Son Rise

There is fresh cut stone and unsettled dirt, the deep Georgia red clay my dad spent half his life trying to get back to. And now it engulfs him. It is where his ashes lie, in a box, covered up in darkness, several inches below the air and sunshine and the creeks and hardwoods he so loved. It is in a sense poetic. Man came from dust and to dust he will return, ashes to ashes. 

Though he has been technically gone for six months, there is a stifling finality to his death now. Thanksgiving was definitely different this year. We had a different turkey carver and blessing sayer (Thanks, Trav), but it will forever be the weekend we buried my dad. 

 A tiny plot of land and a headstone mark the dirt and flowers, the place we will now go to “pay our respects.” I am not even sure how to begin processing the fact that this greatest of men, who held my heart in his hand since the day I was born, is reduced physically to ashes in the ground. 

He is again just a stone’s throw from sisters Mary and Edna Fort, both retired school teachers, who lived across the street.  A decade ago, Mary, then in her nineties, would call my dad frequently with this request, “Robert, I just baked a homemade pecan pie. Meet you half way?” Dad would dart out the door and meet her in the middle of the driveway they all but shared to retrieve the warm pie and to visit with his friend. He in return brought the Fort sisters roses from his garden nearly every week of the summer and made them laugh over a cold Co-Cola. 

He now shares the same piece of earth as Sam Jones, who once stormed the beach at Normandy and as an eighty-year-old former sheriff always sat with his back to the wall, just in case.  George Garrett is close by, a man who watched the horror of Japanese planes flying over Pearl Harbor while bombs rained from the sky. Needless to say, my dad is in fine company. His ashes are in their temporary resting place. 

“For we believe that Jesus died and rose again, and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him. According to the Lord’s word, we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep.  For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever.”  1 Thessalonians 4:14-17

I have been thinking a lot about this, when Jesus comes back, the “rapture”- when believers alive and dead will be caught up with Christ in the clouds, and also the second coming- when Jesus reigns over His kingdom and does battle with Satan once and for all. It is something I have always believed and trusted in, but my lack of true understanding over the details of it have kept me from really studying the second coming of Christ. 

If I were to tell you about Jesus, I would certainly talk about His first coming, as a baby…His sinless life, His death on the cross for the sins of the world. I would definitely talk about His resurrection, and how He conquered death so that through trusting in Jesus (by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone), we have confident access to knowing God and spending eternity with Him.

Ashamedly, I am not positive I would mention arguably the most crucial event next to the doctrine of salvation, Jesus’ second coming. The thing that all believers, alive and dead, the angels, and all of creation continue to pine for is when Jesus Christ will return in body to earth and right every wrong.

The story does not end with Jesus’ resurrection or His ascension. It doesn’t end when as believers we die and go to live with God for eternity in heaven. That is a breathtaking part of the story, but it is not the end. 

Not surprisingly, the second coming of Christ is mentioned around 240 times in the New Testament. But get this-- the Old Testament talks about the second coming of Jesus about twenty times more than it mentions Jesus’ first coming (The Second Coming of Christ, Dr. Don Butler). This is astounding to me!

 Before Jesus ever came to earth as a little tiny baby (so sorry, but I can’t help but think Ricky Bobby here), the majority of writings about Christ in the Old Testament look forward to His SECOND coming, not his first. And yet, we rarely ever teach about the second coming of Christ. 

Dad, even though he is free from sin and his mortal decaying body, still anticipates the Day when Jesus will return to redeem all that was lost and broken by the fall….just like the believers who are still alive. Even though Dad is with the Lord, there is something unsettled, unfinished.  He has the same longing now as he did while he was alive. 

The living and the dead in Christ are united in the fact that we all look expectantly for Jesus’ second coming. We collectively groan for the same thing: maybe today Jesus will come down to redeem everything once and for all. That is a really sweet thought for me.

 I remember when I was nine years old we took a family trip to Washington, D.C. and one of our stops was to the Arlington National Cemetery. Not surprisingly because my dad was a huge patriot. It was moving. 

