Withered Hearts

Withered Hearts

Reading: Mark 3:1-6

And when He had looked around at them with anger, being grieved by the hardness of their hearts… (Mark 3:5a – NKJV)

The man`s hand may have been withered, but those of the faction of the Pharisees had withered hearts. Their religious legalism had withered their compassion and blinded the eyes of their hearts.

Jesus was grieved by the hardness of their hearts…

The Greek indicates that Jesus was in a continuous state of grief (Wuest) For a loving Savior, Whose heart bleeds for the lost estate of mankind, continuous grief for hardness of heart is the only reasonable response. He was, A man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.

Just because Jesus is a Man of Sorrows, does not mean we have license to add to His grief.  What brings grief to our Savior almost more than anything else, is hardness of heart.

What hardened the hearts of the Pharisees?

Their hearts had been hardened by an act of the WILL:

Three times in the book of Hebrews the plea is made: Do not harden your hearts. (Hebrews 3:8; 3:15; and 4:7)

I have myself had personal experience with this:

At the age of thirteen or fourteen, I was on a bus to school in the morning rush hour. As the bus turned the corner into a particularly busy intersection we saw an elderly man on a bicycle. The bicycle had one of those baskets in front to carry documents or other items. I guessed he must have been a messenger of the court, or some such occupation.

Just as the bus turned the corner his wheel hit something and he, the bicycle, and everything in the basket, landed on the road. The papers were scattered.

The reaction of the boys in the bus was to break into peals of laughter at the plight of the old man as he desperately tried to retrieve the papers in the middle of rush hour.

My own heart was breaking for the man. I had no way to help him since I was in a bus that was soon gone.  Up to that time I had a very tender heart.

To my shame, that changed. It hurt so much to bear another’s pain, I hardened my heart so it would not hurt so much.

It took years after my conversion to Christ for the Holy Spirit to soften my heart again.

Choose rather to bear the pain than to have a hard heart!

Hard Hearts Healed

(© Wednesday 4^th June – by Christopher Shennan)

It hurt so much to feel for those

That were passing though grief and pain,

That I shut their suffering out;

I vowed never to feel it again.

 

At first it came as a relief

To be free from another’s pain

“I have enough of my own to bear,”

I said, “Let others just do the same.”

 

The result of my decision came

As a shock and surprise to me;

I found my heart grew callous, hard,

And my spirit was bound, not free.

 

Then Jesus called, “Come follow Me,

For the burden I bear is light;

Carry another’s load of care

And your own soul will know – delight.”

 

The joy that I feel now is pure;

As I share the pain my brother feels,

The burden I bear gets lighter,

And the hurt I sustain? – It heals.

My website: http://www.christophershennan.ca
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