love

On this first Valentine's day of mine as a married woman I have been thinking a lot about love. Love is the topic of this weekend's Disciple Now at our church. Love is what this day is about, right? Buying roses and chocolates... Having romantic dinners... letting kids have a party at school and making them give Valentine's to everyone, even the people that they don't like...buying weird stuffed animals with weird sayings on them... okay maybe not that last one, but you get the picture, right?

Those traditions do not seem to happen in my family. Caleb bought me a great present and gave it to me last Tuesday. It was the Zumba game for Xbox (by the way). We tried to go to dinner on Saturday night and were met by an hour and a half wait, so we chose somewhere else to go, only after arguing about what we should do. I think we just have to understand that we are not Valentine's Day people, but what does that mean anyway?

We say that we love many things. I love my sweet puppy dog. I love ice cream on hot summer days. Okay, really I just love dessert. I love my husband. I love my family. I love watching a good tv show. I love Target. I love the feeling after a good run. I love my friends. There are a lot of ways to love.

We love. Love is an action. It means waking up in the morning and choosing to work on our relationship, no matter the circumstances that we face.

I remember calling my dad to tell him that Caleb and I were talking about getting married. He was not surprised, which surprised me! And, he gave me the best advice. He told me MB, you either decide to work on your marriage, or not.

One of my favorite sayings about love comes from a very wise Ugandan man I met on my journey in 2008, Peter, he told me that love is always better demonstrated that defined.

Lord, may we always seek to demonstrate our love understanding that it is more than simply emotion and good feelings, but that our love is demonstrated by how we act. Plain and simple.