I remember driving through and seeing row upon heartbreaking row of tombstones. I looked out the window and watched each line pass my gaze. It reminded me of orange groves when we would drive to Georgia from Florida growing up. In one glance it looks chaotic and then as you move ever so slightly, the rows align perfectly. 

I remember thinking even as a child in Arlington how unusual it was that the rows were not parallel with the road. It was as if the tombstones were looking off somewhere aloof and distant, unaware of the road in front of them. This is because the tombstones are not aligned with the road. They are aligned to face the east. 

 

In the Arlington Cemetery, in the Hamilton Cemetery, and in every other cemetery in the world, something extraordinary happens each morning. The sun rises in the east.

I don’t mean this only in the optimistic sense that it brings a new day or that times goes on and eventually the raw wounds will give way to scars. 

Listen to this…

 Most headstones in the Western world face the east. They face this way because Jesus is coming from the east when He returns to redeem all that was lost.

Powerful!!

“For as lightning that comes from the east is visible even in the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man." Matthew 24:27 

This beautiful tradition symbolizes the great rumbling of anticipation, the undercurrent through all of history, the unfinished business of the Risen Lord. The tradition of burying the dead to face the east does not exist for the dead, so they will be raised looking the right way or some nonsense like that. God can raise the dead from any direction and any place and time in all of history he chooses.

The eastward facing graves exist for us, the living. The tradition reminds us to look to the east every day with joyful hope and confident anticipation and to remember that the dead are longing for Christ’s return along with us. The sun’s rays hit those headstones to proclaim that death has no victory, no sting for the believer because we have a hope that will not disappoint us.

Biblically speaking, “ashes” is not coincidental when talking about the beginning and end of our physical life. God made Adam from dust and to dust will man return. In the same way, “the east” is not a coincidental phrase when talking about the fall and redemption of man—the birth of sin and the death of sin.

Look at where God planted Eden. Genesis 2:8 says, “Now the Lord God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed.” The first Adam, the beginning of mankind was formed in the east. The fall of man, the original sin, happened there...just as the redemption of all mankind will come from the east. 

God saved His people from Pharaoh’s army with help from where?  The east. Exodus 14:21, “Moses stretched out his hand over the sea and all that night the Lord drove the sea back with a strong east wind and turned it into dry land.” 

Ezekiel saw God returning from the east to dwell with His nation again. The glory of the Lord entered the temple from the east gate. “Then the man brought me to the gate facing east, and I saw the glory of the God of Israel coming from the east. His voice was like the roar of rushing waters, and the land was radiant with his glory.” Ezekiel 43:1. After God passed through the east gate of the temple, it was to remain shut. No one was allowed to walk through it because the Lord Himself had passed through it. And the gate will remain shut until the Lord returns and again enters it…from the east. 

The second Adam, Jesus, comes from the east. The three kings saw His star "in the east" (Matthew 2:2). “Who has stirred up one from the east, calling him in righteousness to his service? He hands nations over to him and subdues kings before him. He turns them to dust with his sword, to windblown chaff with his bow." Isaiah 41:2

Just as we came from dust and will return to dust, so the fall of man in the east will be redeemed by Jesus when He comes from the east. God has great purpose and resolution in every letter of His perfect Word. 

I have never seen my dad wear any piece of jewelry except his simple gold wedding band. To say he was not a jewelry kind of guy would be a major understatement. He was a country boy, and probably “the most informal person I have ever known,” in the words of his friend Allen Levi.

After the death of Allen’s brother and our dear friend, Gary Levi, my dad wore a bracelet each day in Gary’s memory. It was a white glow in the dark rubber bracelet with the words “Perhaps Today.” Gary Levi signed letters with those hopeful words. “Perhaps Today” is the mantra of those who yearn for the return of the King. They wake each day looking for Him.

 My bedroom window faces the east. Every morning the sun comes pouring into my window, reminding me where to place my hope. The sun has definitely set on me these last six months, but even in the darkness of my room in the middle of the night, I can make out the precious letters on my dad’s glow in the dark bracelet “Perhaps Today.” 

"For you yourselves are fully aware that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night....But you are not in darkness, brothers, for that day to surprise you like a thief. For you are all children of light, children of the day. We are not of the night or of the darkness. So then let us not sleep, as others do, but let us keep awake..." 1 Thessalonians. 5:2, 4-6

And after every night, sometimes to my amazement, the sun still rises.

