Broken-heartedness

It is hard to mend a broken heart, but in a few years doctors might be able to do essentially that. Scientists are closing in on ways to help patients grow new heart muscle after a heart attack, as well as new lung tissue to treat fibrosis, corneas to erase eye pain, and other body parts to gain a new chance at life.

If the science works, it could represent a new approach to medicine: reversing rather than alleviating chronic illnesses. The idea “is really to restore function to the organ such that the quality of life of that person is normalized,” said one expert.

The need for regenerated hearts alone is huge. Up to 3% of the world’s population suffers from heart failure, in which a heart whose muscle has been damaged by a heart attack or another disease gradually loses its ability to pump blood. The condition affects about 6.5 million people in the U.S. and is the leading cause of hospitalization among Medicare patients.

We all carry the memories of unspoken words and missed opportunities. The quiet echoes of regret and the whispered reminder that perfection is elusive and regret is a constant companion. So, it’s no surprise that a new poll finds that most Americans are concerned about the road not taken in their lives. And when it comes to regrets, people are more likely to dwell on things they didn’t do than the things they have done.

A survey of 2,000 U.S. adults, which found that only 11% of Americans don’t have any regrets. Among the regrets the majority of us have are the following:

Not speaking up (40%)

Not visiting family or friends enough (36%)

Not pursuing our dreams (35%)

The missed chances to take a once-in-a-lifetime trip

On the other hand, the top actions Americans regret doing include:

Spending money or purchasing something they later regret (49%)

Fighting with friends or family (43%)

Making an unnecessary comment (36%)

32% of baby boomers have a regret that spans three decades and still crosses their minds an average of three times per month. While the oldest regret millennials’ is only about 11 years-old, they fret about it on average almost once per week, more than any other generation.

The day after the Trump assassination attempt, The Wall Street Journal ran a story in which they interviewed Americans about the state of our nation. The article concluded, “The weariness was palpable nationwide as The Wall Street Journal spoke with more than four dozen people about how they felt about the shooting that came close to killing a former U.S. president. They pointed fingers and expressed anger, fear, and heartbreak...”

Nearly to person, they expressed a sense of dread, saying there seems to be no good news on the horizon… But unlike other times of crisis, after 9/11 or Sandy Hook or George Floyd, this event left few Americans hopeful that any good might come out of tragedy.

A sixty-three-year-old cook said, “The world has gone to Hades in a handbasket.” A thirty-two-year-old electrician from New Orleans said, “There’s a hole in this country…We’re not sticking together.” A retired project manager said, “We’re in crisis. There is no easy solution, there’s no sound bite. We’ve lost our ability to listen or to hear.”

The article ended by focusing on a married couple in their late 40s from Austin, Texas. “They used to joke about plans to survive a zombie apocalypse,” the authors noted. “Now they talk seriously whether they can afford land outside of a city. A quiet place away from civil unrest.”

In a deeply disturbing scene in the television series “The Crown,” Prince Philip recounted to Queen Elizabeth his moving experience at a funeral for 81 children who had died in the tragic mudslide in Aberfan. (During a heavy rainstorm in October of 1966, a massive pile of accumulated coal waste positioned above the town of Aberfan turned to slurry. The massive flood tragically overwhelmed a school and a row of houses).

The dialogue went like this:

The Queen: How was it?

The Prince: Extraordinary. The Grief. The Anger – at the government, at the coal warden…at God, too. 81 children were buried today. The rage behind all the faces, behind all the eyes. They didn’t smash things up. They didn’t fight in the streets.

Q: What did they do?

P: They sang! The whole community. It’s the most astonishing thing I’ve ever heard.

Q: Did you weep?

P: I might have wept. Yes. Are you going to tell me it was inappropriate? The fact is that anyone who heard that hymn today would not just have wept. They would have been broken into a thousand tiny pieces.

The mourners who gathered at the funeral at Aberfan sang the hymn “Jesus, Lover of My Soul.”

Jesus, Lover of my soul,

Let me to thy bosom fly,

While the nearer waters roll,

While the tempest still is high.

Hide me, O my Savior, hide,

Till the storm of life is past.

Safe into the haven guide;

Oh, receive my soul at last.

Other refuge have I none;

Hangs my helpless soul on thee.

Leave, oh, leave me not alone;

Still support and comfort me.

All my trust on thee is stayed;

All my help from thee I bring.

Cover my defenseless head

with the shadow of thy wing.

