Valentine’s Day

by Angie Thomas

Valentine’s Day…some love it….others dread it or even despise it.  As with almost everything in our culture, the uniqueness of a holiday is often lost and misconstrued by commercialism and unrealistic expectations.

What if God wanted to really communicate to you His great love for you? We have tossed around the phrase “God loves you” so much in our Christian culture that it has quite possibly lost its power to penetrate our hearts and minds.  But God can remove the darkness around our hearts and give us new and clear perspective of His deep, pure, and passionate love for us!  Read Song of Solomon and be amazed at the intense, passionate way God describes His love for us.  Reflect on the amazing new heart we have been given in Christ because of His love for us.  Read the story of the crucifixion in one of the Gospels and consider the deep pain and anguish your Savior experienced because of His love for you.

As we start this journey to deepen our love for Jesus, the place we must start is reflecting on His unimaginable love for us.  Listen to Ephesians 3:14-21 (The Message):

My response is to get down on my knees before the Father, this magnificent Father who parcels out all heaven and earth. I ask him to strengthen you by his Spirit—not a brute strength but a glorious inner strength—that Christ will live in you as you open the door and invite him in. And I ask him that with both feet planted firmly on love, you’ll be able to take in with all followers of Jesus the extravagant dimensions of Christ’s love. Reach out and experience the breadth! Test its length! Plumb the depths! Rise to the heights! Live full lives, full in the fullness of God.

God can do anything, you know—far more than you could ever imagine or guess or request in your wildest dreams! He does it not by pushing us around but by working within us, his Spirit deeply and gently within us.

May His Spirit work deeply and gently within us!