Every morning, its hope-giving rays illumine the bronze letters “Robert Stanley Alston” in Hamilton, Georgia and its same life-sustaining rays filter through my shutters to brighten the darkness of my room and my heart in Tuscaloosa. 

With every new sunrise, the Lord reminds me of the impending consummation I crave, and He graciously restores in me the expectant hope that, perhaps today, His Son will also rise up out of the eastern sky. In other words, it's Friday for now...but Sunday's a comin'...

“He who testifies to these things says, ‘Yes, I am coming soon.’ Amen, come, Lord Jesus. The grace of the Lord be with God’s people. Amen.” Revelation 22:20-21

Come quickly. 

1 Corinthians 15:50-54

^!!!!!!!!“ I declare to you, brothers and sisters, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable.  Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed— in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed.” !!!!!!!!! WORD!!!!!!!

Barking and Shouting

For the first time in my life, Athens felt hollow. It was empty even with 90,000 people in it. The red and black streets bustling with anticipation somehow seemed deflated. I put on a happy face, stuck a “G” on my cheek, and I took the girls to the Dawg walk and the stadium. It actually was fun to run into old friends, to feel the red racing through my veins again, to be with my crew, my mom and my brother and his family. But way down deep it was stinging. I stuffed it all day because I just wanted it to feel like Athens again. The carefree, joyful, fun place it has always been (with the best food ever).

I have never said this in my life, but I was almost glad we lost.  To Missouri. Wow, I really wrote that. The streets of Athens on Saturday afternoon were almost silent with thousands of people moping to their cars. I felt like I had a reason to be so down with all of the disappointed faces.  It would have been more painful to walk Lumpkin Street feeling decimated while people were celebrating, cheering, and barking, anxiously awaiting another week between the hedges, continuing on toward the SEC Championship dream.

I just wish there was something in my life untouched by his absence.

 It’s not that I am all that down all of the time. In fact most of my day to day life looks exactly the same whether my dad is walking the earth or not. But grief has a nasty way of sneaking up on you, of attacking your mind and heart when it is least convenient.  I just want a break from it, a vacation from the pain. I majorly need a happy place.

Athens has always been that place, in all stages of my life—from my first game between the hedges as a young child up through dates, even breakups, friendships, family events, football games, walks down Milledge, and each windows-down-hair-blowing-radio-blaring-drive-around-town-kind-of-day. Athens is so many things to me.  I joined my first church in the Classic City, Redeemer Presbyterian, and I finally got it, deep in my soul, what it means to know and be known by the Living God.  

In the past, the green blades of grass on North Campus have provided a soft place to fall. But not this time. Four generations of my family have walked through the Arch, but instead of a beautiful gateway into our sacred family bond, it now looks like an ominous handcuff, linking me to my sadness.  Every ring of the Chapel bell that once resonated in my heart like home sounds like an alarm only I can hear telling me something is absolutely wrong.

 

 I desperately want something I love to feel the same without him. I had hoped to check my huge five piece set of emotional baggage somewhere in Atlanta, and cruise into Athens uninhibited, unfettered, and untouched by mourning. But there is no escaping grief. There is no place on earth I can go and not think of him, either remembering him or wishing he were there. I would settle for being able to call him and tell him about it, hearing the joy in his voice at all that I am experiencing. But I can have none of it.

My dad’s absence is suffocating. He is missed in the stories at the tailgate of his college roommates (who have been in the same spot at “the Tree” for every home game for the past 40 years). He filled up each place with his laughter and joy and easy way of being. My friend Cabell reminded me that he was usually the center of attention—not in an obnoxious “look at me” kind of way, but in an “everybody wants to hang out with him because he tells the funniest stories and genuinely brings joy and light” kind of way. When the person whose presence fills up the room is gone, the room just feels empty no matter how many people are in it. Even if it’s a stadium and there are 90,000 screaming fans.

So in Athens, I learned that there is nowhere I can flee from my grief.
But there is also no place I can go from His presence. Every time I want to just hide under the covers and not face another day, I hear His voice (and my two year old screaming “Mommy!” on the monitor at 5:45 a.m.—which will be 4:45 a.m. tomorrow, thank you Daylight Savings Time).

