If you are not close to the Lord at the time of the death of your child, then it is its job, and it will rip your heart out and leave you completely hollow inside. So that when all your internal searching comes up empty, that you may humble yourself and turn towards Christ, and come to Christ, until all your sorrows becomes joy and all your pain turns to love.

But meanwhile you feel your heart ripped out so literally that you feel you could look down and see it beating in your hands. What do you do when your heart is in your hands, and there is nothing left inside you? There is no desire to put the heart back in. And you can’t toss it away. So you give it away. And the Shepard’s hands so gently receive it from you. He holds it so carefully, and so sure, as he has handled millions of hearts before yours. He heals it and purifies it. And your heart is malleable in his hands, and he makes of it what he will.