jesus was on the cross, even God himself
wounded. There are times people will reach for something that will not turned his face away, prompting Jesus to cry out, "My God, my God, why
allow them to feel love again, finding themselves in relationships with have you abandoned me?" (Matthew 27:46). Yes, he knows the agony of
someone that disrespects and dishonors them. Sometimes people are abandonment.
drawn to drugs alcohol and a promiscuous lifestyle. So where has your
broken heart taken you? Ponder on that question for a moment. At all You and your broken heart have gone to places you care not to share.
costs we must guard our hearts. It's the place that love dwells and it's the Now is the time for God to heal that broken heart. He need a place to dwell
very first thing God forms in the human body. It pumps the very blood that and your heart is where He wants to live. When we allow Gog access to
gives life. our hearts He will give wise council and a greater discernment on who to
trust with your heart. You’ve done it your way and it didn’t work. Give it to
When the heart is corrupted it begins to do wicked things. I have been God you have nothing left to lose but everything to gain.
heartbroken many times in my life and am just realizing that my trust to

16 | Apr May Jun 2018 LIVING Day By Day •Net