Rabbi Sharon Brous writes about an ancient Jewish practice from Second Temple Judaism:

Several times each year, hundreds of thousands of Jews would ascend to Jerusalem, the center of Jewish religious and political life. They would climb the steps of the Temple Mount and enter its enormous plaza, turning to the right en masse, circling counterclockwise.

Meanwhile, the brokenhearted, the mourners (and here I would also include the lonely and the sick), would make this same ritual walk but they would turn to the left and circle in the opposite direction: every step against the current.

And each person who encountered someone in pain would look into that person’s eyes and inquire: “What happened to you? Why does your heart ache?”

“Because I am a mourner,” a person might say. “My father died,” another person might say. “There are so many things I never got to say to him.” Or perhaps: “My partner left. I was completely blindsided.”

Those who walked from the right would offer a blessing: “May the Holy One comfort you,” they would say. “You are not alone.” And then they would continue to walk until the next person approached.

This timeless wisdom speaks to what it means to be human in a world of pain. This year, you walk the path of the anguished. Perhaps next year, it will be me. I hold your broken heart knowing that one day you will hold mine.

Editor’s Note: You can read the original from Mishnah Middot 2.2 here.

A mere generation ago, “heartbreak” was an overused literary metaphor but not an actual medical event. The first person to recognize it as a genuine condition was a Japanese cardiologist named Hikaru Sato.

In 1990, Dr. Sato identified the curious case of a female patient who displayed the symptoms of a heart attack while testing negative for it. He named it “Takotsubo Syndrome” after noticing that the left ventricle of her heart changed shape during the episode to resemble a takotsubo, a traditional octopus-trap.

A Japanese study in 2001 not only confirmed Sato’s identification of a sudden cardio event that mimics a heart attack but also highlighted the common factor of emotional distress in such patients. It had taken the medical profession 4,000 years to acknowledge what poets had been saying all along: Broken Heart Syndrome is real.

Nowadays, there are protocols for treating the coronary problem diagnosed by Dr. Sato. But although we can cure Broken Heart Syndrome, we still can’t cure a broken heart.

So, laughter really is the best medicine. A mere chuckle is enough to expand cardiac tissue and increase the flow of oxygen throughout the body, thus exercising a weakened heart, according to a new study.

Scientists in Brazil set out to prove that “laughter therapy” can improve cardiovascular health and ease symptoms of heart disease. Professor Marco Saffi said, “Our study found that laughter therapy increased the functional capacity of the cardiovascular system.”

Researchers looked at 26 adults, at an average age of 64 who had previously been diagnosed with coronary artery disease. Every week for three months, half of the group viewed comedy programs while the other half watched serious documentaries about topics such as the Amazon rainforest or politics.

Results showed that the group who watched comedies had a 10% advancement in the amount of oxygen the heart could pump into the body as well as an improvement in their arteries’ ability to expand. Blood testing also detected notable reductions in inflammatory biomarkers, which can indicate if people are at risk for heart attack or stroke and show how much plaque is built up in blood vessels.

It’s believed that laughter has this effect because it releases endorphins, which are needed to maintain healthy blood pressure and reduce strain on the heart by keeping stress hormones low. Saffi said, “This study found that laughter therapy is a good intervention that could help reduce that inflammation and decrease the risk of heart attack and stroke. People should try to do things that make them laugh at least twice a week. Laughing helps people feel happier overall.”

Possible Preaching Angle:

Scripture foretold these findings many years ago. We read in Proverbs, “A joyful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones” (Prov. 17:22). A happy heart produces good health, but a heavy spirit can drag you down.

You've never heard of Tanuja Ghale. She's a fellow believer, salon owner, and evangelist in Kathmandu, the capital of Nepal. One day she saw a young woman on the streets of that city and told her she was beautiful. Inexplicably, the woman began to weep. That morning, her husband had beaten her and told her she was, "… the worst woman in the world."

When Tanuja tells women they're beautiful, they're shocked, and want to know what beauty she sees in them that their loved ones have missed. Then those women may be ready to hear that God loves them unconditionally. Our words can have such a profound positive (or negative!) impact.

We all have an ongoing fear of being ghosted. Ghosting is now so common that it was added in February of 2017 to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary. It describes the phenomenon of leaving a relationship by abruptly ending all contact with the other person, and especially electronic contact, like texts, emails, and chats.

It is a biological fact that rejection or being ostracized can make us feel like we don’t belong and to have feelings of low self-worth. Todd Rose writes in his book: “An entire area of our brain (the anterior cingulate cortex) is constantly on the lookout for even the smallest hint of negative judgment.” Rose refers to studies which show, “A wounded heart, it would seem, can hurt just as much as a broken leg.”

