Friday, February 14, 2014

Valentines Day - Selfless Love

Valentines Day, a day in our culture of hearts, cards, flowers, chocolate and of course love.  So many things are written about this day and its origins that are not totally correct.  Many legends have emerged over the centuries.  Yet when we look back at the early reasons for this day being a celebration maybe we will gain a different understanding of the day.

Since we do not have a lot of 1700 year old texts that provide a lot of detail for us about the "saint" that Valentines Day is named after, we use the best information we can find and the oldest to help us.  What we learn is that St. Valentine was a leader in the early Church that still endured an amount of persecution from the political leaders of the day.  Valentine was known to be martyred for dis-obeying the edict of the Emperor regarding marriage and soldiers.  So that regular troops would not feel the urge to leave the battle to go to their families, they wife and children.  The Emperor made it illegal for common soldiers to marry.  This created a difficulty for any of these men who were drawn to Christianity and the Biblical teaching on marriage and relationships.  So against the direct command of the Emperor, St. Valentine performed marriage ceremonies, bringing together these common soldiers and the love of their life to be a married couple.  When he was found out and caught, he was tortured and eventually killed.

Valentines Day needs to be a day where we are reminded to express our love to those we care about.  It is a day to celebrate the marriage that St. Valentine died to protect and teach.  Biblical marriage should be a part of our remembering why this day is on the calendar.  But also that as a leader, he would be willing to suffer and die to do what was right.

So even if you are single and have no "valentine" as our culture defines it, you can still live to celebrate the remembrance of Valentine.  You can live to benefit others, you can live to stand for what is True and Biblical.  You can seek to do what is right no matter what the cost and how others might respond to you.  You can show selfless love and care for others.

I am often reminded of selfless love when my wonderful wife Brenda shows such great care for me, even when I am not deserving of her love.  She will make me a card, give me a gift, a hug, encourage me in so many things she says.  She will patiently wait for me to wake up and become bearable for the day.  She will wait up with me and for me when there are things that keep me up late.  She sticks with me through the hard times and the good.  She does her best to share with me reminders from God's Word and the wisdom of life to help me stay on track.  She really seeks to serve me sacrificially to help me be a better man.  It challenges me and reminds me to look at how I am to love, care for and serve her. 

So whether it is Brenda and I or any of you, may we be reminded today to express a Christ-centered "selfless" Love for others like Valentine did.  Valentine is  not our ultimate example of this, Jesus is.  So may Valentine point you toward the True source of selfless Love, Jesus the Son of God our Savior and Lord.

Pastor Bruce

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