TELL YOUR HEART TO BEAT AGAIN

I had a big cactus plant that I grew from a pup. It required very little care, just sunshine and a bit of water now and again. It was healthy and sturdy and it sat nicely on the shelf until I accidentally knocked it one day and it fell. Seeing no harm done, I put it back into the pot and didn't pay much attention to it.

Days passed and I noticed that something was wrong with it. It was literally shrinking before my eyes.

I did an internet search to find out the possible reasons for this malady and I learnt, a tad to late, how to nurture a fallen cactus to full health. Seemingly you will need to examine the wound, excise the rot and apply sulphur powder which is a natural fungicide to the wound.

I took the cactus out of the pot to inspect it and noticed that by then the rot had become so bad, it had given up the ghost.

What had just happened? A fine stately specimen had been reduced to sad pulp, only fit for the compost heap.

There is so much similarity between this wounded thorny object and a human heart.

I was listening to the song 'Tell your heart to beat again' by Danny Gokey and found out the story that inspired the song.

The story goes that a heart surgeon in Ohio once removed a patient's heart to repair it. It was a successful operation but ironically the heart wouldn't beat. Before giving up altogether, the surgeon knelt down beside the unconscious patient and spoke to her:

“Mrs. Johnson, this is your doctor. We have fixed your heart—we have repaired it. There’s nothing wrong with your heart. Mrs. Johnson, if you can hear me, I need you to tell your heart to beat again.”

I can't help thinking of the cactus where the insides were so messed up,  it was beyond living. But if I had intervened earlier, it could have lived.

How many times have we let disease and bad experiences and hurtful memories eat into our insides?

We don't realise that over the years, if not dealt with, the decay gets worse. 

We think that if we don't remember them, they won't affect us. We think that if we avoid dealing with them, we will escape the consequences. It only takes an incident, a song, a word, a deed, even something that happens to someone else - to trigger the pain - and all those memories will crash upon us, just as if they happened yesterday. Very vivid with all the details we thought we had forgotten. Sometimes we don't even realise that they have been there still, after all these years.

Dawna Hetzler the author of 'Walls of a Warrior' says, ' We have to be intentional and want restoration. Begin the journey of forgiveness, prepare to love again, slow yet steady. Believe again. Sing a new song.'

And Mrs. Johnson had to tell her heart to beat again.

She lives still.