"The LORD is near to the brokenhearted And saves those who are crushed in spirit"

“This is John and David, my two sons” the father smiles as he proudly introduces his sons to his new neighbor. “Do you have any boys?” He asks. “No, we have been trying but no kids yet”, says the neighbor. “Ahh, well I'm sure it will be worth every effort when you finally get some”, the father tells him.

“We buried their mother, my wife of forty years this last summer. It was the hardest thing I ever had to do. So grateful for my boys. Having them next to me got me through the toughest time in my life. Don't know what I would do without them. I see so much of my wife in them too.”, he tells his neighbor.

The father walks back to his farm with his two boys, one under each arm. His heart swelling with joy, pride and love as he thinks of all he has to be grateful for in having them. Losing his wife (their mother), last year made him all the more treasure every moment with his boys.

Ever since their mother died in an accident the last year, the youngest son was having some trouble. He was hanging with a group of friends who loved to party and stay out late. He was sleeping it off in the morning and letting all his chores go.

His father lovingly continued to confront him on this. He needed to be more responsible. His father gave him a curfew. He told his father, “A curfew, you treat me like a child. I am not following any curfew!” “If you don't come in on time,” his father said, “you will lose your privilege to use my car for that week.”

His son threw up his hands and told his father, “I'm done with you! I can take care of myself. Just give me all that is my share when you die now because to me, you are as good as dead! I want nothing to do with you anymore.”

The father was deeply heartbroken. The words tore his heart in places he didn't know could hurt so much. He sat beside himself not knowing how to respond. As his son went on to blame his father for everything that went wrong in his life with words of hate, the father resigned to his request.

With tears streaming down his eyes, he wrote a check out to his son for his portion of the inheritance. He gave it to his son, looked him in the eye and told him, “I hope one day I will mean more to you than my money. You just can't see how much I love you.”

The son called a friend and then when he arrived, jumped in his car and ran off. Day after day the heartbroken father watched for his son to return home to him.

I have a friend who went through something like this. Her daughter ran away from home. Day after day, she still had to get up and go to work. She said she was going through the motions but felt disconnected from her body as she did. It was the most painful time in her life. Every day she watched, prayed and hoped to hear something from her daughter. She said she felt like she wanted to die. She couldn't really talk about it with too many people at the time because she would break down crying.

I have never experienced such a tremendous painful event as this father or my friend did in their child leaving. For my two youngest kids, it was the opposite – their folks left. My little boy at the time (I only had one of them at this point) used to count the days to see his folks every day.

 

We would figure it out together. Okay, it is Monday and you will visit on Sunday. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, then Sunday - 6 more days. Then on Tuesday we would go through it again – It is Tuesday and you will visit on Sunday – Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday – 5 more days. The same every day until Sunday and then we would start over.

Their whole worlds came crashing around them in a matter of a few days. In their moment of deepest agony, they felt helpless.  With my child, we felt helpless too.  We could do nothing to fix what felt so broken inside.

Job and Jeremiah in Lamentations speak of utter anguish of soul. Job says in Job 7:11, “Therefore I will not refrain my mouth; I will speak in the anguish of my spirit; I will complain in the bitterness of my soul.”

Joseph also was someone who experienced anguish. In Genesis 42:21, his brothers said among themselves, “We [are] verily guilty concerning our brother, in that we saw the anguish of his soul, when he besought us, and we would not hear...”

One of the hardest thing for me, is standing next to someone suffering anguish. I want to fix it and I can't. I want to protect the ones I love from anguish, especially my children.   It felt like one of the hardest days of my life to tell my little boy that his dad and then a few weeks later his mom, was not coming for visits anymore.

Ironically, as hard as it is for me to sit in places of other people's anguish, for some years I volunteered on a crisis / suicide hotline.  Week after week, I would sit with people in their places of anguish.

In places of anguish, here are some things I have come to know -

Like Job's friends, lovingly sitting with someone in anguish is the greatest support we can give them. We cannot fix someone else's anguish, only be there for them while they are in it. And like Job's friends blamed his sinning as the source of his problem, it can be more harmful to try to find the source of their trouble and fix it or place blame on them for it.

We do not have a God who does not understand anguish. Jesus suffered tremendous anguish on the cross in our behalf so that we might know His freedom.

 

Luke 22:44, “And being in anguish, he prayed more earnestly, and his sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground.”

 

We are not without hope. God hears our cry and knows our pain. He sees our despair and deeply cares.

David cries out in Psalm 18:6-19

“In my distress I called to the Lord;
I cried to my God for help.
From his temple he heard my voice;
my cry came before him, into his ears.

The earth trembled and quaked,

and the foundations of the mountains shook...
He parted the heavens and came down;
dark clouds were under his feet...
He reached down from on high and took hold of me;
he drew me out of deep waters.

He rescued me from my powerful enemy,

from my foes, who were too strong for me.
They confronted me in the day of my disaster,
but the Lord was my support.
He brought me out into a spacious place;
he rescued me because he delighted in me."

Psalm 34:17-19, “The righteous cry, and the LORD hears And delivers them out of all their troubles. The LORD is near to the brokenhearted And saves those who are crushed in spirit. Many are the afflictions of the righteous, But the LORD delivers him out of them all.…”

God is always at work in our lives. Even in anguish, God is working out good in our lives in the midst of it (Romans 8:28). As with Jacob who was sold into slavery by his brothers, God has bigger purposes we may not see at the moment. Later, Jacob told his brothers that God had planned for his tremendous anguish to result in saving many lives (including their whole family) in the significant famine.

