NOTHING TO GIVE

I have always had a HUGE HEART, but for much of my life I didn’t have anything to give – not anything of any value, anyway. I had plenty of love, and compassion, and desire to help, but my heart was so clogged with junk that the good stuff only came out in fits and starts.

I was like a car that started, and sputtered, and stalled, and re-started, and got stuck in neutral, then the wrong gear, couldn’t shift, crashed, got totaled, managed to get back on the road, more sputtering, boom, crash. Roadside assistance anyone?

Not even the best of human mechanics could get me anything more than temporarily, patched up. I was a clunker of a car. Even when I got started back up again, I had nothing to give – nothing of lasting value anyway.

The problem wasn’t that I didn’t have a HUGE HEART. I did. And the problem wasn’t that I didn’t want to love, and to give, and to help others. I did. The problem wasn’t even that I didn’t try. Oh, I tried and tried – and tried some more. My heart was just too messed up to be of any real value to anyone else.

Do you know something? Even if my heart had been in really good shape, and even if my life hadn’t been a mess, I still had nothing to give. Do you know why? The answer is simple, though I didn’t understand it back then.

I didn’t have Jesus to heal my heart and life, and I didn’t have Jesus to give to others. I am no longer a broken down car. My heart is no longer in a zillion pieces. Jesus has healed my heart and life, and now I have Jesus to give to others.

My HUGE HEART is no longer sitting around in the parking lot waiting to be towed off for yet another mechanic to see what temporary measures could be taken to fix me up again – at least enough to get me back on the road. My HUGE HEART is now being put to maximum use. For the HUGE HEART Jesus has healed is now used by Him to give Him to others.

Yesterday, a few minutes after I walked into the nursing home with paralyzed doggie Miss Mercy in her wheelchair, I got pretty choked up. Tears then. Tears again as I write this. See, when I was a young woman, I worked in several nursing homes. I had such a heart to give. But I had little more to give then a little compassion here and there.

I stopped working in nursing homes and never thought I would be back in one like I was yesterday. The tears came because yesterday I didn’t go into the nursing home with a little bit of compassion to give here and there.

Yesterday, I went into the nursing home with a healed heart overflowing with the Gospel of Jesus Christ. And I didn’t spend my time there merely patting a few people on the shoulder. I opened my heart, I opened my mouth, and I proclaimed the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

I no longer have nothing to give with a broken HUGE HEART. I have EVERYTHING to give with a healed HUGE HEART. I have everything I need for myself because I have Jesus. And I have everything to give because I have Him to give to a world in need.

Dear Father, please draw people to you through this devotional. Draw them into intimacy with you. Draw them into your fold. Draw them into your hold – to stay. Lead your lost sheep home. Lead the wandering ones back to you. Lead them in their hearts to repentance that they may turn from darkness and be translated into your light. Please bring them into your Word, not for a moment, not for a day, not once in a while, but for their lives. Not just for study, but that they would be hearers AND doers of your Word. Transform their lives, and use them for your glory! In Jesus’ name. Amen.