Verse of the day: tear your heart, not your clothes (Joel 2. 13)
Tearing of clothing and other outward signs of religious emotion can easily manifest themselves and are often hypocritical. Feeling true regret is much more difficult, and therefore much less common. Men will comply with the most diverse and detailed standards of religious ceremonies that please the flesh. But true faith is quite humiliating, sought after and complete, and does not attract the carnal taste of men. Some prefer something more ostentatious, superficial and worldly. Ears and eyes are satiated, vanity is nourished, and complacency is exalted. However, they are wrong, because at the time of death and on the Day of Judgment, the soul needs something more substantial than ceremonies and rituals that it can rely on. Offered without a sincere heart, any form of worship is a blatant and shameless mockery of heavenly majesty. The heartbreak is the work of God and lived with solemnity. It is a secret sadness lived personally, not as a ritual, but as a deep and convincing work of the soul, by the Holy Spirit, in the heart of each believer. It is not a question to be simply discussed and believed, but must be experienced acutely and sensitively in each child of the living God. The tearing of the heart is powerfully humiliating and cleanses completely from sin; but then gently prepare the gracious consolations that proud spirits cannot receive. It is a distinctive characteristic, because it belongs to God’s chosen ones, and only to them. Today’s verse commands us to tear out the heart, but naturally it is as hard as marble. So how do we do this? We have to take our hearts to Calvary. The voice of a near-dead Savior broke the rocks at that time and is as powerful today as it was that day. O blessed Holy Spirit, let us hear the death cry of the Lord Jesus, and our hearts will be torn, like the men who tore their clothes on the day of mourning.