“Heaviness in the heart of man maketh it stoop: but a good word maketh it glad” (Proverbs 12:25).

Do you ever feel you have so much trouble that even your heart is weighed down and bent over?  Did you ever feel as if something was wrong with you when your heart was breaking?

This proverb tells us that is only natural.  As our physical bodies can bend under a heavy load, so also our hearts can be bent down.

It is at times like this that a word of encouragement, an act or word of kindness, can ease the burden and cheer the heart.  The encouragement or kindness may have nothing to do with the troubles that beset our hearts, but they remind us of love, of mercy, of kindness, and so turn our hearts from those troubles, at least for a time, making the burden easier.

Of course, most of us know this — we’ve experienced it.  Someone has said or done something that lifted us when we were troubled.  The question for us is more challenging — how often have we provided that “good word”?

That person to whom you are speaking may be standing upright, but their heart may be stooping, bent over with grief and pain, whether you know it or not.  We can selfishly talk about what we want to talk about, or we can gladden their heart.  The choice is ours.

We need to be people who always look to speak a “good word”, to speak kindness and encouragement, to tell others of God’s love for them.  This world is full of “stooped over” hearts.