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Weary Christian sat alone in the place where he met the Master Physician every morning. In his left hand he held his battered heart--bruised by many years of disappointments and failures, unmet expectations, broken dreams, his own rebellion, careless words, and enemy attacks. Examining the new wounds that poured fresh crimson blood, along with older scars that were blackened and calloused over, he spoke to the heart. “I don’t know how you’re going to keep on beating inside me. And, I don’t know how I’m supposed to live out there,” he motioned with a thrust of his chin toward the world that waited. “How am I supposed to be who the Master wants me to be with a heart like you? You have failed me once again,” he muttered, knowing that his heart wouldn’t answer back and that he wouldn’t trust the answers if it did.
He closed his eyes and began to speak to the Master. He opened the book, allowing the Master’s Voice to speak freely, and he began to read, but the words kept running in and out of his mind and wouldn’t stay put. Tangled in his thoughts was the bleeding mess hiding in his hand. Finally, he decided there was no use concealing what his heart had become. The All-knowing Master knew.
“I’m so sorry, Lord,” the tears began. “I’m so sorry, and I’m so tired. I’ve tried to be like you. I am trying to live like you and love like you and give my heart to the world like you. I am trying so hard, but sometimes it just doesn’t matter . . . In fact, Master, I keep waiting, waiting, waiting and trying my best to do everything you tell me to do. Because you promise that you will heal me and cure my broken heart. But look, Master, look at my heart! Look at what has become of it!” In one quick motion, Christian exposed the bleeding mass to the Master Physician. “Look at what I have done to it and what the world has done to it. Every time I think it’s beginning to get stronger, someone else or some new disappointment comes along and gnaws another hole in it. I can’t fix it. What am I doing wrong, Master? How come you aren’t healing my broken heart? What am I doing wrong?”
In a whisper, the soothing and precious comfort of the Master’s Voice came to him. "Open the book again. Open it and see." Christian obeyed, and the book became a mirror. In the reflection, he saw his bloody heart and his bloody hands--the truth. His heart was sick and treacherous, and it was, indeed, failing, but he saw something else, too. Glowing within his chest, beating surely was a different kind of heart. “Where did that come from?” he questioned the Master.
"That is Jesus’ heart. He gave it to you on the day He named you. It’s been there all along, but you have been trying to live relying on your old heart. It cannot keep going, so you are trying to heal it or looking for other people to heal it and sometimes even asking me to heal it but never giving it to me long enough to allow healing."
Christian moved in closer, examining Jesus’ heart. “But wait, Lord. Jesus’ heart has scars, too. His heart knows pain and disappointment . . .”
"Keep looking. Yes, living in your world damaged his heart, too, but do you see the seal around it? Do you see all my promises encircling it? Those are your promises, too. The world cannot destroy His heart like it can yours, and one day His heart will be totally restored."
“Oh, Master! Take my heart. Take it and finish the job the world started! Destroy it. I don’t want it anymore. I would rather have Jesus’ heart!”
"Christian, that is not my plan. I don’t want to destroy your heart. I want to make it look like Jesus’. Your job is to hide yours behind Jesus’--to live out there in this world empowered by its beating. Stop giving your heart to the world; they will only damage it more, and it will betray us both. Instead, offer the world Jesus’ heart. That’s what his heart was made for. Give me your heart. Bring it to me, and we’ll work on it together in the quiet, in this place."
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