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Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Thoughts on, or after, Valentine's Day

I read this recently and thought it was fitting for Valentine's Day, albeit a day late. Please enjoy and tell me what you think. Nate


God loves us, and it is plain as the nose on our face. So what is love? Is it a feeling? An emotion, little butterflies in our tummies? Or is it a choice? A choice maybe to love in the hardest times, or even unto death. Jesus Himself told us that there is no greater love than a man laying down his life for his friends.

Is love really love when it must be forced? Think about it. Who has ever loved green beans just because they were told to eat them when they were kids? In fact, unless you always loved green beans, most children I’m sure found it even harder to swallow because they were being forced to like them. See, love is not love unless it is given a choice. God could not create us to automatically love Him and have a perfect love. He would have had little robots to love Him and do what they were programmed but that would not have been the relationship that He created us for. So love must by its very nature have a choice. A choice to either love or not to love. It is this reason that God created us with this choice and it is this reason that we had the choice to make. The sad truth is that Adam chose to rebel and man has chose to disobey our Creator ever since. Look at any 4 year old or teenager for that matter. They are a perfect picture of how we try to rebel against our Father every day. We think we know better when in truth we know nothing.

You see, the story of the bible is a love story. It is God’s love story about His pursuit of His people and their turning from Him. Many say that the God we read of in the Old Testament is a violent, murderous God who wipes out entire people groups on a whim, not a loving God. But is this really an accurate picture? I have seen this argument brought up often on the Internet but always from those who already disbelieve the bible and the God who inspired it. So how should we look at it? The best way is to start at the beginning. When you go to see a new movie you wouldn’t wait till it is half over and then go in to see the rest, you would see it from the beginning. The same is true of a good book. You wouldn’t pick up a mystery novel and start in the middle and read on from there. You would know nothing of the characters and the end would not make sense, so you start with chapter one.

Happy Valentine's Day and God Bless You All.

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