Digging Our Hearts from the Mulch

My daughter recently moved to a new school where, on the first day, she promptly fell hard for a little boy named Liam. According to our girl, Liam had “great hair,” was kind, and was smart. Apparently, this was the winning combination needed to steal her kindergarten heart.

Since that first day, we’ve heard about Liam regularly, about his recent unfortunate haircut, his move to another table (which crushed her spirit), and about her growing affection. She blushes when she talks about Liam. We are in so much trouble when she’s a teenager.

By the way, she’s sworn us to secrecy on the whole Liam love affair thing, so if you see her in Target, try to keep your knowledge on the down low.

During the week of Valentine’s Day, each of the students in her class was invited to decorate a container to receive Valentines from their classmates. Our sweet girl decorated hers with a giant red heart and the misshapen words, “I love Liam.” Whoa. This love affair was getting serious.

Avery went to preschool for two years before she started kindergarten. At each of her preschools, they maintained the same behavior tracking system her current school uses, involving coordinating colors with each student’s behavior for the day. Avery had never been on yellow—below “Outstanding!” and “Good job!”—a day in her life until her teacher told her to be quiet and she felt she just couldn’t do that. You see, her BFF was informing her that Liam said he liked her.

She came home with the day colored yellow on her chart, her face painted red, and her heart ablaze. No yellow day could bring her back down to earth; she was on cloud nine.

However, a couple of days ago, she came home distraught. It seems while playing in the sand, she discovered a shiny plastic heart in mint condition. After cleaning it off, she presented it to Liam, who promptly replied, “Ew, gross!” His crew of little friends then joined him in burying Avery’s heart in the mulch. Ouch.

As she recounted the events of the day to me, she asked, “Why would he even do that? Why would he bury my heart in the mulch?” I explained that sometimes the people we care about make poor choices, ones that hurt us. I elaborated, noting that none of us are our best selves all the time. Our hearts will sometimes be buried in the mulch by the ones we care about most. We’ll have to dig it out and forgive them. She pondered. After a bit, she returned from her craft table with an ornate card covered in pink and red hearts. On the front, it read, “ I forgive you.” She proudly opened it and read the inside to me. “Dear Liam, I forgive you for burying my heart in the mulch.”

I am ashamed to admit I laughed out loud—at the card, at the thought of future boys for whom she might need to craft a similar card.

I also laughed because I knew Liam would never see that card. While I was happy to teach my daughter not to lose any sleep over Liam’s poor choices, I didn’t feel like he needed another opportunity to bury her heart in the mulch so soon. I helped her “lose” the card before it could make it to her backpack.

As I relayed the story to a dear friend, she astutely noted how encouraging it was that my daughter had not internalized this rejection. There was never a moment when she said, “What’s wrong with me that Liam doesn’t want my heart?” Instead, she said, “Why would he even do that?”

My friend and I reflected on the years we’d spent believing it was our fault when those we loved buried our hearts in the mulch. We languished over what we could have done differently. We were often hesitant to forgive, or trust, again.

My little girl was happy to forgive, dig her heart out from the mulch, and move on. I wonder if it’s because children grasp hold of the truth and cling to it. The kind of truth we teach them as we’re laying them in their beds at night and kissing their heads isn’t simply a notion or an idea to them; it takes root in their hearts. So when we tell them, “Jesus loves you. You can trust him with your heart. He will never leave you or forsake you,” they believe us. They know this means they are intimately acquainted with the One who will never bury their hearts in the mulch.

Scripture tells us God said, “‘I have loved you with an everlasting love; Therefore with lovingkindness I have drawn you and continued My faithfulness to you’” (Jeremiah 31:3 AMP).

What about us? Do we know this? Has this truth taken root? Do we trust him with our hearts? Do we forgive those in our past who’ve not been their best selves? Have we left our hearts behind, buried in the mulch, too afraid to dig them out and trust again?

Little boys on the playground, and, yes, even the ones we love, will sometimes hurt us, but we are intimately acquainted with the One who will never leave us or forsake us. Are we living and loving like it?

Let’s dig our hearts out from the mulch today, dust them off, and entrust them to the One to whom we’ll never have to draft a “Liam-style” forgiveness card.

Stacey Philpot is wife to Ryan and mother to Hayden, Julie, and Avery. She is a writer, goofball, and avid reader. Stacey has ministered for over 15 years to youth and women in her community in order to equip them to go deeper in Christ. She blogs at aliferepaired.com and chronicallywhole.com.

Photograph © Brannon Naito, used with permission