The Remedy for a Wounded Heart

“He healeth the broken in heart, and bindeth up their wounds.” — Psalm cxlvii. 3.

THE setting of a broken limb does not involve an immediate healing of the wound. Neither does the setting of a broken heart. A broken heart is a heart whose movement is paralysed. It is a heart which has lost the use of its wing, and is incapacitated for locomotion; it is unfit to take its part in the world. To heal the breakage is to restore its power of movement, and enable it to do its work in life. But to heal the breakage is not to heal the wound; that may still continue for a long time. Even Christ does not promise an immediate healing of the wound. But He promises an immediate binding of it. He promises to arrest the flow of its bleeding, so that we shall be able to move about in spite of it, to do our work in spite of it. What is this wonderful Hgament with which Christ binds the wounds of the once-broken heart? It is the sympathy with another’s pain; it is the remembrance that I suffer not alone. The sympathy with my brother restrains my personal outflow. It takes away the egotism of my grief. I no longer feel that a strange thing has befallen me. I no longer resent the rain-cloud as a special wrong. I feel that it is not special — that it is universal. It is the thought of this that stops the outward bleeding of my heart. It makes me refuse to show my wound. It forbids me to cry out in the streets as if I were a solitary sufferer. It says, “Think what your brother must feel; he has the same pains as you!” It bids me count the burdens of the passers-by; and, as I count, I forget to remember my own.

Lord, when I am labouring, and heavy laden, bind me with Thy yoke! Nothing hut Thy yoke can bind my wounds. Thy yoke is humanity — a sense of the common pain. There is nothing that will cover my personal scars like Thy Cross. Let me join the procession to Thy

Cross; let me help Thee to bear it up the Dolorous Way! Grant me the power to share Thy pain — the universal pain! Nothing else will bind my wounds. I have heard a singer tell how, when his burden fell into the sea, the sorrow of others overshadowed him. But Thine is the opposite order; the sorrows of others first overshadow me and then my burden falls. In vain shall I stand on the bridge at midnight and gaze into the dark waters if all I see therein is the shadow of my own grief! Reveal Thy shadow, O Christ — the shadow of humanity! Let me see in the water Thy marred visage — marred with the sorrows of Man! My heart will never cease to be hot and restless until I have felt the heat and restlessness of other hearts — the burden of Thy Cross. Thy shadow will bring me light. Thy darkness will bring me dawn. The carrying of Thy Cross will give lightness to my own. The pity for Thy tears will wipe all mine from the eyes. My bleeding wounds will be bound when I hear the words, “Good and faithful servant, enter thou into the pain of thy Lord!”