As C.S. Lewis put it, “God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks to us in our conscience, but shouts in our pain.”

Certainly, there are times in suffering when God seems distant or absent, but this does not mean that He is in reality not right in the thick of it with us. This is when the Word of God and His promises mean the most. Where the rubber meets the road, so to speak. “I will never leave you nor forsake you,” He has said. “The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit," the Psalmist wrote.

And so in a stadium filled with people screaming and barking (at least in the first half), I hear Him shouting to my heart, “Do not be troubled! Do not be dismayed!” and I feel a peculiar joy flitter through my soul.

You see, I am learning that only suffering can sift the heart so completely, and only in deep sorrow can joy sometimes be found. Suffering is at the core “of why people disbelieve and believe in God, of why people decline and grow in character, of how God becomes more and less real to us…And when we look to the Bible to understand this deep pattern, we come to see that the great theme of the Bible itself is how God brings fullness of joy not despite but through suffering, just as Jesus saved not in spite of but because of what He endured on the cross. And so there is a peculiar, rich, and poignant joy that seems to come to us only through and in suffering (Tim Keller, Walking with God through Pain and Suffering).”

And that joy, the kind that startles and somewhat haunts me in moments of remembrance, is more searingly beautiful than any other kind of joy I have ever known. It is a hopeful joy hitched to a redemptive promise.

I am grateful for God’s voice that shouts to me in my pain and nourishes me like Weaver D’s comfort food for my hungry soul (or East West Bistro, or DePalma’s, or my favorite Athens restaurant the Last Resort—or Zim’s and Five Star Day Café- I know they are no longer there but a girl can dream).

Every now and then I think of my dad without hot tears forging paths down my face, and I feel his warmth in the memories. I count that as progress.

And it doesn’t hurt as much when Georgia beats Florida. Like they did tonight. For the third year in a row. That makes me smile, too.

O Joy that seekest me through pain,
I cannot close my heart to thee;
I trace the rainbow through the rain,
And feel the promise is not vain,
That morn shall tearless be.

-George Mattheson, 1882

The Sacrifice of Praise

I put on black yesterday and climbed the stairs of my church to honor my friend Susan Fitts. Susan loved Jesus, she taught the Word of God with care and conviction, and she interceded for countless others daily. She helped found our church. I grieve for Susan’s family and for our church body, and for the huge hole unveiled in her absence.  

Today, my mom put on black and stood with her friend Cheryl while they mourned her husband Ray Ivey. Ray was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer about a year ago, and my dad wrote Ray a letter every week during his battle.  Dad reminded Ray of the Truth and the Way, and he offered up encouragement and no doubt humor for the journey. My dad’s last letter to Ray arrived right on time, a few days after Dad died. 

I wandered around my dad’s office that first day after he passed away, trying to figure out his latest thoughts, trying to catch a scent of him or find some piece of what his hand touched last, desperately trying to feel closer to him. I found a piece of scribbley yellow legal paper with Ray’s name on it. It was the next installment of his written legacy to Ray Ivey.   Spelled out in his awful penmanship was the life-giving, uncorrupted, eternal Word of God. Not a letter of it will pass away. I know my dad never guessed he would beat Ray to heaven or that his big country grin would be part of the glad entourage waiting to greet his old friend. 

Ray and Susan entered into Paradise, alive indeed, away from their decayed and sick bodies. 

Still, there is brokenness all around me. Sadness and loss are woven into each story as every joy ultimately ends in tragedy here on earth. Along with the most radiant wedding ceremony or birth of a child comes the looming fact that one will likely suffer the death of their beloved. The one left behind will mourn and grieve and have to learn life all over.  I look to my left and a beautiful high school girl in my town is killed in a car accident. I look to my right and a senseless act of violence has left my friend’s husband teaching his brain how to work again. No one escapes.

 I know what you are thinking—this girl needs medication. And while I probably do, stay with me on this one.

John Piper reminded me this week that NONE of it is meaningless.  For those who trust in Christ, every tragedy will end in JOY. And every minute or gigantic piece of suffering in Christ’s name is producing for us an eternal weight of glory. 

