A Matter of the Heart

Love is in the air. Tomorrow, many people will be celebrating Valentine’s Day. Restaurants will be packed. Flower and lingerie shops and party and department stores will be swamped. The commercialism of “love” will be on full display, and in the process, we will collectively spend over 18 billion dollars.

Valentine’s was one of my favorite seasons to work, when I was in retail.  I enjoyed watching people pour into the store by the droves, usually at the last minute, to scoop up heart shaped boxes of chocolates, cologne, and cards.  One time, a man came in and bought five giant boxes of candy with the stuffed animals to match. I told him that he must be well-loved and vice versa, and he replied that he was.  Then, he said with a straight face: “I have to keep my wife, mother, baby mother, and girlfriends happy.” All I could do was shake my head, but this is how some people not just think – but live.

“Many claim to have unfailing love, but a faithful person who can find?” Proverbs 20:6.

Being a casual observer and participant in it all taught me much about human beings and our perceptions (often misguided) of affection. Relationships aren’t about things – no matter how nice. Love isn’t just about grand proclamations or gestures, nor is it about quick hits and fixes. Someone can say and do all the right things, but to channel a popular R&B song of the 80’s: if you heart isn’t in it…

Don’t provide mere tokens of your affection, while withholding that which is most important: you.
We live in a time, where people seem to applaud non-commitment “commitments.” People erroneously laud being sugar daddies, mommies, and babies, while others brag about being and having side chicks and Ricks. This unfortunate phenomenon is not confined to romantic relationships.  It permeates all aspects of our society and all manner of our relationships. Indeed, we are an adulterous (disloyal, faithless, untrue) nation. And the Church?  We have left our First Love and have pursued and hooked up with the things of this world (1 John 2:15-16).

The Pharisees, who were always trying to set a trap for Jesus, asked him in Matthew 22:36: “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” Jesus replied in verses 37-40: ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

True love is found first in our relationship with Our Father, and then in our relationships with one another. Love those who God has placed in your life, which requires a demonstration (not in things and on occasions) but in giving your attention, time, respect, commitment, obedience, and heart. Let’s give of ourselves: wholeheartedly.

Scriptures for further reading:
  • “Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.” Proverbs 4:23
  • “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” John 3:16
  • “If you love me, keep my commands.” John 14:15
  • “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her.” Ephesians 5:25
  • “Wives, in the same way, submit yourselves to your husbands, so that even if they refuse to believe the word, they will be won over without words by the behavior of their wives” 1 Peter 3:1
  • “Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you.” Exodus 20:12 
  • “One who has unreliable friends soon comes to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.” Proverbs 18:24
  • “Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their labor: if either of them falls down, one can help the other up. But pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up.” Ecclesiastes 4:9-10 
© 2019 by Antoinette V. Barber

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