An Echo of Heartbreak

The sky was gray and rain was in the forecast. But it wasn't supposed to rain for maybe a hour or so and then it would continue for the next two days. Really, this was my last chance to go for a run until maybe Thursday at the earliest. It wouldn't be the first time that I tried to outrun a storm.

So I set out into our neighborhood. My Lent playlist was pulsing in my ears, because of course I'm the kind of weird person who runs to a Lent playlist. This was actually the first time that I had truly listened to it on a run this year. My old headphones were shorting out on me and I could only hear one side. And although there is something hauntingly Lent-like about a version of "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" that sounded like it was being sung from the other end of a long, echoing hallway, it was time to get new headphones.

So I had the new headphones and the rain was holding off save for a few drops here and there. It was one of those good, cathartic runs. And then a couple of things happened towards the end.

A song that I tossed into the playlist right before my run began to play. "Does Your Heart Break" by The Brilliance begins with these lyrics:

When the walls fell
And the hungry child
Cried out for help
Did You hear the sound?
Did Your heart break?
Does Your heart break now?

And then, as if that question were being answered, the sky opened up. Thick drops of water tumbled to earth. And that question reverberated until my run came to an end at the foot of the hill that leads to my house. The rain poured down the rest of the way home.

I don't think that God was actively speaking to me. That is to say, I don't think God rigged this experience. I suspect that the Almighty has more important things to do than sync weather patterns up with my playlist. The rain coming at that exact time was likely a coincidence. But it was also a reminder.

It was a reminder that God's heart does indeed break for those who are suffering. There is much about God that I am still trying to sort out and much more that I will never even grasp, but one of the things that I must believe about God is that God is not some cold, unmovable deity. I have to believe that God's heart breaks. That it breaks for starving children, families torn apart by war, lives shattered by natural disasters, men, women, and children tormented by hatred and prejudice (the second verse tackles the death of Eric Garner). If those things do not pierce God's heart then I'm not sure what I'm doing here. God's heart has to be with those who are hurting and thus are hearts should be there too.

That beautiful song never actually answers the question. It doesn't resolve. God doesn't respond. The tension holds. All of which makes "Does Your Heart Break" an appropriate song for the Lenten wilderness. And yet the rain on my run was a reminder, an echo of how God feels when God's children hurt. God's heart does break.