What’s Love Got To Do With It?
February 14, 2015
I read an article last week, in a waiting room, which reported that Americans will spend an all- time high of $18.9 billion on Valentine’s Day! That’s a huge price tag, so I thought, because people, and not just Hallmark (second highest card generating holiday for them after Christmas), are wildly in love with this holiday. But when we parse the data as to why the average person will spend $13.99 on Valentine cards, various sources report, it’s not really about the love.
The reports “un-romanticized” the holiday when it came to spending:
1. Men felt obligated to spend $ on this day
2. Women celebrate the holiday because “everyone else does”
3. The longer someone is in the relationship, and the older they get, the less they spend
4. One in five women buy Valentine’s gifts for themselves
5. Americans will spend more than $700 million on their pets for Valentine’s Day
6. Rose prices spike just in time for Valentine’s Day
Then what’s love got to do with it? Maybe not much on Valentine’s Day, but love has everything to do with it every day in the Bible. There is an age-old, eternal TRUTH, not found in TIME Magazine, but in The Bible, that tells us in no uncertain terms:
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.”
John 3:16
Here’s what the Bible says when it comes to love:
1. God so loved us, He wanted to give His Son
2. “Everyone else” doesn’t do this. Only God gives like this
3. The longer we are in relationship with Him, and the older we get, He still gives
4. We can’t buy this gift for ourselves but we can accept God’s gift of salvation
5. God spent His Son’s life on us
6. Spikes in the hands of Jesus, the Rose of Sharon, paid the penalty for our sins so that we can enjoy eternal life in Heaven. It costs us nothing.
What God’s love did for us, by giving His only Son, is priceless. Don’t run out to get a Hug luvin’ Hippo toy this Valentine’s day. Believe in Jesus and cling to His finished work on the cross! It cost Him His life so that we could be secure in His unconditional love forever!