With Valentine's Day coming up, everyone is rushing around buying presents for their friends, families, and significant others. Valentine's Day can be hectic. It can be happy for some, but it can be sad for others. Some people go all out celebrating, others do little. Some love the holiday, others are critical of it. However, Valentine's Day is much more than buying flowers or chocolates for those you love. It's a day celebrating love but we often get so caught up in celebrating love here on earth. We too often forget about where love comes from and who is love - God.
God is love; He is unconditional and pure love. His love is so deep that we cannot even begin to fathom how great it actually is. If God is the purest form of love, why shouldn't we celebrate Him and His love on this day of love?
Sure, buying all those presents for everyone and telling them you love them is great, but is it enough? What does celebrating His love really look like?
As Christians, having received God's love, we are called to love. We must love God first, and love our neighbors as ourselves second (Mark 12:31). We must love Christ before we can begin loving others because true love comes from God, and only those who know Him can know love and be love (1 John 4:8). Our love cannot be selfish, self-seeking, impatient, or one-way. It must be pure and true. We are called to love how God loves.
We must put others before ourselves. We must be willing to forgive others like Christ forgives us. We must be willing to swallow our pride when we are in the wrong. We must love no matter the person or the consequences.
Ultimately, we love because Christ first loved us. But how do we know that we are loved? If we are sinners (andwe all are) who are unworthy of God's perfect love, how can we know that He does love us, despite our shortcomings? We know and we believe because of Christ. God sent Christ down to this earth to die for our sins and bear the burden we deserve. He was sent so He could defeat sin and death, neither of which we could defeat, so that we may have eternal life with Him. True love is sacrifice. Jesus Christ did nothing to deserve the harshest death on the cross, while His disciples turned on Him and cursed Him. He deserved to be praised. However, He loved us so much that He humbled Himself enough to come die for our sins-- so that we may get the life we don't deserve. That is the beauty of grace, and that is the power of His love. So if Christ loved us, may we love Him first, and love others as ourselves this Valentine's Day and every day from here on out.
