Our hearts will often get in the way of our relationship with God.
When the Bible talks about the heart it does not mean the organ pumping inside our bodies to keep us alive. It is rather our inner self. Our mind, our desires, our passions. Someone has summed it up like this “The heart is the helm of the ship. It takes a bearing and then sets the course of your life. As goes the heart, so goes the person”
So often scripture reminds us about the state of our hearts.
“Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.” Proverbs 4v23 NIV
“For whatever is in your heart determines what you say.”
Matthew 12v34 NLT
“For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies.”
Matthew 15v19 NKJV
When One goes through intense suffering the heart is affected without a doubt.
Since we began our own personal journey of suffering, I can see how it has impacted our hearts, our very lives. How we think. How we act. How we speak. The consequence of this is that it also impacts our relationship with God.
As Bonhoeffer talks about the poverty of our hearts, so then those who have suffered trauma to any degree, our hearts will become impoverished.
This effects our prayer life and our prayers become weak and focused on my needs and wants and we can at times forget who God is and what He has said in His Word.
Now this is quite natural and we shouldn’t feel condemned because of that.
But as Bonhoeffer reminds us that the richness of God’s Word hasn’t changed with our impoverished hearts. On the contrary, it’s this that we need to come back to. Our prayer lives need to be focused on what He has said in His Word not what our hearts are dictating to us.
It has taken me 28 months to write something like this and still I struggle with prayer and focusing my thoughts on Him and His Word.
However, it is so important for us to allow God’s Word to steer the ship of our lives and not our hearts, which can be deceitful at times especially in times of suffering.
As we do this, I believe our hearts will become more and more in line with Him and His will and purpose for our lives. These things take time and can take several years for many people.
As I read and hear others who have suffered greatly their prayers and their stories and their ministry have an integrity, a solidness, a passion that only comes out of many years of struggle, pain, honesty, humility amongst other things.
When Jesus had suffered much even to death on the cross, He felt forsaken, He felt alone as He bore the sin of the world. His heart must have been torn to shreds as indeed His body was. Yet even through all of that He came back to scripture. ‘My God My God why have you forsaken Me’ was Him using scripture when He had nothing else, when His heart was impoverished. Psalm 22v1.
The point is, He never gave in. He held onto His Father because He knew the end of Psalm 22. Look at v.24 “For he has not despised or abhorred the affliction of the afflicted, and he has not hidden his face from him, but has heard, when he cried to him.”
I know I need to come back to the richness of God’s Word. This is a daily task and not every day is the same when struggling with PTSD and circumstances that control the way we feel. It takes discipline and it takes a desire to want things to be different, even if it feels like I just want to give up.
We know that we have a great high priest who is able to not only sympathise with us but also pray for us as He did Peter.
Luke 22v31-32 “Simon, Simon, behold, Satan demanded to have you,d that he might sift you like wheat, but I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned again, strengthen your brothers.”
We know that Peter denies Jesus three times, but Jesus restores Him. There may be times when we have denied Jesus in suffering, when we feel like we have failed Him. But I know that He is praying and interceding for me, for us, so that like Peter our faith may not fail.
Maybe Peter had forgotten the richness of God’s word, just like we all do at times. But we have the promise that He is for us and never leaves us and is praying for us. And with all of that we have His Word in all it’s richness that we can hold onto even if we pray, “God where are You, why have You hidden Your face”. Psalm 10:1;. This is scripture we are praying not necessarily our impoverished hearts. Even scriptures like this have a richness that we often overlook especially when read in context.
Dear Lord,
Thank you for Your Word which speaks truth, honesty, and life. Help us to take You at Your Word and to never let go even when things are seemingly dire. Thank You for the example of Jesus. Amen
I found this so so interesting as it explains that disconnect that we feel when we go through suffering. Thankyou for sharing this
Excellent