February is the month of love according to magazines. We are all encouraged to buy Valentine cards and romantic presents for those special people that we love as partners or potential partners. I like a card and present as much as the next person, but I am inclined to believe that we are missing something with this tradition. If we love someone enough to tell them about red roses and blue violets on this particular day, shouldn’t we be telling them or showing them our love the other 364 days? Or maybe I have got it wrong, and Valentine’s Day is an extra telling of our love. The day when we put embarrassment to the side and say and do the soppy things that we have thought about the other days. Love is never straight forward and what seems right sometimes can seem completely wrong others. What is love really? A Bible reading often read at weddings is 1Corinthians 13 which is all about love. A modern translation of the Bible is “The Message”. This is how it puts it. “Love never gives up. Love cares more for others than for self. Love doesn’t want what it doesn’t have. Love doesn’t strut, Doesn’t have a swelled head, Doesn’t force itself on others, Isn’t always “me first,” Doesn’t fly off the handle, Doesn’t keep score of the sins of others, Doesn’t revel when others grovel, Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth, Puts up with anything, Trusts God always, Always looks for the best, Never looks back, But keeps going to the end.” I reckon that if we go along with that all the time we can send our soppy or funny cards with our flowers and chocolates and we won’t be far wrong.
God Bless
Maureen Kendall