WEDNESDAY February 14, 2024
Valentine’s Day
“Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends.”
John 15:13
Every year on February 14, across the United States and other places around the world, Valentine’s Day is celebrated. Love and romance prompt people to give cards, flowers and gifts. Where did this tradition start? There are several legends, but one is a story told of a Roman priest named Saint Valentine. The Roman Empire, during the reign of Claudius II, banned young soldiers from marriage. They better fulfilled their military duties and were called upon to persecute Christians. Valentine assisted people at this difficult time. He performed marriages against the order of the state and aided Christians.
Valentine was imprisoned, tortured and beaten. According to legend, before he was martyred, a young girl, who may have been his jailor’s daughter, would visit him. Valentine fell in love with her and wrote her a letter signed, “From your Valentine.” Finally, he stood before the Emperor and refused to renounce his Christian faith. Valentine was beheaded on February 14, 269 A.D. Since then, the Christian Church has set aside February 14, as a day to commemorate Saint Valentine.
However, it was thought that Geoffrey Chaucer, an English poet from 14th century England, was attributed with modernizing the version of Saint Valentine’s Day to express romantic love. In one of his Valentine’s poems he wrote: So short our lives, so hard the lessons, so difficult the tests, so sudden the victory, so tenuous the hope and joy that so easily evaporates into fear––this is what I mean by Love.
Honestly, God’s Word is the ultimate love letter written to us to prove His divine love for us: “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life” (John 3:16). God is love. His Son died for our salvation, proving and demonstrating the genuineness of His love toward us. Love is seen in His actions.
In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
~1 John 4:10~
For more from Raul Ries, please visit SomebodyLovesYou.com!
