Sid Roth - Heal a Broken Heart
Sid Roth: Hello. Sid Roth here. Welcome to my world where it's naturally supernatural. I'm so excited about this show. My guest is going to teach you the missing message of Jesus. It's there. It is in the Gospels. But it's missing today, and that is Jesus came to heal the broken hearted. And you see, you can't get everything God promises to you if you have a broken heart. And it's my conviction in a broken world with a broken devil, with broken people, how do you expect to have a healed heart unless Jesus heals your heart. Now have you ever felt that something is wrong and you don't know what it is. What a frustrating feeling. That's what happened to my friend John McTernan. John, what was going on in your life? You're a believer. You're speaking before people. You're not supposed to have a problem, but you do. What's your problem?
John McTernan: Sid, it's internal and it's kind of hard to explain. But I felt a drag side. I felt like a car going down the road on the interstate at 65 miles an hour at all sorts of power, speed, and yet it was holding back. There was a power drain inside of me. I could feel it. I knew something was wrong. I had brought it before the Lord for many, many years, and it just sat there. It didn't go. I had no idea what it was.
Sid Roth: Okay. So one day he's minding his own business, listening to a radio program and the light bulb went on. What happened?
John McTernan: There was a woman being interviewed about, she was a psychologist, Christian psychologist, and she's being interviewed by her research on children of divorce and how every one of them, virtually every one of them had a broken heart, and it affected them where the developed loneliness. That was an outstanding trait of a broken heart of a child from a divorced family. And it was like, bingo, my parents were divorced. I didn't even know them together. They were divorced before I could remember. And I began to think, and I'm saying, broken heart, maybe that's what I have. And I sought the Lord about it, and I prayed, and at that point, I didn't know I had a broken heart. And if you, Sid, had come to me like let's say years before that and you said, "John, I didn't know you had a broken heart," I would go, how? How would it be broken? I had no idea at all. And when I sought the Lord
Sid Roth: You know, I'm reminded the Bible says, "The heart is the most deceitful thing". Here he is a believer with a broken heart and he's so programmed to operate with that broken heart he doesn't even know it's broken.
John McTernan: That's exactly right, Sid. That's exactly right. So I knew Luke 4:18. And in Luke 4:18, that is the ministry of Jesus Christ. And we all know that he came to save us from sin. Right?
Sid Roth: Of course.
John McTernan: But it doesn't end there. When you look at Luke 4:18, it says, "And he came to heal the broken hearted, to deliver the captives, to open the eyes of the blind and to set at liberty them that are bruised". We stop right at the salvation message. But if you look in the Bible, there's a semi-colon, and right after it, it says, "The Lord came to heal the broken hearted".
Sid Roth: There are many other areas that some have had a broken heart of. I mean, a divorced home, that's enough. But there are a lot of other areas, like what?
John McTernan: Sid, rejection, especially with children. I have come to see it's much easier than we realize to break a child's heart. Their heart is very tender and it's very easy to break a child's heart. But rejection, death. Death can really break a heart. I have found with women, abortion, devastating with breaking the heart. Physical abuse, sexual abuse, the military with men, women in the military now also. But that, what they see and what happens can break their heart. We call it like post-stress, you know, the trauma and much of that is really a broken heart.
Sid Roth: But you know what? Just the peer pressure of a young child going to school and maybe they're not so pretty, and maybe they hear someone laughing at them, they say nothing. But in a child's mind, that's enough to do it. So what was the revelation you had when you started praying?
John McTernan: My mother had remarried. Now there is no way on my own I could remember this, because we're going back now to when I was six years old. And my stepfather, I don't think, I know he didn't do this to be malicious. But he approached when I was about six years old about being adopted, and I had no idea what he was talking about.
Sid Roth: You thought he was your natural father?
John McTernan: No, no. I had, my father would come and visit me, and he was a good friend. I knew him as Joe. I didn't call him Dad or anything. I knew him as Joe. And my stepfather wanted to block out my father from coming, and he talked to me about adoption. I had no idea what he was talking about. Finally, it dawned on me. I had like a revelation that Joe was my father and this man was my stepfather. And I remember I said to him...
Child: When my name change, can I still see Joe?
Man: No, you'll have my name.
Child: No. My name John McTernan.
John McTernan: And I knew right then and there the whole thing opened up. I understood perfectly at six years old and I knew if I told my father he would protect me from what was going on. It was a complete revelation, but it broke my heart.
Sid Roth: Hold that thought. When we come back, we're going to find out what God did that so changed his life, that people don't even recognize him. He doesn't even recognize himself after his heart is healed by God Himself. But better than that, how about having your broken heart healed. Don't go away.
Sid Roth: I mean, what a devastating thing. A young boy, the one that's been with him his whole life that he thinks is his father and he knew his natural father, but he didn't know him as "father". And his father brings him, in the basement and tells him the truth. How old were you?
John McTernan: I figured about six.
Sid Roth: At six, what affect did it have on you?