What kinds of snubs can cause distress? The author lists hurtful things such as not being greeted on a bus by a stranger, not getting a quick response after sending an email to a friend, or getting the silent treatment from a partner.”

Rose further writes:

It doesn’t take much for us to experience this social pain. Indeed, psychological research suggests that even the mildest snub can cause distress. Our internal sensors are so attuned to rejection that we feel pain even when it is remote and clearly artificial. Cyberostracism, being ignored or excluded online, produces a similar physical and emotional response. Once it’s switched on, our ostracism alarm only appears to have one setting: full blast.

Possible Preaching Angle:

Jesus understands our feelings of rejection since he himself was despised and rejected (Isa. 53:3; John 1:10-11). Jesus has therefore promised that he will never leave us or forsake us (John 14:18, Heb. 13:5), he actively searches for the lost sheep (Matt. 18:22) and helps those who are downcast (Matt. 11:28-29).

Thomas A. Dorsey’s song “Take My Hand, Precious Lord” is one of the most beloved gospel songs of all time. The song’s power comes from profound personal tragedy. In August 1932, Dorsey, a Black band leader and accompanist, was on top of the world. He had recently been hired as director of the gospel chorus at Pilgrim Baptist Church in Chicago, and he was about to become a father for the first time.

Dorsey was nervous about traveling to a gospel music convention so close to his wife’s due date, but she gave her blessing. While he was in St. Louis, Dorsey received word that there had been complications with Nettie’s childbirth. He raced back to Chicago, but both mother and child died.

The double funeral took place at Pilgrim Baptist Church. Dorsey later said, “I looked down that long aisle which led to the altar where my wife and baby lay in the same casket. My legs got weak, my knees would not work right, my eyes became blind with a flood of tears.” Dorsey fell into a deep depression. He questioned his faith and thought of giving up gospel music.

Dorsey’s friend and fellow chorus director Theodore Frye persuaded him to accept a dinner invitation. After dinner, Dorsey meandered over to the grand piano and began to play the hymn “Must Jesus Bear the Cross Alone,” with its lyric “There’s a cross for everyone, and there’s a cross for me.” Dorsey began to play variations on the hymn’s melody, adding new lyrics. He called Frye over and began to sing, “Blessed Lord, take my hand.” Frye stopped him: “No man, no. Call him ‘precious Lord.’” Dorsey tried it again, replacing blessed with precious. “That does sound better!” he told Frye. “That’s it!”

Dorsey returned home and finished the song “in the next day or two.” Dorsey debuted “Take My Hand, Precious Lord” for the Pilgrim congregation at a Sunday worship service. The lyrics filled the sanctuary that morning: “Precious Lord, take my hand / Lead me on, let me stand / I am tired, I am weak / I am worn.” Dorsey was shocked to find congregants out of their seats and in the aisles, crying out in prayer. His song of deliverance from unbearable pain touched the heart of a congregation of Black Americans with testimonies of their own—of illness, death, poverty, or the daily indignities of discrimination.

In Wendell Berry’s novel Hannah Coulter, the main character, Hannah, is grieving the death of her first husband, who died in World War II. She offers the following reflection on grief and how we often deal with it:

I don’t think grief is something we get over or get away from. ... It is around us and in us all the time, and we know it. We know that every night … There are people lying awake grieving, and every morning there are people waking up to absences that never will be filled. But we shut our mouth and go ahead. How we are is fine. There are always a few who will recite their complaints, but the proper answer to “how are you” is fine.

The thing that you have most dreaded has happened at last. The worst thing that you might’ve expected has happened, and you didn’t expect it. You have grown old and ill, and most of those you have loved or dead or gone away. Even so: how are you? Fine. How are you? Fine.

Possible Preaching Angles:

Grief; Sorrow; Church —The presence of Jesus and the presence of his church are the two places where it’s okay to not be “fine.” We can bring our griefs to our Savior and to his people. Future; Heaven – We can patiently endure our current troubles because we are secure in the fact that a better world is coming, where we will have eternal peace, joy, and fellowship.

Viola Davis has been hailed as one of the greatest actresses of her generation. According to one film critic, watching her act is to watch someone draw on “private hardship” and then “witness a deep-sea plunge into a feeling.” Davis claims that there is one memory that defines her “private hardship.”

When she was in third grade, a group of boys made a game out of chasing her home at the end of the school day. They would taunt her, yelling insults and slurs, throwing stones and bricks at her, while she ducked and dodged and wept.

