The Cry of the Desperate

By Michael Plemmons

Ours is a complicated world. We live each of us side by side beside the wounded of heart. All around us are the desperately lonely. There are hearts and souls whose life is filled with a sense of isolation, despair, and pain. Who can understand the pain of the terminally ill? Day after day they grow weaker and weaker; their bodies wracked with pain. Each day is just a battle to survive; for millions life is as basic as just finding the strength to take the next breath.

The cries of desperate hearts can be heard all around us. The grief-stricken widower, the abused child, the prisoner in jail; the list goes on and on. All around us and from every walk of life millions of souls face each new day with voices of desperation. They each have a story. No one but them can truly understand the daily turmoil they encounter with every sunrise.

Pain in all its forms is the common universal human denominator we all share. Tens of thousands of families have lost their homes in the current economic downturn. For these families life has become a struggle just for survival. Daily they face the task of finding food, shelter, and hope for their families.

Indeed, throughout history we hear the voices of the desperate crying out for deliverance. In this timeless menagerie of pain and suffering, seen in every age and time, can someone be found who has heard and hears the cries of the desperate?

A little over two thousand years ago a Jewish rabbi faced his hour of pain and suffering. Jesus and his band of disciples had shared a last meal together and had made their way out of the city into the surrounding Judean hillsides. The disciples knew this night was different from other nights. As they walked along they must have reflected on the words their master spoke to them as he shared a last Passover meal with them. Their hearts were consumed with grief because Jesus had informed them that night that he would soon leave them.

Passover was a time of grand celebration when all Israel rejoiced in the memory of deliverance from slavery in Egypt. Yet Jesus broke with tradition that night when he spoke of a new covenant he was going to establish in the earth. One can but look with wonder at the life of this gentle Galilean and his journey that had brought him to this time and place. His very birth had been announced by a chorus of angels -- a savior had been born.

For the past three years of his life his mission was one of compassion to all the desperate voices longing for answers. They came to him from everywhere. He healed their sick and spoke words of wisdom and comfort such as never had been heard before. How many times he must have given of himself one by one to all the wounded hearts that made their way to him. No matter how weary in body, he always had time for the wounded heart.

Yet he knew that this effort was not enough. The universal problem of man was that we were broken on the inside. As he and his disciples made their way to the garden of Gethsemane, he spoke of his impending arrest that night and the death that would follow the next day. Their hearts were filled with sorrow; yet by his death and resurrection a new day would be inaugurated in the world of mankind.

Wounded desperate heart, Jesus did not just die a sacrificial death for you to cleanse your heart from sin. No, he opened to the world the heart, love, and compassion of the divine. He rose from the dead; and no matter what you may be dealing with in your life, he is still speaking words of hope, love, and compassion. He will respond to the cry of the desperate heart wherever it may be found.

“For God loved the world so much that he gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. God sent his Son into the world not to judge the world, but to save the world through him." (John 3:16-17 NLT)