Let Not Your Heart Be Troubled

“Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in Me. . . . I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also.” —John 14:1–3, NKJV

John Bunyan, author of Pilgrim’s Progress, knew something of heart troubles, having lost his first wife, the mother of his four children. He also spent twelve years in prison for preaching without a license. While he was rotting in prison—wait, he did not rot in prison! He wrote Hearts’ Ease in Heart Trouble in prison. Based on John 14:1–3 (“Let not your heart be troubled”), Hearts’ Ease offered God’s promises and comfort for suffering, loss, and sorrow. I found a kindred spirit in Bunyan’s writings because great sorrow struck our family when I was a young mother. My husband, our thirteen-year-old son Tony, and our eleven-year-old son Joey lost their lives in a plane crash. Gone were any illusions about trouble and suffering only happening to others. This did not fit with any of my plans, hopes, and dreams.

I was going to marry a nice man, have a dozen red-haired sons, and drive an Audi. It never occurred to me that I could face terminal illnesses, addictions, divorces, financial failure, or the death of people I love. How could my heart not be troubled in a world full of such troubles? I waited by the phone as search and rescue combed the mountains of Alaska, looking for the small plane. We did not have to wait forever, although it seemed like it.

My own brother, a pilot, delivered the excruciating news: “There are no survivors.” Our two youngest children, who were home with me, pressed onto my lap, the three of us forming the tightest, hottest speck of excruciating agony in God’s whole gigantic universe. Does He know? Does He care? flashed through my mind.

And almost instantaneously, the answer followed: Yes, He knows; yes, He cares. My sorrows are His sorrows; my grief is His grief; my loss is His loss; and Jesus, too, will not see my family until the resurrection. As one with us, He endured our sorrows, troubles, and pain. He carries us, keeps us, provides for us, and comforts us. He is ours, and we are His.

The One who says, “Let not your heart be troubled,” is with us. Always.

Pat Arrabito