One day, the boys caught her. Her shoes were worn through to the bottom, which slowed her down. The boys pinned her arms back and took her to their ringleader, who would decide what to do with her next. They were all white, except for the ringleader. He identified as Portuguese to differentiate himself from African Americans, despite being nearly the same shade as Davis. Unlike her, he could use his foreign birth to distance himself from the town’s racism: He wasn’t like those Black people.

“She’s ugly!” he said.

“I don’t know why you’re saying that to me,” she said. “You’re Black, too!”

The ringleader screamed that he wasn’t Black at all. He punched her, and the rest of the boys threw her onto the ground and kicked snow on her.

Davis went on to be nominated for two Oscars. But she realized that not only had she remained that terrified little girl, tormented for the color of her skin, but that she also defined herself by that fear. All these years later, she was still running. … Davis’ early life is dark and unnerving, full of bruises, loss, grief, death, trauma. But that day after school was perhaps her most wounding memory: It was the first time her spirit and heart were broken.

For over half a century, the voice of Oswald Laurence was heard on the Underground Transit System in London. He made a simple but needed public safety announcement, warning passengers to "Mind the gap."

When Oswald passed away in 2007, his widow Margret felt heartbroken and alone. She missed Oswald's love and zest for life. To ease her pain, Margret would visit the Embankment Station, sit on the platform, and listen to her beloved husband's voice saying, “Mind the gap.” Then, one day in September 2012, she sat down, and his voice was gone.

In modernizing their systems, the London Underground officials had replaced Oswald's voice with an electronic recording. Margret was distressed by the change and requested a copy of Oswald's recording, so she could listen to it at home.

When the London Underground staff learned of Margret's story, they were moved by an extraordinary act of compassion and kindness. The staff got past all the red tape, searched through the archives until they found Oswald’s recording, and then had it digitized. It was also decided to continue with Oswald’s recording at the stop nearest to Margret's home. Today, if you find yourself at the Embankment Station on the Northern Line of the London Underground, you will still hear the 1950 recording of Oswald Laurence's voice.

Has that message saved lives? Who knows? But has that message touched at least one life? Absolutely. In fact, that’s why it’s still there. One act of kindness can change a life!

You can watch the short video and hear Oswald’s voice here.

According to Daniel Pink, writing in the Wall Street Journal, regret is the second most common emotion felt among human beings. Pink argues that regret isn’t just common, it’s actually beneficial:

For all its intuitive appeal, the “No Regrets” approach is an unsustainable blueprint for living. At a time like ours—when teenagers are battling unprecedented mental-health challenges, adults are gripped by doubt over their financial future, and the cloud of an enduring pandemic casts uncertainty over all of our decisions—it is especially counterproductive.

I have collected and analyzed more than 16,000 individual descriptions of regret from people in 105 countries. One of them was Abby Henderson, a 30-year-old, who wrote: “I regret not taking advantage of spending time with my grandparents as a child. I resented their presence in my home and their desire to connect with me, and now I’d do anything to get that time back.” Rather than shut out this regret or be hobbled by it, she altered her approach to her aging mother and father and began recording and compiling stories from their lives. “I don’t want to feel the way when my parents die that I felt about my grandparents of ‘What did I miss?’”

Regret feels awful. It is the stomach-churning sensation that the present would be better and the future brighter if only you hadn’t chosen so poorly, decided so wrongly or acted so stupidly in the past. Regret hurts.

Regret is not … abnormal. It is healthy and universal, an integral part of being human. Equally important, regret is valuable. It clarifies. It instructs. Done right, it needn’t drag us down; it can lift us up.

Possible Preaching Angle:

Pink observes that love and regret are the two most common human emotions. Addressing loves and regrets by preaching a cruciform sermon will hit the lived experience of every person in the room, even if their hearts haven’t yet been broken open to a regretless salvation. When regret brings us to repentance and salvation, it is part of being forgiving and being set free from our past through God’s grace.

In Delia Owens best-selling book, Where the Crawdads Sing, readers are introduced to a young girl named Kya, living in Barkley Cove, NC. Known to locals as "Marsh Girl,” she had lived a hard, lonely life, abandoned and forgotten by virtually everybody. As her story unfolds, one of those characters return to the marshes of North Carolina. Tate was her first love and had become the only family she knew. He had left the swamp for success elsewhere, promising to return for her. But Tate never returned, and he never wrote to explain why.