 But for now we are stuck somewhere muddling in the mush pot, between the tragedy that has happened and the looming joy that will someday come. And in this middle ground, our hearts join with ALL of creation and GROAN for Jesus to come back and make all things right and new. We long for that distant memory of Eden, where we commune with God and there is no sin or suffering or death, and we plead with Him for that day to come again. 

 I look back at my life, the first 34 years, and see how blessed, how very charmed my life has always been. How whole and un-broken, by comparison to what it is now. I have friends who grew up in broken homes, wrecked families, who are well-acquainted with the effects of the fall. 

I, on the other hand, danced through my childhood and adolescence with joy and with anticipation for more of life to find me. This is largely because I lived each day knowing how very loved and treasured I was by both of my parents, a total gift. But there is no perpetual summer, no eternal daylight. Eventually, times of sorrow and death pervade every life. The question becomes what will we do with it? 

Get this:  Jesus said,

“ ‘The stone which the builders rejected,
This became the chief corner stone’ (Jesus is talking about Himself here)

¹⁸ Everyone who falls on that stone will be broken to pieces; but on whomever it falls, it will scatter him like dust.” (Or “will be crushed” in the NIV)  Luke 20:17-18

There are only two categories Jesus mentions here.  Jesus drew a distinction between those who fall on the stone and those on whom the stone falls (specifically addressing the Pharisees here). Those of us who fall on Christ, who trust Him, we are broken to pieces. Those on whom the stone falls, those who reject Christ, are scattered like dust, or as the NIV states, “will be crushed.” 

There is no third category, no room for us to skip merrily around the stone singing “The Hills are Alive” or to sit on the stone and draw sunshines and smiley faces with sidewalk chalk. There are those who are broken and there are those who are crushed and scattered like dust. Period. 

If we have trusted Christ, we know that we can never be crushed or completely destroyed.  ^“But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us.  We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed.” 1 Corinthians 4:7-9

So we are not crushed, but the other option is to fall on Christ, the Cornerstone.

We fall on Christ, and get--- what?

Broken.

 Into. A million. Little. Tiny. Pieces. This is how I feel. And this is what God promises for those who fall on this stone, Jesus. I feel like I can’t move, can’t breathe sometimes. I definitely feel like I can’t do laundry or dishes or clean toilets. Or change dirty diapers.

God has thoroughly, swiftly, and completely broken me. 

Why is this surprising? This was the very way of Jesus, His own body broken for us. And when we take and eat the Lord’s Supper, we partake with Him of both the suffering AND the redemption. We don’t get one without the other. We partake in His suffering SO THAT we will partake in His glory. Everyone who would proclaim His Gospel drinks the same cup. Death and life. Suffering and glory.  Emptiness and fullness. Sorrow and joy. Brokenness and wholeness, together.

Remember that line of the song “To become like You in Your death, my Lord, and to know You in Your suffering?” There is no deeper way to know Jesus than in suffering and brokenness. I don’t think we truly know anyone until we walk through suffering together. I didn’t really know the depths of Marcus’ heart until last year when we knelt together on the beige carpet in our bedroom with buried faces, crying out and begging God to spare Marcus’ life from the cancerous mass in his lung. We were heartbroken, afraid, and in shock, yet completely united in our suffering in a way we never had been before.

It is the same way now with my mom and brother, and Marcus and my sister-in-law, Melanie. We have always loved one another as a family, but the bond is so much deeper now, as we are walking through loss and suffering together. We have never loved each other so well. And I know I have never felt so spiritually alive even though a part of me feels so totally dead.

Tonight I carved a pumpkin with my kids. I had this whole super spiritual lesson all lined up. It was going to be straight awesome, something they would look back on with warmth and joy and do with their children someday. I was going to talk about how carving a pumpkin is much like what Jesus does for us.  He takes all the yucky stuff out of us. He gives us new eyes to see and new ears to hear, a mouth to tell others about Him, and we are to be a fragrant aroma- I know this is a stretch, but it’s a nose, OK?  So then, we cut holes for eyes, nose, mouth, and… ears?? We actually ended up drawing ears on (complete with earrings) with a Sharpie. Classic. 

