If we can’t imagine our own deepest desires, then we can’t understand Jesus’s desire for us. Perhaps we know that God wanted to create us and save us, but unless we experience our own desires, we can’t feel the intensity of the desire of the God-man Jesus for us. St Augustine said that “God loves each of us as if there were only one of us.”

The spiritual classic the Imitation of Christ says, “His glory and beauty are within you, and he delights in dwelling there. The Lord frequently visits the heart of man. There he shares with man pleasant conversations; welcome consolations, abundant peace and a wonderful intimacy.” We can only know this with our heart.

What does it mean to know with one’s heart? We are so used to knowing with our mind that we have to pause and remember experiences of knowing with our heart.

I can remember an intense experience of the heart. I had taken my wife and daughter to Paris and we arrived very early in the morning. We walked down to the Place de la Concorde and I happened to look at my daughter’s face (she was 20 and this was her first time in Paris). She had a radiant smile of wonder on her face as she looked around. My heart swelled in me and practically burst with happiness. That is what I mean by knowing with the heart.

I encourage you to remember experiences in your own life where your heart was filled with happiness and joy. That will give you some faint idea of how Jesus’s heart is filled with you.