God Makes Better

"A merry heart does good, like medicine, but a broken spirit dries the bones."

Proverbs 17:22

Have you ever laughed so hard you cried?  That's what happened to me last night as our family played a board game together.  Something struck me funny and the more I thought about it, the funnier it was.  Later I was reminded of this verse and the tendency is to quote the first part without realising there is a second, contrasting part.  This verse explains the way we feel on the inside has an impact on physical health and vitality.  The way we feel impacts our perspective and response.

As a fit of laughter which soon passes shows, humour and merriment are limited in their effects.  Medicine ingested has a temporary effect and must be taken again when needed.  There are maladies, however, no amount of medicine can cure.  Laughter may temporarily lighten the mood, but it is no cure for folly as Solomon wrote in Ecclesiastes 7:6, "For like the crackling of thorns under a pot, so is the laughter of the fool. This also is vanity."  Solomon knew laughter in itself was vanity and could not cure a broken spirit, for one of the most humorous people I ever knew ended his life by jumping off a bridge.  The joy of the LORD is distinct from merriment because it is a fruit of the Holy Spirit Who fills believers in Christ by grace.

King Solomon observed a broken spirit dries the bones.  This speaks of one who is afflicted, depressed and beat down.  Feeling down on the inside has the ability to sap gladness, thanksgiving and enjoyment of all the gifts and blessings God has provided all people.  Even feelings of brokenness can have curative properties for our character which endure.  Solomon also wrote of these benefits in Ecclesiastes 7:2-3:  "Better to go to the house of mourning than to go to the house of feasting, for that is the end of all men; and the living will take it to heart. ³ Sorrow is better than laughter, for by a sad countenance the heart is made better."  Merriment can leave us empty in the end without self-examination, and sorrow moves us to seek a cure for what ails us.  Jesus came to heal the brokenhearted, and thus in Him we find genuine hope that endures.  When we are sick we want to "get better" (as in a return to the good health we enjoyed previously) and the LORD can utilise continued sickness or sorrow to make us better people than before--more like Christ.

God has given humans the capacity for merriment and sorrow, the opportunity to consider how we feel and to decide to adopt God's perspective in every season of life.  A broken spirit needs more than medicine but supernatural healing from within by the power of Jesus Christ.  When we realise we are without strength, looking to the LORD in faith lifts ours spirits.  Whether your heart is merry or your spirit cast down, take to heart the words of Habakkuk 3:17-19:  "Though the fig tree may not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines; though the labour of the olive may fail, and the fields yield no food; though the flock may be cut off from the fold, and there be no herd in the stalls--¹⁸ yet I will rejoice in the LORD, I will joy in the God of my salvation.¹⁹ The LORD God is my strength; He will make my feet like deer's feet, and He will make me walk on my high hills."  Though Habakkuk suffered and there were no obvious signs of his situation improving, he was able to better look to God in faith as his depth of character grew.  In the end this was of far greater benefit than hysterical laughter.