Through the evangelistic efforts of the Church, we are encouraged to “invite Jesus into our heart.” For someone seriously contemplating such an invitation, a pertinent question would be, “What are the ‘terms and conditions’ that should be attached to this invitation?” Is our ‘heart’ a type of spiritual Airbnb, where Jesus stays for a while, and re-arranges the decor in ways we would never have thought about? Or are their other options?

Seeing Jesus standing outside the empty tomb on Easter morning, Mary Magdalene’s first assumption was that he was the gardener (John 20:15). Perhaps she was onto something. What if we invite Jesus to be the gardener of our heart? The gardener is responsible for the fertility and the fruitfulness of the garden. The fertility of any soil is a function of both the chemistry and the texture of the soil. If the soil is packed down, it is not receptive to either seed or water. What sort of shape is the soil of our heart in? Life can walk all over us, even sometimes stomp all over us, so that the soil of our heart is packed down pretty hard. Our hearts have been hardened. For the sake of our fertility, for the sake of being able to bear much fruit, the gardener may have to break our hearts to make us receptive towards the seed that he will plant in us. This time of preparation may not be particularly pleasant, and we may be tempted to back out, but Jesus gives us a prayer for this scenario, “Not my will, but yours be done,” (Luke 22:42). At harvest time we can look back and say, “What heartbreak?”

Once the seed sprouts, what does the gardener use to bring about the potential of our soil chemistry? We are watered and fertilized by the very being of the Gardener in the Eucharistic sacraments. The Gardener and the seed are mysteriously one and the same. In Ephesians 4:13, St. Paul talks about “growing... to maturity, to the measure of the full stature of Christ.”

If you are contemplating inviting Jesus into your heart, the first question might be, “Are you going to extend an invitation for him to come in as a guest, or to come in as the gardener?”’