When My Heart Is Overwhelmed {and a free printable}

There are those moments in life when you’re just overwhelmed. We go through these moments — work is busy, home life is busy, motherhood and homemaking are busy, there are chores that need to be completed and projects that need to be started. There are places to go — needs and wants. And through it all there are flaws and imperfect people living in an imperfect world with less than perfect actions and reactions…and their hearts are just as overwhelmed as ours.

I have found that it is far easier in my heart to stuff it down and deal with it on my own. But the heart is deceitful…

“The heart is deceitful above all things, and beyond cure. Who can understand it?”

Jeremiah 17:8

King David has always captivated me. His story is one of strength and courage, but my, what a flaw drenched man he was. He was a warrior and a king, a man after Gods heart — but he strayed off that straight and narrow at times.

I cannot imagine the things that weighed down David’s heart. And yet even in his greatest times of despair, he cried out to God. Not only did he cry out to God, he believed that God would hear his cry and save him.

My busyness, my heartaches, my embarrassments, my angers and my weighed down heart cannot compare to Davids. And yet, He cares for me. God hears my cry, even when it is radiating from my heart rather than my mouth. If He cares enough and does not forget the sparrows that fall from the sky — and I am worth far more than sparrows to Him — then what makes me think He wouldn’t care about my heart as well?

The heart tells us those things — your troubles aren’t bad enough to care about, you’re acting silly and emotional, try having a real struggle in life to be overwhelmed with.

But scripture tells us the complete opposite.

And I see my hands cupping an ocean of doubts, fears, worries, emotions and struggles. Don’t move too quickly, or they will all spill over. Round and round we go, on a merry go round of daily life. How do I not spill a little here and a little there?

Then His hands appear….outstretched, rough and peaceful. They are more than capable of holding it. Give it to me, I’ll hold it…..

And my hands open up like flood gates to pass over an overwhelming ocean into the hands of my Creator, making a conscious choice to never take it back. My hands are still soaking wet with the remnants of stinging salt water, but there is freedom.

You see, as your hands fill with the overwhelming thoughts and emotions, the struggles and messes, they pile one on top of the other…..on top of the other. Letting go of them as they come to you is the only way to ensure freedom.

We could all learn a little lesson from King David — when my heart is overwhelmed, lead me to the rock that is higher than I. Because come wind or storm or rain or flood…..He’s still there….He’s still higher….He is still God, and I am still man. And whether we like it or not, He wants all of it, every single bit of it. Our hearts were not created to “do it all”. But our Creator was….