The heart day is coming up. You know the day. Gluey homemade cards from elementary classmates and equally sticky heart-shaped cookies with too much frosting. That’s how heart day was introduced into my life. Bless those teachers and homeroom moms!
Somewhere along the way, we all probably figure out that heart cards and heart cookies are just the tip of the iceberg. In the culture of “extra” that we live in, there is opportunity to overdo or to think everyone else is being indulged except us.
Several years back, I recall reading of a man arrested at his local grocery store for shoplifting a bouquet and chocolates on February 14. He told the arresting officers his wife was really going to be mad if he didn’t bring gifts home to her that day, but he was broke. My heart broke. For him, for his wife, for the burden implied. Heart days shouldn’t be such hard days.
I don’t mean to be sappy, or indulgent, or dismissive. Like almost every occasion, meaning and intent evolve over the years. Perspective is key. Teaching kindness and thoughtfulness is so welcome. Reminding someone they matter, even are loved, is always in season. Personally, many of you do that for me regularly. A kind note or message, an encouragement, a smile or a shared laugh, along with margin for a pang of the heart without embarrassment or dismissal.
If we know Jesus, or if we know about Him and are going deeper to know Him and His intent for our hearts, then our hearts should not be now as they were. It’s like the reverse of the cookie. From crumbly to whole.
Perhaps this is the extra to offer someone for heart day: it is possible and probable to move from broken to well-patched to over-full!
I’m wondering how it might be if we chose to focus on loving well rather than focusing on what is missing. Jesus’ commandment in Matthew 22.37-39 supplies the means and the motive … You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
My close today is borrowed from a homemade heart card received last year … Wishing a lovely Valentine’s Day with the awareness of the immeasurable love of our God.
You, each of you, are so loved! Blessings, Colleen