Today is Valentine’s Day! I am taking Patty to a Valentine’s Dinner at JBC. Wow! I am so romantic! When I was in the fifth grade, Mrs Gibbs, our teacher, said we all needed to bring Valentine’s cards for everyone in the class. That was in Alameda, California, the last place my Dad was stationed before he retired, and we moved to the farm in Oregon. We had only lived there for a month, so I didn’t know many kids in my class. I was not very excited about this assignment. I didn’t know the names of very many, and I didn’t know what to write on the cards. I didn’t want to write “I love you,” as Mrs Gibbs suggested, to kids I didn’t know, for that matter; I didn’t want to write I love you even to the ones I knew. My Mom solved my problem by buying some premade cards for kids, and all I had to do was sign them and hand one out to each kid in my class. As I handed out my cards, I noticed that most of the boys were doing the same thing, and one was giving out a little candy heart to each person. I have been memorizing the book of 1 John. I just about have it done. The book’s theme is “love,” and there are a lot of verses on love in the five chapters; here are a few.
1 John 3:10 By this the children of God and the children of the devil are obvious: anyone who does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor the one who does not love his brother.
1 John 4:7-8 Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love.
1 John 4:11-12 Beloved, if God loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has seen God at any time; if we love one another, God abides in us, perfecting His love in us.
1 John 4:20-21 If someone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen. And this commandment we have from Him, that the one who loves God should love his brother also.
The primary way we love is by forgiving anybody of anything, just as God has forgiven us. Another key way, according to 1 John, is by helping, coaching, and encouraging one another as we all struggle to live life for God. One of the things I did for Patty was to make a list for her of what I committed to doing for her every time I said, “I love you.” I say “I love you” to my church family before I preach, and I have made a list that I review often of what saying I love you means; it is a statement of commitment.