One night Tate came up to her front door. Kya is enraged at the sight of him as he attempts to apologize:

Kya, leaving you was not only wrong, it was the worst thing I have done or ever will do in my life. I have regretted it for years and will always regret it. I think of you every day. For the rest of my life, I’ll be sorry I left you. I truly thought that you wouldn’t be able to leave the marsh and live in the other world, so I didn’t see how we could stay together. But that was wrong.

Finishing his plea, Tate watched her until she asked, “What do you want now, Tate?”

He responded, “If only you could, some way, forgive me.”

As Kya looked at her toes, she thought to herself "Why should the injured, the still bleeding, bear the onus of forgiveness?”

Possible Preaching Angle:

Kya asked a good question. One with which we should wrestle when thinking about the work of Christ on the Cross.

Sir Everton Weekes, the legendary West Indian cricketer, stands out as one of the finest sportsmen to come out of the Caribbean. During a glittering career, Everton Weekes played in 48 Internationals and scored 4,455 runs as a batsman, at an average of 58.61. His average places him at number 10 on the all-time International Test averages in cricket history.

One strange statistic of his prolific skill, however, is that Sir Everton Weekes scored only one hit for “six” runs in his entire career. (A “six” is when a batsman hits the ball to clear the boundary rope without it bouncing inside the playing area).

When asked once about this strange statistic, Everton Weekes hinted that it was probably reflective of the time when as a child, he would play street cricket in the neighborhood with friends. He said, “If you hit the ball in the air and broke someone's window, you weren't getting that ball back, so we had to keep it on the ground.”

Possible Preaching Angle:

Although in Sir Everton Weekes' case it never had a negative effect on career, sadly, many people allow past memories to hold them back from bringing out the best in them. If you are one of them, may Paul’s words encourage you. He said, “... But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus” (Phil. 3:13-14).

A single mom was heartbroken after her teenaged daughter was sentenced to Juvenile Hall. What was the offense that warranted such a punishment? Failing to finish her homework. ProPublica reported that Charisse and her teenage daughter Grace were given a strict warning from Judge Mary Ellen Brennan of Oakland County after Grace was placed on probation following theft and assault charges.

Brennan said, “I told her she was on thin ice and I told her that I was going to hold her to the letter of the probation.” She required that Grace submit to GPS monitoring, counseling, visits from a case worker, restrictions on phone and internet access, and keep up with her schoolwork.

The problem arose after Grace’s school responded to the COVID-19 pandemic. According to Charisse, Grace’s mood disorder and ADHD required an individualized education plan that mandated extra teacher support to help keep her on track with assignments. Once classes went online, that support went away.

Nevertheless, new caseworker Rachel Giroux heard in a check-in that Grace had fallen asleep during class and failed to turn in an assignment. Giroux filed a violation of probation report on Grace, despite failing to check in with Grace’s teacher to verify her progress. After the violation was filed, Grace’s teacher told Giroux that she was “not out of alignment with most of my other students.” But that failed to change her mind. Giroux asked the judge to place Grace in detention because she “clearly doesn’t want to abide by the rules in the community.”

Possible Preaching Angle:

In our effort to train up our young people, our punitive actions should be guided by grace and mercy as acts of restoration, not retribution, lest we sentence punishments that make things worse in the long run.

In a recent TED talk, Psychologist Susan David shares how the way we deal with our emotions shapes everything that matters: our actions, careers, relationships, health, and happiness. In this potentially life-changing talk, she challenges a culture that prizes positivity over emotional truth.

Now, don't get me wrong. I'm not anti-happiness. I'm a pretty happy person. But when we push aside normal emotions to embrace false positivity, we lose our capacity to develop skills to deal with the world as it is, not as we wish it to be. I've had hundreds of people tell me what they don't want to feel. They say things like, “I don't want to try because I don't want to feel disappointed.” Or, “I just want this feeling to go away.”

I say to them, you have dead people's goals. Only dead people never get stressed, never get broken hearts, never experience the disappointment that comes with failure. Tough emotions are part of our contract with life. You don't get to have a meaningful career or raise a family or leave the world a better place without stress and discomfort. Discomfort is the price of admission to a meaningful life.

Video Clip begins at 8:52

"Man has places in his heart which do not yet exist, and into them enters suffering, in order that they may have existence," said Leon Bloy, a French Catholic writer and convert from Judaism. As Archbishop Charles Chaput observes, "Suffering can bend and break us. But it can also break us open to become the persons God intended us to be. It depends on what we do with the pain. If we offer it back to God, He will use it to do great things in and through us, because suffering is fertile. It can grow new life."