The greatest love…
So the 14th of Feb is Valentines Day, there’s going to be flowers, chocolates, cards, hugs, kisses, and people everywhere showing their love for one another. This is great! And today we’re going to take a look at Valentines Day, and how it may have began. Hopefully by the end of this post you may have spent some time thinking about the greatest love of your life.
So where did it all begin?
No one is exactly sure as to how Valentines day began, some say that it came from a weird pagan fertility festival, that was changed. The most popular explanation as to the history of Valentines day is that back in about 270 A.D. In Rome the emperor Claudius II decided that he only wanted single men in his army, so that they would be able to fight better, not getting distracted by a family and all that. So he made it illegal for young men to get married, now Valentine (or Valentinus) was a Priest who was in Rome at this time, and he realised how wrong this whole thing was. Valentine knew that it was right for young men and young women to get married and to start Christian families and raise Christian children in a loving, Godly environment. Therefore, what Valentine decided to do was he would secretly marry young couples without the emperor knowing about it, in order to see these Godly families become a reality. When Valentine was found out he was put to put into jail to await his death sentence. When he was in jail, the young loves that he had married would come and visit him in jail, and bring him flowers and notes to show their appreciation for what he had done for them. The story then carries on that a little while before he was to be put to death Valentine fell in love with his jailer’s daughter. On the day that he was executed, February 14th, it is said that he gave his love a letter and at the bottom, he signed: From Your Valentine.
The name Valentine come from the Latin name Valentinus, which is derived from the word valens which means worthy. Today however, according to a Discovery Card survey, the average American Husband is expecting to spend 8.30 (about R1170.00) on a Valentine’s Day gifts this, Valentines Day brings in an average of Billion in America!
Love received…
Showing love for one another is good, and God wants us to show love for each other in the right way, remember God is the One who invented love. The Bible tells us not only that God loves, but that God actually is love! So don’t think that love is something that God is against! But what is the greatest love that there is? The Bible tells us in Romans 5v8: but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. This is the greatest demonstration of love that there ever has been, because this is the greatest love that there is! Remember the verse that the Apostle John wrote: 1John 4v10: In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. This is what love is, love is God sending Jesus Christ to pay the price for our sin!
Love returned…
But what about our love for God? Why should we love God? We know that God hates sin, He cannot be in the presence of it, it is impossible. We know that we are sinners, and that by our earthly nature we do nothing but sin. Therefore we know that God hates our sin, and that since we choose to sin, we are deserving of punishment, eternal hell. This is scary! When we realise these facts, and then we look to the cross of Jesus, where Jesus took the full penalty of our sins because of love. Because of God’s love He made a way for us to be with Him forever, God loves us! This love eclipses our fear of God, we see His anger at our sin, and then we see the love that He has in paying the price of it on our behalf! This love that God has for us is amazing, it is out of this world, there is no greater love than the love displayed by God on the cross, towards us! That is why John writes in 1John 4v18 that perfect love drives out fear! We no longer have any fear of punishment, because of God’s love for us! In verse 19, John helps us to see our response to this, because God loved us first, we love Him!
Love right…
Matthew 22v36+37: This is to be us, we should live like this, and this is the love that we are to have for God. This should not be an effort; it is the natural response to who God is! We see how much He has loved us, and therefore we will show that love back to Him! Remember He is the One who made the first move, not us…
1John 5v3 This is love for God: to obey his commands. And his commands are not burdensome… John here define how our love for God looks like, he is telling us what love for God is. Our love for God is to obey His commands, these two things are one in the same, there is no difference between the two of these things! Obeying what Jesus has commanded us to do, is the way we show our love to Him. Do you love Him, how much do you obey His commands.
Let’s look at some of Jesus’ commands:
Matthew 5v38→48 Jesus commands us to be graceful, not to be vengeful people, we commanded to repay our enemies with kindness.
we are commanded that when we give to those in need, that we are to do it quietly, not so that others know about. We should give to glorify God, not ourselves.
Matthew 10v28 Jesus commands us to fear God more than we fear man, that means that we must be more concerned about what god thinks of us than what man thinks of us.
John 13v34+35 Jesus gives us the commandment that we are to love one another, we are to especially love our Christian brothers and sisters.
Matthew 22v36+37 is the greatest of all the commandments, and that is that we are to love God with all of ourselves, be extreme in your love for God, there is no greater love in your life.
Back to 1John 5v3 you see the last part of that verse, And His commands are not burdensome. This is the whole key to this scripture, God is not calling us to a grudging love, He is not telling us to tick all of these things off of your list and if you get over 75% then you love Me. God is telling us here that the love that we do have for Him will show up in the way we automatically obey His commands. When we look at the commands of Jesus, we should be thinking, something like; “Oh wow, i am doing that anyway, that is so cool!” Not “Sigh, more things i have to do…” I hope that you get this, that these commands that Jesus has given to us, are not to be a burden, but a joy! There is joy to be found in serving God, because we are doing things for the One we love the most!