Jeremiah 29:11, “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”

The time will come where there will be no more tears or anguish. But right now, we are living outside of Eden and will face brokenness. The brokenness in us and around us, brings us to brokenness and leads us to God.

Matthew 5:3-4 (MSG) “You’re blessed when you’re at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God and his rule. “You’re blessed when you feel you’ve lost what is most dear to you. Only then can you be embraced by the One most dear to you..”

God has forgiven and died for our so that we would be made whole.

Isaiah 53:5, "But He was wounded or our guilt and iniquities, the chastisement [needful to obtain] peace and well-being for us was upon Him, and with the stripes [that wounded] Him we are healed and made whole."

We don't always understand why things happen, but if we have a relationship with God, we can find tremendous comfort in Him.

In Matthew 5:4 Jesus says, “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.”

 

“But it’s in that disappointment, in that confusion, in that pain—the pain that comes from things not going how I wanted them to—that I find the same thing happening, again and again. I come to the end of myself, to the end of my power, the end of my strength, the end of my understanding, only to find, in that place of powerlessness, a strength and peace that weren’t there before.”

― Rob Bell, Drops Like Stars: A Few Thoughts on Creativity and Suffering

He is with us in our anguish, will strengthen us and see us through it.

Isaiah 43:1-3 says, “But now, thus says the LORD, your Creator, O Jacob, And He who formed you, O Israel, "Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name; you are Mine! When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; And through the rivers, they will not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be scorched, Nor will the flame burn you. For I am the LORD your God, The Holy One of Israel, your Savior; I have given Egypt as your ransom, Cush and Seba in your place.…”

 

 

Jesus' coming was the answer, in God's mercy, to seeing our pain and anguish and having no hope. We needed a Savior to lead us out of our anguish of despair and into joy.

Psalm 102:19-20, “The LORD looked down from his sanctuary on high, from heaven he viewed the earth, to hear the groans of the prisoners and release those condemned to death.”

Isaiah 9:1-7 says,
“Nevertheless, there will be no more gloom for those who were in distress (anguish). In the past he humbled the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, but in the future he will honor Galilee of the nations, by the Way of the Sea, beyond the Jordan—

The people walking in darkness

have seen a great light;
on those living in the land of deep darkness
a light has dawned.

You have enlarged the nation
and increased their joy;
they rejoice before you
as people rejoice at the harvest,
as warriors rejoice
when dividing the plunder.

For as in the day of Midian’s defeat,
you have shattered
the yoke that burdens them,
the bar across their shoulders,
the rod of their oppressor.

Every warrior’s boot used in battle
and every garment rolled in blood
will be destined for burning,
will be fuel for the fire.

For to us a child is born,
to us a son is given,
and the government will be on his shoulders.
And he will be called
Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

Of the greatness of his government and peace
there will be no end.
He will reign on David’s throne
and over his kingdom,
establishing and upholding it
with justice and righteousness
from that time on and forever.
The zeal of the Lord Almighty
will accomplish this.”

 

There are many in the Bible who have went before us and found God in their anguish. We can use their prayers and make them our own.

Psalm 102,

“A prayer of an afflicted man. When he is faint and pours out his lament before the LORD.
Hear my prayer, O LORD; let my cry for help come to you.
Do not hide your face from me when I am in distress.
Turn your ear to me; when I call, answer me quickly.
For my days vanish like smoke; my bones burn like glowing embers.
My heart is blighted and withered like grass; I forget to eat my food.

Because of my loud groaning I am reduced to skin and bones.
I am like a desert owl, like an owl among the ruins.
I lie awake; I have become like a bird alone on a roof.
All day long my enemies taunt me; those who rail against me use my name as a curse.
For I eat ashes as my food and mingle my drink with tears because of your great wrath, for you have taken me up and thrown me aside.
My days are like the evening shadow; I wither away like grass.

But you, O LORD, sit enthroned forever; your renown endures through all generations.
You will arise and have compassion on Zion, for it is time to show favor to her;
the appointed time has come.
For her stones are dear to your servants; her very dust moves them to pity.
The nations will fear the name of the LORD, all the kings of the earth will revere your glory.
For the LORD will rebuild Zion and appear in his glory.
 He will respond to the prayer of the destitute; he will not despise their plea.
 Let this be written for a future generation, that a people not yet created may praise the LORD:

 "The LORD looked down from his sanctuary on high, from heaven he viewed the earth, to hear the groans of the prisoners and release those condemned to death."

 So the name of the LORD will be declared in Zion and his praise in Jerusalem when the peoples and the kingdoms assemble to worship the LORD. In the course of my life he broke my strength; he cut short my days.

So I said: "Do not take me away, O my God, in the midst of my days;
your years go on through all generations.
 In the beginning you laid the foundations of the earth, and the heavens are the work of your hands. They will perish, but you remain; they will all wear out like a garment.
Like clothing you will change them and they will be discarded.
But you remain the same, and your years will never end.
 The children of your servants will live in your presence;
their descendants will be established before you."

Lord, my heart goes out to those around me who are struggling in places of deep anguish. Please meet each one of them there and let them know Your deep love, comfort and peace. Hold them closely. Lift them above their troubles and seat them with You in heavenly places.