John McTernan: From that moment on I did not want to live with my mother and my stepfather. I wanted to be with my dad. And it brought in, it developed that spirit of loneliness was deep with me. I had, it was a supernatural spiritual loneliness. It brought a feeling of rejection in. It actually brought fear into me because I remember I was afraid he would try that again. And I never was, from that day on, I was never comfortable in the family. And it devastated me inside as a little six year old. And that was that problem. It broke my heart at six and it carried over when I came to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ.
Sid Roth: Okay. You have the revelation that you have a broken heart. You now realize when it happened.
John McTernan: Yes.
Sid Roth: You know exactly. What did you do about it?
John McTernan: I cried out to the Lord to heal my heart. And Sid, it took me with the Lord about two or three weeks of prayer. And I can remember laying in bed at night with tears rolling down out of my eyes with this feeling of loneliness and emptiness, and it got to the point where I realized then that I know why a spouse will die like within a year after a spouse passes away.
Sid Roth: I've noticed that pattern.
John McTernan: That loneliness, that's what I actually felt. It felt like I was dying. That's how severe it was. And then I cried out and I said, "Lord, if I die over this then I go to be with you, but I'm staying and I'm believing you're going to heal my heart". And literally, I could feel relief. It like came like that. It just came like up and out.
Sid Roth: It sounds easy, John.
John McTernan: Well those two weeks, three weeks leading up to it, for me, was not easy. But the Lord delivered. I began a whole new man. That emergency brake feeling came off.
Sid Roth: But what about that fear, the loneliness, the loneliness you explained, the rejection, what about those things?
John McTernan: I began to see how I operated in my life. One of the healing, one of the ministries of Jesus Christ is to open the eyes of the blind. And all of a sudden I began to see like now that my heart was healed actions that I did to protect that heart, and also the way I interacted with people with the fear of rejection and not wanting to be rejected, and things I said, and things. There was a whole complete revelation and I began to confess it to the Lord and say, "Lord, I'm not living with fear anymore". I didn't even know it was there.
Sid Roth: I heard a man once say, God never sets you free of your friends. He sets you free of your enemies. And he had no idea there was an enemy called fear. But this is the amazing thing. Once the heart is restored then these other critters that are enemies, they literally have to go.
John McTernan: That's right.
Sid Roth: It's so wonderful. But tell me when the Bible talks about the ministry of Jesus was to restore the broken hearted, what does the word "broken" mean in Hebrew?
John McTernan: That's a real good question. And it's actually Hebrew and Greek really mean the same thing. It means a violent shattering. There's the word "violent". And it's like you have like this glass here and I took it and I just didn't drop it, but I threw it down on the ground.
Sid Roth: There would be no way to restore that.
John McTernan: It splinters apart and that is what the Bible describes as a broken heart. And Sid, there is nothing human on this earth that can heal a broken heart. It can only be, it's supernatural, it can only be healed by Jesus Christ. That's his ministry.
Sid Roth: Tell me about the woman with ulcerated colitis.
John McTernan: Well what happened, Sid, is when my heart was healed, all of a sudden I would come in contact with people and in my mind I would hear, I would look at you for example and I'd hear "broken hearted, broken hearted". And I would go up to you very politely, I just didn't yell at you. I'd say, "Excuse me, but I believe the Lord is telling me you have a broken heart". And people would start crying and it was amazing. The Lord is putting people across my path who need to be ministered to. So this ministry started to develop, just happened when I'd see instant results. Sometimes the results would take a while, but instant results. And this one woman had a powerful spirit of rejection. It happened when she was about five or six years old, just like you mentioned, rejected by kids, and all her life this rejection just continued. She had two husbands that left her and they liked divorced her on a Friday, and then married another woman on a Monday. And that, she was just, she had a like self-hatred of herself. And when I ministered to her about the broken heart it was very hard for her to receive that God loved her because of her broken heart. Even though she believed in the Lord, I know that this sounds weird, but that's what happens with a broken heart. Jesus was her savior. But the reality of calling God, Abba Father, she couldn't do it. She said, "I can't do it". It took a couple prayer sessions. And she ulcerated colitis where about four or five years she was in the final stage of it. I mean, it was critical. She was anemic, bleeding severely. Finally, she broke through with Abba Father, her heart was healed and that point my ministry, now what I do is if someone has physical issues, when I pray with them for a broken heart, we also pray for the physical issue. Because a lot of times the physical issue is caused by the broken heart, the fear and anxiety, and tension. So we prayed and her ulcerated intestines were healed right there on the spot.
Sid Roth: Once the heart is healed, the emotions get healed. The physical body gets healed.
John McTernan: Yes.
Sid Roth: John has even gone into mental institutions in hopeless cases. One of the most hopeless cases they had in a mental institution was her heart was healed, she was healed. But I'll tell you what, I want you to pray a supernatural prayer with John, because this is what he found out. The gift is growing. The same thing happened with me. I started laying hands on people and they got physically healed. Then I started speaking it, not even laying hands, and they got just as healed. I'll have him pray for you when we come back.
