Proverbs 12.25 Heaviness in the heart of man maketh it stoop: but a good word maketh it glad.

Heaviness or anxiety in a person’s heart weighs it down. It is like a dark cloud that refuses to lift. It grips your total being and leaves you feeling hopeless and beyond repair. Both writer and reader have been visited by this issue of heaviness. There are innumerable reasons why our hearts can get weighed down. We are broken people who live in a broken world.

Perhaps your heart is weighed down this morning. Is there anything that can give you any kind of relief? Absolutely. The gospel of Jesus Christ is the good word that can make our heart glad even while our emotions are weighed down. Jesus spoke these words that we can hang our heavy hearts upon: The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised.

Read those words again. Let those words drench your soul like water in a sponge.

There is healing medicine in the gospel of Jesus Christ for our bodies, our souls, our minds and our emotions. Yes, bad and tragic things happen to God’s people. Hurt. Sorrow. Pain. Death. Saints are not exempt from life’s afflictions. But at the end of the day, we look to the words of Jesus for both hope and help in time of need.

This is not positive thinking. Thinking positive is a denial, not the answer for life’s pains. The Christian does not live in a fantasy world that denies the reality of suffering. The Christian life is not “Christian Science” which is neither Christian nor science. The Christian life is walking in fellowship with Jesus. It is remembering that He is with us always. It is remembering that the ultimate fulfillment of these words of Jesus await any, and all who call upon His Name.