Valentine's Day is an opportunity to show others our love. We give candy, flowers, and gifts to friends and loved ones. It's literally a sweet day, with sentiment and real sweets. It's good to show love to those we love and to love our enemies as well. Jesus says in Matthew 22:39, ” Love your neighbor as yourself.” But we know that it's preceded by another and greater commandment. “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the greatest commandment. And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself.”
So, we are commanded to love our neighbor, and ourselves, but the greatest commandment is to love God. On this day of love we might ask ourselves, “Do we want to give a token of our love to God? And if so, what would we give Him?”
Throughout the Old Testament, God asks His people to give Him their hearts. He likens Himself to a lover who has been rejected when the people forget Him and His commandments. God is our lover? The Word of God says, “We love because He first loved us.” There are many messages of love, many valentines, which we might have missed in God's letter to us. It says, He loves His people with a “steadfast love”, He loves us “freely”, “He exults over us with singing”, and “You are precious in My sight and honored and I love you.” Take time today to give Almighty God, your heavenly Father, a precious valentine of love, your heart and your devotion.
– Mary Atwood