Sid Roth: Now we find out in the Bible amazing supernatural blessings that God has given to Abraham. But there's a tie-in between a heart being broken and receiving these supernatural blessings. There is, like with John, there is a disconnect and many people don't understand this. Explain that.
John McTernan: When our heart is healed, it puts us in a new relationship with God. It's like when you have an earthly father and you're afraid of him for whatever reason, you shy back, you're afraid to talk to him, you're afraid to ask him. Well with a broken heart, that can carry over towards our attitude. And God tells us to call him "Abba Father". And those attitudes towards an earthly father, we can project towards God. But he's not like that towards us. So a broken heart can break the feeling, or block the feeling of how much God loves us, how much He wants to bless us, and also the ministry of Lord Jesus is to open the eyes of the blind. So once our heart is healed, Sid, it's a progression. Salvation, healing of the heart, setting the captives free, opening the eyes of the blind and then setting at liberty them that are bruised, it's a progression of what God does in our life. So when our heart is healed and we're set free, all of a sudden there's no blockage between us and Abba Father, and we believe that He'll bless us then.
Sid Roth: So very briefly, will you tell me, I mean, John gets calls from people that have loved ones in mental institutions. Tell me about one.
John McTernan: A friend of mine asked me to minister to his sister who was believer, and she has been in and out of the psychiatric ward for severe depression. She had been there, she's in her 60's, she had been in there now for three months. And didn't know she was in there for three months.
Sid Roth: How bad was the depression?
John McTernan: The doctor said it was the worst he's ever seen. They were thinking of permanently institutionalizing her. When I visited her and I looked at her, Sid, if you could see depression, that was her. I mean, you could like cut it or touch her with depression. And there's a Bible right next to her. So I began to talk to her and she said, "I've been prayed over and so many people prayed over me, and I've gone to Christian psychologists". I said, "Did anyone ever pray for you for a broken heart"? And she went like this and she said, "No, never". I said, "That's the problem". Terry was her name. So we got into her background. When she was 16 years old she had a child out of wedlock. The child died and it ruptured her family, relationship with her family that destroyed her inside, and she went on a path of rejection and depression into the psychiatric ward. So we prayed and she forgave what happened, she believed the baby died because of what she did. Then she believed God punished her by taking the baby. She had a grudge towards God. She had to forgive herself. She had to forgive her parents. When that all came and then we prayed, Sid, the greatest, for me personally, I think miracle I had ever seen, her continence changed. She had this glow to the point where people in the psychiatric ward were saying to her, "What happened to you? You look so different". My friend said to me, "You did like a magic act. His name was John". I said, "What are you talking about"? He said, "That's not my sister". He goes, "I don't know who she is". He goes, "I've never seen anything like this from the depression to the joy". And they released her from the hospital, and she now is leading a normal life. The whole problem was a broken heart.
Sid Roth: Okay. Will you pray as God instructs for those that are watching, because I know that this is what you've been crying out to God for.
John McTernan: Yes. Father, we come before you in the awesome name of Jesus. And Lord, we bring the listeners before you and the key on their part is forgiveness, to forgive those that broke their heart, forgive themselves and maybe possibly we be reconciled with you from a grudge. Father, once that's done, I pray now that in the name of Jesus you take that shattered, broken, splintered heart and put it together, make it solid, make it one according to your word, and bind it with the power and the love of the Holy Spirit, never to be broken again. And bring the healing that comes with that, Father, the healing from fear and depression, and anxiety, and rejection where we can call you Abba Father and walk in love with you. And then, Father, we ask for the flow as the heart is healed, Lord, that issues like high blood pressure, heart problems, ulcerated colitis, Lord, fibromyalgia, all sorts of things that are triggered by the tension inside, the anxiety inside, the fear inside, Lord, that your natural healing virtue would flow through their bodies, and they be released and healed of these diseases and maladies. In Jesus' name I ask. Amen.
Sid Roth: Amen. Now I can tell this. There is a requirement in the Kingdom. It came from our teacher, our Lord, the Messiah of Israel, Jesus, the Anointed One. And this is what he says: "I will forgive you to the same degree, the same amount that you forgive other people". So how much do you want God to forgive you, 95 percent? You say, I don't feel like it. I don't deserve it. Doesn't count. Meaningless. God says, if you confess your sins He is just and faithful to forgive you of all unrighteousness and unforgiveness is a sin that blocks the hand of God. Unforgiveness is taking the arsenic you want your enemy to take. Stop it. Come to your senses. It's an act of your will. It's not a feeling. It's not emotion. So don't tell me you can't do it. You can do it. You want to please the Living God. There's no one else that you need to please. Please Him. Tell Him you choose to forgive that person out loud in Jesus' name and don't look back. And I'm going to tell you something. Now does it mean you have to trust them? Not until they earn it. But you can forgive them. I'm telling you, you can, because I have. And then ask Jesus to forgive you of everything you've ever done and say, "Jesus, I make you my Lord. Come inside of me. Take over my life. I love you, Lord". And then I pray that you experience the tangible presence of the love of the Living God, in Jesus' name.