Enlarged heart

Loss of any kind will inevitably do one of two things. It will constrict and harden your heart or loss will soften and enlarge your heart.

A long time ago Kristin and I fostered a newborn infant who we planned on adopting. His name was Matthew, and we picked him up from a Roman Catholic adoption agency in Knoxville and brought him home to our place in East Tennessee. We couldn’t believe how beautiful he was and how uncommonly blessed we were to have him.

We took him to church on Palm Sunday and everybody was amazed and treated him like baby Jesus just arrived from Bethlehem.

Then his birth mother changed her mind. She couldn’t keep him, that’s why he was up for adoption, but she couldn’t let him go either. So, on Good Friday the social worker who placed him in our arms came to our house to take him away. As she took him she may as well have taken our beating hearts out of our chests and placed them in the back seat of her minivan next to Matthew’s car carrier.

I’ll never forget it…we stood there in the driveway broken beyond repair and just before she put the car in reverse the social worker rolled down her window and said, “I’m so sorry. I’ll be in touch. I’ll call you to let you know how he’s doing in a few days.”

I was too sad to be angry. “Sure, sure. Thanks” I said. We never heard from her again.

I have no idea how Matthew is doing. I do not know if he is alive. I do not know if he is thriving or struggling mightily. 15 years later I still feel the loss of him, our son.

But as I continue to let Jesus’ teaching about losing our lives to save them wash over me, I can also feel the loss saving me, that is, expanding my heart to a size it would not have grown to otherwise. And in my expanded heart, which is Jesus’ heart planted in my chest, there is room for all parents who have lost children.

In my expanded heart, which is Jesus’ heart planted in my chest, there is room for social workers who have to run terrible errands and make promises that they cannot keep. I would have said the same thing were I in her shoes, I am certain of it.

In my expanded heart, which is Jesus’ heart planted in my chest, there is room for mothers who are trying desperately to build families and are running into roadblocks that they are powerless to overcome.

Jesus' death on the cross is an outpouring of compassion for and solidarity with everybody who has ever lost anything - which is all of us.

The simplest definition of a Christian that I know is this: A Christian is one who says, “Yes,” to love and thus makes a choice to allow all of life’s losses to expand and grow his or her heart to such a size as is sufficient to welcome others who suffer the same. My heart has been renovated by loss and enlarged by love. There is room, so much room.