In Honor of Valentine’s Day
Just the other day, Sophie (my 8 year old) came running into the kitchen exclaiming that she needed to hurry and buy valentines for her class mates. “We only had five days to do it, Mom!” She’s so much like me!
PINIMAGEMe – 7 years old
When I was her age, I always enjoyed Valentines Day because my mom would take me to the store and I’d pick out my favorite valentines. They’d usually be the ones with fluffy baby animals on them and cute sayings. I’d bring them home and look through them. I always picked specific cards for specific people, “The kitty cat goes to my friend Lisa because we’re best friends. The monkey goes to Michael because he always makes me laugh. The hamster goes to Jimmy because it’s my least favorite card and he’s always mean to me at school.” It was serious business!
I remember coming home on the 14th and looking through my valentines. I would read each one and look at the picture.
What was this person trying to say to me by sending this picture and writing their name in this certain way? (True story.)
Sometimes boys in my class would send me valentines with hearts drawn next to my name or an extra cute picture on the front. It was obvious to me they were letting me know they kinda liked me.
Here I must interject, Mark constantly tells me that females tend to over analyze male behavior. Me? Never! That’s absurd! He says when you ask a guy what he’s thinking and they don’t have an answer it’s probably because there’s nothing going on in their head…no thoughts at all. I imagine he probably wrote his valentines in front of the television while eating potato chips – the card you got was determined by where your name was on the list and which one he picked up next!
Anyway, back to the story…I loved Valentines Day, AND I loved Conversation Hearts! Not a Valentine’s Day went by in elementary school that I didn’t receive a couple of boxes of Conversation Hearts.
Did you know that the first Conversation Hearts were invented in the 1860s by the brother of NECCO’s founder? These first hearts had printed paper notes tucked inside. The lengthy, old-fashioned sayings included such wistful thoughts as “Please send a lock of your hair by return mail.” Every Valentine’s Day the company presents new messages on the tiny colored hearts that have been a holiday tradition since the Civil War. The messages change over the years and of course they’ve gotten much shorter. This years hearts include sayings like, “Text Me”, “Tweet Me” and “You Rock”. (information courtesy of Holly Hartman – Information Please® Database, © 2007 Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.)
Many years have passed since elementary school and the definition of love has changed dramatically for me. I have God to thank for that! Love is sacrifice. Love is choosing the good of someone else over my own desires. Love is serving. Love is giving. Love is…well, I think the Bible says it best:
Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance. 1 Corinthians 13:4-7
Maybe there is no one in your life that treats you with this kind of love. Maybe you long for a love like this. Well, I bet if God had His own box of Conversation Hearts, they’d say things like, “Forgiven”, “Redeemed”, “Unconditionally Loved”, “My Joy”, “Always Hope”, “Be At Peace”, “I Delight In You”.
And He has His hand out to you today. He wants you to take them from Him.
The NECCO brothers may have created the Conversation Heart…but GOD IS LOVE. He is the author of it and therefore the first to give it away.
1 John 4:8 “But anyone who does not love does not know God, for God is love.”
John 3:16 “For God so loved the world,that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
Romans 5:8 but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
Romans 8:37-39 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Galatians 2:20 I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
1 John 3:1a See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are.
I woke this morning from a vivid dream. In the dream I was asked to sing a song. I was standing in a grassy meadow and people stood at a distance in clusters around me. The words of the song were still running in my head when I heard my children talking outside my bedroom door. “What song was I singing?” I lay there for a minute getting my wits about me and wondered about my dream. I don’t recall the last time I dreamed I was singing and so I felt prompted to share it with you as I close today’s blog because the song was about LOVE. It’s message and mine to you today, with Valentines Day upon us, is that I hope you know you’re loved.
What Can Separate You – Babbie Mason
His love reached from the heavens to the far ends of the earth,
to give you life forever, He left no stone unturned.
And before the birth of time, Jesus had you on His mind,
so you never need to question His concern.
So what can separate you from the precious love of God?
And who could ever come against His strong and perfect love?
So when you’re in the valley, and your nights are cold and lonely,
The darkest hour is just before the dawn.
Remember nothing can separate you from God’s love.
He numbered each and every star and calls them all by name.
He counts them one by one and sees that they are still in place.
If He cares for every star, then He sees right where you are.
You can trust you’ll never fall from His embrace.
So what can separate you from the precious love of God?
Who could ever come against His strong and perfect love?
So when you’re in the valley, and your nights are cold and lonely,
The darkest hour is just before the dawn.
Remember nothing can separate you…
Neither pain nor sorrow, not today and not tomorrow, nothing past or nothing present, nothing future, nothing ever.
Remember nothing can separate you from the precious love of God.
Remember nothing could ever come against His strong and perfect love.
So when you’re in the valley and your nights are cold and lonely,
The darkest hour is just before the dawn.
Remember nothing… absolutely nothing, remember nothing can separate you from God’s love.
If you don’t know God’s love in a personal way, you can. Feel free to contact me at tammy@luminosityonline.com to find out more.
And to all of you, my friends, Happy Valentines Day!
Jennie - Happy Valentine’s Day to you too, Tammy, and thank-you for your encouraging and uplifting message!