I thought I was going to see their little eyes illumine with understanding. I thought their hearts would leap with new found love for one another and for God. I thought they would shout out in unison, “I want Jesus to change me like our pumpkin!!”

 Instead, I had crying at the sight of the “goopy stuff,” cartwheels, fighting over the shapes of the eyes and nose (I am not joking), cartwheels and back walkovers, the baby running around with permanent markers writing on EVERYTHING, more cartwheels, knife-wielding (no names), crying, and still more cartwheels. I eventually ordered everyone away so I could carve my pumpkin in peace. I then passive-aggressively poked holes and virtually tortured my pumpkin (and myself in the process)… all to put a light inside for others to see (and for it to look cute on my porch, let’s be honest). Clearly, not the way I pictured it.  

Through the holes, through the ripped out guts, through the pumpkin completely emptied of its pumpkin-ness, there is a blaze of light. It had to be broken and empty and carved just right-complete with Sharpie earrings-to become beautiful, to be a vessel, to be something other than just a pumpkin.

 We have this treasure, the very glory of Almighty God in our jar of clay, our body. And when does the light inside the jar shine most brilliantly? When the jar is, well…broken. When things don’t go quite as planned and we are disappointed. When we are sorrowful and sick and we have come to the end of ourselves. When our hearts are carved up. When enough of what we have is removed to make room for the One who is our portion, our All in All. 

So what am I supposed to do? I am acutely aware of the fact that I am broken. Then what? How can I allow Him to use my empty brokenness and make me a vessel? What should be my response to Him breaking me? 

 The sacrifice of praise.

 

The very word “sacrifice” implies that it costs us something. Praising the Lord, in fact, thanking Him, when trying times come is a true act of worship. We will praise God in heaven, certainly.  But in Paradise, there is no sadness and nothing is broken. Praising Him will flow naturally from His presence and glory when we see His face. Then, we will have no reason NOT to praise Him. 

However, we will never, ever again have the same chance to praise the Lord through pain and suffering NOW as we do here on earth, before our faith is sight, when everything tells us NOT to praise Him. 

When with crooked hands and tear-stained cheeks we lift our heavy, broken hearts, we offer a sacrifice of praise. To bless His name when we are sick, when someone we love dies, when a child is delayed, when a marriage is broken…when we are seeing dimly and not face to face, when it costs us everything, this is the sacrifice of true praise. And a tiny flame is ignited in our hearts.

We are basically saying, not because I have but because YOU ARE, I will praise You. No matter if my circumstances don’t feel good, You are always good and worthy to be praised. And the tiny flame grows ever so slightly.

My friend Jenny Lynn reminded me that when we command ourselves in intense suffering to “Bless the Lord, O my soul” just as David did, the comforting power of the Holy Spirit is unleashed in us. God’s peace blazes in the darkness of affliction when we turn from looking inward to gazing upward. Pain to Praise. Worn out to Worship. Broken to Blessing. And the flame shines brighter.

So while I am in the mush pot, the middle, between the disaster and the Day… 

Help me, Lord Jesus, to offer you the sacrifice of a busted up, decimated, desperate hallelujah. And would You shine ever so brightly? Take out all the goopy stuff and give me new eyes to focus not on what is seen but on what is unseen. Carve me up. Give me a new heart just like Yours, that does not love based on gifts or deeds…but loves and worships just because of who You are and what is to come. I can offer You nothing that will make You love me more. And I want to get where the depth of my affections never waver based on what You give or what You take. 

 The Great I AM…worthy, worthy, worthy…

 And please, come quickly, Lord Jesus. 

Totally worth the listen- Click here for "Though You Slay Me" Shane and Shane (featuring John Piper)

“For here we do not have an enduring city, but we are looking for the city that is to come. Through Jesus, therefore, let us continually offer to God a sacrifice of praise—the fruit of lips that openly profess his name.” Hebrews 13:14-15

“The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.”

Psalm 34:17-19            

“My sacrifice, O God, is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart you, God, will not despise.”

Psalm 51:16-18

“The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners.”

Isaiah 61:1-3