Good Morning Gorgeous,

It’s a brand new day. A fresh start! A whole new day to bask in the love of the Father!

Valentine’s Day is approaching quickly. Whether or not you celebrate this day with gifts or declarations of love, the retail stores make it hard to miss. Valentine’s Day items are in every grocery store, drug store, gas station, and mall. You can’t escape seeing that it is around the corner.

I started to think about love in our culture, and then started to think about the pure love of our Lord.

Love in our culture can be polluted with ideas that are actually the opposite of love.

Love in our culture is often transactional and based on whether or not someone is meeting our needs.

Love in our culture sometimes hurts emotionally and in some cases physically.

Love is idealized in movies as passionate, heated, and filled with jealousy. It often burns bright and then fizzles quickly.

These things and so much more that we call love, are the very opposite of love.

I have been hurt by people who were supposed to protect me. I like many others have been seriously hurt while someone was claiming they loved me.

Yet, the closer I drew to the Father, the more I learned and experienced His perfect love that casts out ALL fear, the more healing I experienced.

His love dressed my wounds.

His love wrapped my heart in bandages.

His love never ever hurt me.

His love celebrated the beautiful creation I am in Christ Jesus.

His love is safe.

His love is secure.

His love is unconditional.

His love is faithful.

His love is filled with patience, mercy, and compassion.

His love is a firm foundation.

His love secures, saves, and upholds.

His love will never leave me, never forsake me.

So as our culture hypes up Valentine’s Day, we can use it as a reminder of how desperately and fully loved we are by God. My family will be celebrating the day. We will send Valentines to school and exchange small gifts.

But I am also choosing to shift the focus back to God and His love. There are endless scriptures about His love for us. It is the most beautiful love you could ever experience.

So eyes back on Jesus again and again.

Dear Heavenly Father,

Help us to open our hearts to receive the perfect love You have for each of us. Draw us in and help us to experience Your love in deeper ways. In Jesus’s name, Amen.

Blessings and love,

Vanessa Lynn