My heart becomes like wax, it melts in my heart, says the Scripture.
It is necessary to cultivate love, to protect it, to nourish it. Avoiding the mannerism, we must practice the affective manifestations of piety - without reducing love to these manifestations -, put our heart into kissing a crucifix or looking at an image of Our Lady..., and not want to go to God only "by force of arms", which in the long run fatigues and impoverishes the relationship with Christ. We must not forget that in our relations with God the heart is a precious auxiliary. "Your intelligence is dull, inactive: you make useless efforts to coordinate ideas in the presence of the Lord: a real dullness!
"Do not strive, do not worry. -Hear me well: it is the hour of the heart "9. It is perhaps the moment to say a few simple words to him, as when we were a few years old; to repeat with attention ejaculations full of piety, of affection; because those who walk on the paths of God's love know how important it is to do the same thing every day: words, actions, gestures that Love transfigures daily into others to be used for the first time.
To love God with all our heart, we must frequently turn to the Most Holy Humanity of Jesus - and perhaps read for a time a life of Christ - and contemplate him as perfect God and perfect Man. Observe his behavior with those who come to him: his merciful compassion, his love for all. In a particular way, we will meditate on his Passion and Death on the Cross, his boundless generosity when he suffers the most. At other times we will address God with the same words with which human love expresses itself, and we can even turn songs that speak of this clean and noble love into true prayer.
Love for God - like all true love - is not only sentiment; it is not sentimentality, nor empty sentimentality, for it must lead to multiple operative manifestations; indeed, it must direct all aspects of man's life. "Works are love and not good reasons". Works, works! -Purpose: I will continue to tell you many times that I love you - how many times have I repeated it to you today - but, with your grace, it will be above all my conduct, it will be the little things of each day - with mute eloquence - that will cry out before you, showing you my Love".