Episode Details

Have you ever wanted something so bad, but you couldn’t get it? Have you ever desperately longed for something to change, but it still wasn’t changing? Your whole body begins to ache. When there’s this one thing you truly want but it’s left unfulfilled, eventually even the good areas of your life have a dark heaviness over them. When what you’re hoping for isn’t happening, you hurt. That’s natural. You’re human.

Proverbs 13:12, “Hope deferred makes the heart sick.” Meaning when what you hope for is continually delayed, your heart becomes sick. And my sister, when your heart becomes sick, you are in danger of doing really stupid things to make you feel better.

Have you ever done something you knew wasn’t right, but it was the only way you had a chance of getting what you wanted? You cheated. You twisted things. You ran right through the caution tape and ignored every red flag. You rushed it. You forced it. You got your way. And your way ended up being a mess. You were temporarily happy, then sorely disappointed.

Hope deferred makes the heart sick, and a sick heart is very susceptible to bad choices. Desperation is not a place from which to make plans for the future. Desperation is a place for your knees to hit the floor and seek God. Your heart cannot be trusted here, but God’s can.

Let’s continue our study of the book of Genesis, picking up in chapter 16. Abram and Sarai are now in their 70’s and 80’s and they’ve never had children. Back then, being barren was a social stigma. You were looked at with curious eyes, wondering why you were being punished. If you weren’t blessed with children for your lineage, then surely you were cursed. Cursed for what, became the question everyone had when they looked at you. Surely you had some sort of hidden sin, some sort of disobedience to bring this deep shame upon you.

Everyone knew Abram and Sarai had prayed for a baby, and as the years went on and on and on, it was an added shame to know God wasn’t answering them. Sarai felt cheated. She felt punished for some unknown sin she didn’t know how to fix. All she had hoped for was a baby, and now at 76 years old, her heart had grown sick from all that hope being deferred. Waiting and waiting until now, all hope was gone. It was too late.

Hopeless. Heart broken. Sick-hearted. Desperate. And susceptible to any idea that might fix her problem and change the situation. Again, this is a dangerous place to be.

So Sarai gets an idea. An idea born from a sick heart. Genesis 16: 1-2, “Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had not been able to bear children for him. But she had an Egyptian servant named Hagar. So Sarai said to Abram, ‘The Lord has prevented me from having children. Go and sleep with my servant. Perhaps I can have children through her.'”

That’s a broken sick heart talking. That’s an idea born from a place of brokenness. And it was a bad idea.

Abram sleeps with his wife’s servant, and that woman does become pregnant. What follows is straight out of a Jerry Springer episode. Chaos. Drama. Division. Jealousy. Disaster.

Why? Because a sick and hurting heart was bearing ideas and making the decisions.

If you’re in a place of dark hopelessness, hurting because what you’ve wanted simply isn’t happening, please know this – God wants to hold your heart. He wants to heal your heart that has become sick from the continual delay of what you’ve been hoping for. And he CAN HEAL THIS. Somehow, someway, he will make this okay.

Psalm 147:3, “He heals the brokenhearted and bandages their wounds.” We are the sheep and he is the good Shepherd. We desperately need him to bandage our wounds and heal our hearts. If your leg were broken, I wouldn’t judge you because you’re walking with a limp. So my sister, if your heart is broken, there’s no judgment for past choices made in your hurt. There’s healing for that.

You can trust God with this. You can trust his plan. You can trust hi