Be My Valentine

I like the fact that clean socks magically appear in the drawer and that clean clothes appear on hangers in my closet. I take a lot of things that require time and hard work for granted and I don’t automatically do my share of chores or even give much deserved acknowledgement to balance the relationship.

I have excuses, I am tired, I worked late, I don’t feel so well cover up the fact that I like to be spoiled. I like getting good stuff with less effort on my part.

Is there a chance that you are guilty of the same thing in the relationship with God?

Compare how you feel and act today with what you remember about the first few years after you received and responded to God’s valentine.

-- I will guess that you feel and act differently. Who changed in this relationship? Who is taking who for granted?

Folks, all of us that claim the name of Christ, “claim to be Christians”, need to understand that if we are followers of Christ we are automatically givers of love. In a way we are the continuation of God’s original valentine (Jesus Christ).

We are called to love deeply, emotionally, and to take risk to show our love of others in the name of Christ.

If we are taking what Christ has done for granted, if we are not excited about our relationship with him, then we will stop doing the things that show our love.

Folks, my love for God and my love for you can see that there is some attention missing in our relationship with God.

We as a church have been enjoying special treatment from our first love. We were excited by the extravagance of his valentine and excitedly accepted his love.

Our hearts pounded in our chest and we could not wait to go places together. We dressed up and put on smell food stuff. We held open doors and read scripture and prayed with the love songs in our hearts.

As time passed, I fear that we all became too comfortable and our relationship routine and now we are going through the motions. Doing what we think is the minimum, just enough to get by. We offer little or no risk of our love or abilities in the name of Christ.

We don’t show any excitement about our love, the kind of excitement that other people notice as you can’t seem to hold back a smile or joy because of the love in your heart.

We are taking our God for granted, accepting his gifts and expecting the fulfillment of promises, willing to receive everything he offers with little or no intention of giving back. Little or no work on improving the relation ship. Little or no expression of devotion that the world would notice that says I am in love and I hope you are too.

Folks, everyone of us needs to give and receive love. I hope you will think about this valentine form God and acknowledge his gifts in your prayers. That you will search for His heart in the Bible. Take time this afternoon or tomorrow the reread 1 Corinthians 13.

All Glory be to God!