Speaker: Darlene Sala | Series: Encouraging Words | In her book The Broken Way, Ann Voskamp tells about the time her daughter Shalom came to her, paper heart in one hand and a roll of clear tape in the other.  Tapping her chest, Shalom observed, “We need to tape hearts right to us, Mama….So we always know His love’s around us everywhere.” The words struck a note in Ann’s mind. She writes:
“If only we could all wear a heart right across the center of us so there was always this knowing: God has not forgotten you.   God has not abandoned you….
“Shalom looks down, smooths out her paper heart…. And then the inevitable happens, what always happens: the heart breaks, rips right down the center.”
Ann is waiting for her to cry. Then she holds the torn bit of paper out to her Mama and says, “It’s all okay…. Maybe the love gets in easier right where the heart’s broke open.”[1]

Do you have a heart broken open today? It’s not easy to live with a broken heart.  But maybe the pain and despondency you’re experiencing right now will be the opening where God’s love will find its place in your heart.  Yes, His love is all around you. But has His love found a securely rooted place in your heart so that you never doubt that He is there, holding you and caring for you in spite of what the circumstances tell you?

The apostle Paul wrote, “For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:38, 39 NKJV). Let Him fill your broken heart with His love.

[1] Ann Voskamp, The Broken Way (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2016) pp. 22-24 excerpted.