Break my heart for what breaks yours...

"Break my heart for what breaks yours..."

Those were the words I sang this morning, the words that came singing right out of my soul.  My heart's cry.  If my heart doesn't break at the things it should, I will never be equipped for this task.  Enter temptation: But if I don't hand over all of my heart - maybe I could keep it from breaking!  That was my struggle this morning.  I barely (I wish I could say BOLDLY... but honestly I'll tell you I just barely) agreed.

I remember, when I sang it, silently praying that "it wouldn't hurt too much"...  Oh Lord, I don't know if I want to.  I'm afraid.  I'm tired of brokenness.


I know He's a Big God.  I know his Healing Hand in my life, my heart, and my soul.  I know He Loves.  I know He is Mighty, Good, and Sovereign...  this "Consuming Fire" I serve.  But I never considered really, how He must break for all the pain in our lives.  Break my heart for what breaks yours...  God's heart breaking?  Indeed.

"Break my heart for what breaks yours"...

I am quickly learning that you can't "kind of" do this job.  You just can't.  If you're going to walk this road with these broken hearted children, you're going to have to be "all in".  It's going to hurt.  You're going to have to  sit right in the middle of all their pain and darkness and neglect and abuse and climb in on purpose.  If you don't get in there with them, they'll never trust you enough to help you pull them out.  And you can't get in there, without coming out with a broken heart.

"Break my heart for what breaks yours"...

And so we're driving home together and she begins to talk, and she begins to remember... something about this road always causes her to remember... and I try to listen without the recoil of my heart registering on my face... and my stomach begins to turn, and my heart begins to break under the weight of itself... I want to pull over and wrap my arms around this sweet child and make it go away.  Take her pain away.  And I want to ask her to stop.  I don't want to know anymore.

But she is somehow not broken in this moment.  She is so far removed and closed and scarred she just continues like a robot.  I am the one left in the wake of it all.  Holding this horrible package she has handed over.  She looks lighter, a tad lighter.  There is something in that, I suppose.  I will choose gratefulness for this weight that has left her.

"Break my heart for what breaks yours"...

It's right.  This plan of His.  It's RIGHT that my heart is left broken.  His heart is broken too.  I think of all the pain suffered at the hands of evil all over the world... and throughout our planet's history... and He still stands?!?  His heart breaks for every one and: HE. STILL. STANDS.  I am one woman in a car, listening to a story retold, feeling the brokenness - feeling the weight of grief inside me... over one story I never even witnessed.  I want to lie with my face on the floor and pour out this ache...

...But He was THERE.  He was there in that moment with my new baby girl, and He was there in your moments, and mine, and for all the others you and I will never know about.  AND. HE. STILL. STANDS?

How big of a heart must He have - that though He hurts, He loves on... and though it breaks, it never ends?   He never pulls away, never quits, and never runs.  I can't "kind of" do this job - not if I'm going to do it right.  He has NEVER "kind of" loved me.  NEVER.  My God is "all in".  He comes to sit with us in our mess, comes to bring healing, and restoration.  He takes all our "horrible packages".  And then He reaches down so we can take His hand... we can trust a God that THOUGH HE KNOWS HIS HEART WILL BREAK... HE COMES... and THOUGH HIS HEART BREAKS... HE STANDS.  That's a hand we can trust to pull us out.

I want to love like He loves.  I want my heart to break like His does.  I want to be just like Him.  I want to BE that kind of love.  This morning, I "barely" agreed.  This afternoon - I come "boldly".  Teach me, Jesus - I want my heart to be just like yours.