Valentine’s Love!
I ‘m hoping that we all are celebrating today with someone you love! I also hope we all don’t get caught up in the commercialism so associated with this day. Just like Christmas, Easter and Thanksgiving, Valentine’s day has just become another day to sell cards, candy hearts and heart-shaped balloons! It’s one of those days that you feel an ‘obligation’ to get something for the one you love. There is a problem, though, with this ‘need’ for a special day to do something special for someone, or to show an act of love…especially for our spouses, whom we should be showing this kind of love to on a regular basis. How often we neglect to give this kind of love even to the ones closest to us (and I don’t mean getting ’something’ for them…that’s just an
example…I mean showing love in all sorts of ways). If we struggle to love those that are that close to us, how much more difficult is it to love those that Jesus tells us to love: the poor, the oppressed, the blind, the
hungry, the prisoners, rejected and outcast, and even those who hate us and are our enemies. Love is so difficult, and this is our primary calling. In fact Jesus said this is the ONLY law we must live by (Matt 22:35-40), and in another verse, He says Love is the way to inherit eternal life ( Luke 10:25-28 ). Those are some hard words to hear, considering the fact that we fail to love so often. We get so caught up in our busyness and our stuff that love takes a back burner; in our families, in our communities, and in our world. This IS the most excellent way, as Paul puts it in his letter to the Corinthians. We must learn to love!
So I will tell you a quick story about the real St. Valentine. There are many stories about St. Valentine and who he was and what he did. There is one that says that Valentine was martyred for helping Christians escape harsh Roman prisons where they were beaten and tortured. While he was imprisoned, waiting to be executed, he meets and falls in love with the jailer’s beautiful daughter, who studies the Scripture and prays with Valentine in prison every day. Now, she had been blind since birth, but one day during their time of prayer, she was miraculously healed from her blindness. The night before he was to be beheaded, he sends a note of affection to her, asking her to always remain near to God and continually thankful for her healing miracle. The note is signed “From Your Valentine”…the very first ‘Valentine’ ever sent. Click HERE for more info on St. Valentine.
