If you walk into most retail stores right now, I bet you will find an aisle filled with red and pink hearts, chocolate, and possibly a few stuffed animals. You guessed it; it’s Valentine’s season! In our culture, Valentine’s Day has seeped out of its calendar square and has spread red glitter across store aisles since January 1st. This season of romance, flowers, and chocolate will last until February 14th (unless you’re like my family; we hit the stores for clearance Valentine’s candy February 15th).
With all this delicious commercialism, what messages are being sent about love? Love is romance and gifts. Love is beautiful and necessary for a happy life. There’s palpable pressure to have a date for Valentine’s Day, bonus points if you’re actually in a long-term romantic relationship. Every year, people spend inordinate amounts of money on Valentine’s Day gifts that range from jewelry and expensive dinners to self-care pampering and romantic getaways. One year, a woman I was dating knew that I loved unicorns and bought me 28 Valentine’s unicorn stuffed animals (one per day for the month of February). Commercialism isn’t solely targeting couples with Valentine’s Day advertising either. In recent years, there has been a growing trend of retailers advertising their Valentine’s sales and vacation packages as self-care and emphasizing the importance of loving yourself regardless of your relationship status. But where is God on Valentine’s Day?
What does the Bible have to say about love? We all know 1 Corinthians 13:4-8. I’m sure most clergy have either preached on or led a study on this passage and some point in our ministry. We may have even read it at a wedding or funeral. We know “love is patient and kind. Love is not envious, boastful, arrogant, rude, or irritable. It does not insist on its own way, keep a record of wrongs, or rejoice in wrongdoing. Love rejoices in the truth, bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things, and never ends” (NIV). In that passage, love is a beautiful entity that reflects God’s own heart. It’s so much more than that, though.
Song of Songs sings about the fiery passion of love. Song of Songs 8:6b-7 (NIV) says, “love is strong as death, passion fierce as the grave. Its flashes are flashes of fire, a raging flame. Many waters cannot quench love, neither can floods drown it. If one offered for love all the wealth of one’s house, it would be utterly scorned.” This fierce, unshakable love is priceless. It can’t be bought, sold, or fabricated. It’s worth more than all the stuffed unicorns and chocolate hearts on the planet. Yet, when I think of people in my life who love that intensely, the images that come to mind are not of young couples in love. They are images of parents ferociously protecting their children and indefatigable couples who have been married for over 50 years and are keen for 50 more.
I’m on the road to becoming clergy; I’m in my 3rd year of seminary. The other day in church history class, we read several treatises by 16th century German theologian Hans Denck. One of them was his 1527 treatise “Concerning True Love.” If you don’t happen to have this specific treatise by Hans Denck memorized (it’s a long shot, but someone might… you never know), I’ll summarize my takeaways. Denck’s intro to this treatise sought to show examples of how humans express and live out true love (especially romantically) in contrast to how God (who is love) loves us. He gave examples of how humans would willingly put themselves in harm’s way or make fools out of themselves for the sake of their beloved. The whole time I was reading that treatise, I kept thinking about what I wanted to write for this article. In thinking about the contrasts between the commercialism of Valentine’s Day and the Biblical description of love, I realized that we don’t always know what love is supposed to look like. Of course, we know why we love: because God first loved us (1 John. 4:19). And we know who to love: God and our neighbors (Matthew 22:37-39; Mark 12:29-31; Luke 10:27). But it seems that on the issue of ‘how to love’ we’re a little lost. Sure, we have examples like 1 Corinthians 13 and Song of Songs, but how do we apply those examples to our own lives?
Most of us spend years trying to find the right person(s) to love, but we don’t spend much preparation time on ‘how’ to love. As a single woman, I’m bombarded on all sides with advice and suggestions on ‘who’ to love (and when to love… if you listen to my relatives who want grandchildren now). People say, “Find a woman who has the same interests as you so you have common ground;” or “Find a woman who is different from you so you complement each other;” or “Find a woman who wants the same things as you;” or “Don’t search for anyone at all and let God bring your future wife and mother of your future children miraculously into your path.” I’ve heard all of the advice. I’ve approached Valentine’s seasons with girlfriends, with casual dates, by myself, (and even with a boyfriend during my unsuccessful experiment with heterosexuality). But I’m not sure if I’ve ever truly experienced the all-consuming love that would cause me to put myself in danger (like Denck wrote about), love that is patiently unending (like 1 Corinthians 13), or the fierce love of Song of Songs in a romantic relationship. But maybe love is less about the ‘who,’ ‘why,’ and ‘when.’ Maybe true, Biblical love is all about the ‘how.’ I know many of the people reading this will likely know ‘how’ to love far better than I do. There are people who have been loving like the Bible illustrates for as long as anyone can remember. But maybe there are people like me reading this, too. People who think we have a decent idea ‘how’ to love, but struggle to put it into practice in every aspect of our lives.
Maybe, instead of spending Valentine’s season scrolling through dating apps, I should treat it as a period of preparation. Like a Lenten journey of the heart where I ask God to teach me ‘how’ to love instead of continuing the ceaseless quest of searching for someone to shower with stuffed unicorns and chocolates. Maybe instead of making Valentine’s Day all about ‘who’ we love, we can try making it about ‘how’ God loves. This Valentine’s season, I hope you give your loved ones (both romantic and platonic) all the chocolate, jewelry, romantic getaways, and stuffed unicorns. I hope you make them feel uniquely special and so loved they can feel it from their toes to the tips of their hair. I also hope you make space to be still and prepare your heart for God to teach you how to love a little bit better than you already do.
What a lovely and thought provoking reflection on Valentine’s Day and love.