When the Lord Softens the Heart

The Lord’s timing always amazes me. Not because it’s predictable—quite the opposite—but because it always arrives when I’ve reached the end of myself. His timing never matches mine, yet it always meets me exactly where I need it to. For so long, I’ve carried a weight that I didn’t even recognize as bitterness. It sat quietly beneath the surface of my prayers, disguised as strength, masked as survival. I told myself I was just managing, just pushing through, just doing what needed to be done. But in truth, I had stopped seeing the beauty around me.

When life changes in ways we never asked for, our hearts can harden without warning. We start building walls instead of altars. We start bracing instead of believing. I didn’t realize how tight I was gripping that invisible limp I’ve carried since Tim’s diagnosis—how much of my spirit had become bent beneath the burden of it all. PNES doesn’t just change the one who bears the seizures; it transforms the lives of those who love them. It’s the helplessness that wounds you most—the moments when you want to fix what you cannot touch, heal what only Heaven can.

I’ve spent 22 months watching the man I love fight a battle most people can’t see, all while facing a world that rarely understands. There are those who look and turn away. There are those who could help but don’t. And there are those who whisper assumptions instead of prayers. And somewhere along that road, my heart—once so open, so full of compassion—grew tired. It began to ache not only from grief but from the quiet injustice of it all.

But the Lord… oh, the Lord knows the human heart. He knows when we’ve carried too much for too long. He knows when our souls are bruised from holding it together. And in His perfect, miraculous timing, He begins the work of softening us again. Not by erasing the pain, but by redeeming it. Not by removing the weight, but by sharing it.

I prayed recently for healing—not just for Tim, but for my own heart. I asked God to fix the limp that no one sees, the one caused by years of trying to carry both faith and fear in the same weary hands. And as I prayed, I realized I wasn’t asking Him to make everything easy. I was asking Him to make everything holy. To take this ache, this exhaustion, this frustration, and turn it into something sacred.

The Lord reminded me that healing often begins in the quiet surrender—the moment we admit that we’re not okay, and that’s okay. When we stop pretending to be strong and start letting His strength become enough. The bitterness I carried wasn’t born of hatred; it was born of heartbreak. It came from loving deeply, from fighting hard, from wanting so badly for things to be different. But the thing about bitterness is that it blinds us—it steals the color from life, the beauty from blessings. And the enemy loves that. He loves when we focus on what’s broken instead of who holds the power to make us whole.

But when God steps in, He changes the view. Suddenly, the same life that felt so heavy begins to glimmer again with quiet beauty. You start to notice little mercies—Tim’s laugh on a calm morning, the peace that comes between storms, the strength you didn’t know you had. You start to see that even in suffering, grace abounds. Even in waiting, He is working. Even in weakness, love holds.

I don’t know what tomorrow will bring. I still don’t know how long this season will last, or what kind of road lies ahead for us. But I do know this: the Lord has not abandoned us here. His timing may stretch my patience, but it never fails His purpose. And I am learning that freedom doesn’t always mean the removal of pain—it often means the release of its hold on your heart.

So today, I am choosing to let go. To lay down the bitterness, the heartbreak, the invisible weight that’s shaped my steps for too long. I’m choosing to believe that even when life feels unfair, God is still just. That even when I can’t see the way forward, He’s already walked ahead of me.

And maybe that’s what healing really looks like—not the absence of pain, but the presence of peace in the middle of it. Not forgetting what’s happened, but finding the courage to trust again despite it. Because when the Lord begins to heal the heart, He doesn’t just mend the cracks—He fills them with light.

So I will praise Him in this process. I will look for the beauty I’ve missed. I will see the grace hidden in each ordinary day. And I will hold to this truth: His timing may not erase my pain, but it will redeem it. And when it does, my heart—free at last—will beat again with gratitude instead of grief.

And I will finally walk without the limp of bitterness, not because the burden is gone, but because I’ve learned Who carries it with me.