Heart Attack

There are many things that cause damage to a person’s heart. A blocked artery leads to changes that can cause death or disability. A weakened heart muscle can result from one of those arterial blockages, or possibly from a disease that directly affects the heart muscle. In all of these situations, the result is a pump that doesn’t work effectively, and the rest of the body is limited because of this damage. Sometimes that damage is so profound that the only solution is a heart transplant.

We also have an emotional “heart” that can be damaged. We say, “My heart is broken”, referring not to the physical pump in the chest, but to this emotional center that feels like it comes from that area. Most likely it is because emotion and stress indirectly affects the heart rate, and we feel the effect it has on our pump. No matter; the point is, there is this place of emotion that we feel in the chest, and it can hurt without any physical damage being done to the pump.

Bob Ayala, on his 1985 album Rescued, included a song called Heart Of Steel. It specifically deals with the tragedy of sexual abuse, and the effect it can have on an innocent young person. It can result in that person having a “hard” heart, one that they have intentionally closed off from the rest of the world, to attain protection from the pain that those memories cause. Read the words carefully; it shows how God still loves us intensely and personally, regardless of what damage we have suffered in our lives. He wants to come and replace that hard heart with a heart of flesh, and show us His love, real love. Can you hear Him calling to you today?