“He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds” (Psalm 147:3).

 

I was pondering in prayer how Christ binds a broken heart.

 

A broken heart is a unique pain.

 

I think Jesus takes His time on purpose.

 

As He binds, He also listens.

 

He lets us pour out every anguished tear, and while we do so He is catching each one in a bottle. Then He records each one in His book.

 

Seems pretty careful to me. Tender. Gentle. Long-suffering.

 

As we talk to Him about every emotion and every detail, there comes slow healing. At first, you won’t even recognize it.

 

Out of the darkness comes the pain, and the light of Christ becomes a healing balm.

 

I spent a lot of time studying the “polished arrow” of an archer.

 

Isaiah 49:2

He made my mouth like a sharp sword; in the shadow of his hand he hid me; he made me a polished arrow; in his quiver he hid me away.

 

Becoming a “polished arrow” is a long and tedious process.

 

The archer first chooses the stick and then strips off the bark. Then he places it over a fire to make it pliable, so he can straighten it. If the arrow is not straight, it can never hit its mark.

 

Next, he pours oil on that same arrow to polish it before placing the feathers on the end for good balance and the arrow “head” in its proper place.

 

Jesus must be made head…and the balance between The Spirit and The Word must remain intact.

 

What a painful process for the little stick that is becoming a polished arrow.

 

Yet the little stick is placed in God’s quiver as now a tool fit for His use.

 

That stick was bent back against its natural ways to become a straight arrow. Painful as it was. It was necessary, indeed.

 

That broken heart is the same.

 

God takes what the enemy meant for evil and makes a man, or woman, fit for His use.

 

The anointing now flows from the pain, and you will be pulled from His dear quiver when He decides it is time to do so.

 

The arrow never shoots itself…it waits for the Master archer to pull him (or her) from the quiver now as Heaven’s secret weapon of sorts.

 

As He takes you, the arrow, from His quiver, and shoots you to an unsuspecting “mark” who needs what you hold, healing comes for them and healing comes for you.

 

For all the broken hearts wondering if any good can come from a painful season…

 

From one polished arrow to another…

 

The answer is “more than you could think or imagine.” (Ephesians 3:20)