Heart in Hand

I scrape out my heart, and cup it in my hands
Please, won’t somebody take it?
I look down at the blood, the emotion, the ache
Won’t somebody take it from me?

It beats so loudly, it longs to be known
Won’t somebody take it from me?
It cannot keep still, yet it withers alone
Please, somebody, take it.

I stand on the street with my beat up old heart
Tattered by years of distress
I hold it out in the light to the men who pass by
But each one refuses my best.

“I know it looks rough.” I choke back the tears.
“But this broken heart can love.”
Yet one after the next, they walk by and scoff.
Please, tell me I am enough.

Each day it grows darker like meat at a market,
Colder and harder inside...
No wonder they pass by and divert their eyes
And no one will take it from me.

I drop to the ground and lean back to a wall.
My heart feels dead in my hands.
As pulseless as stone, as worthless as ice
As shattered and sharp as glass.



“I will take it,” he said. “I want to take it from you.”
I look up with death in my eyes.
A man. He looks down at my shredded, gray heart
And stretches out his hand.

I scramble up to my feet and hold my heart out
“Please!” I beg, “Take it from me!”
“What is the price for this heart?” he asks.
“Nothing, just love, just love...”

His eyes grow heavy in memory of sorrow.
“No, not nothing,” he said.
“But it was paid for by Great, Incredible Love.”
And again reaches out his hand.



There was already blood on his palm.
Each finger stained.
Dark red scars wrapped up the length of his arm.
And his eyes... His eyes...

He cupped his hands over mine and
My heart lept. It was newborn:
No hardness, no bruises, no cuts, no gray.
Reborn, both tender and strong.

“I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you;
I will remove your heart of stone
And give you a heart of flesh,” He said slowly.
“And I will put my Spirit in you.”

He did not take my heart – He filled it.
He planted it back in my chest
And sealed it there, with Love I can’t understand
And he held my hands.

“Your heart is exceedingly precious to me.
Do not give it away.
It is filled with My Love, and that you must share,
Openly, every day.

“But your heart as a whole is mine to keep
And mine is shared with you
So do not fear, but rejoice and draw near.
Because you have got work to do.”

And His Spirit remains, holding my heart in hand
And His eyes watch over me.
As I move through my life I will share out His Love
That fills and overflows my soul.

My hands are now empty and lifted to Jesus
The replacer and healer of hearts.
They are Yours as I am Yours, stained with Your Love.
Use me. Fill me. Take me.