Where Was the Love?

Our last post mentioned there was no "ministry moment" during the Thursday night cash back. No mention of God at all. In fact, our "card protector" was a makeshift straw wrapper we found at our seat.

So what changed? The day of the year. Thursday was Valentine's Day - and the church group we've attended for years is against keeping it. It's considered a man-made "pagan day," not Biblical. Ministers would point to Bible verses like this:

...Inquire not after their gods, saying, How did these nations serve their gods? Even so will I do likewise, You shall not do so to the Lord your God: for every abomination to the Lord, which he hates, have they done to their gods... - Deuteronomy 12:30-31 (KJV)

We started doing the "day without love" on February 14 five years ago, after reading a church magazine article with this explanation:

What about showing love on Valentine's Day if I'm not doing it for pagan reasons? Isn't that okay? No, because the expression of that kind of 'love' is still rooted in a former pagan holiday. True Christians must not adopt pagan festivals as holidays....
Showing love as God instructs is not wrong - romantic love included.... But don't do it under the trappings of a pagan holiday like Valentine's Day!...

But just between you, us and the internet, we see a problem with this line of reasoning. Do you see it? The problem is in how the Bible defines God....

And we have known and believe the love that God has to us. God is love; and he that dwells in love dwells in God, and God in him. - I John 4:16 (KJV)

If love was wrong on Thursday, we would ask: did God take Thursday off? Did He stop loving everyone for a day, because some Catholics or pagans had a special "love" or "romance" day? Did the world stop turning? Did the warm sun or helpful rain go away? Of course not.

Our point is simply this: God is defined as "love." And God existed before any pagans or humans did:

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. - Genesis 1:1 (KJV)

Humans might do ungodly things on February 14. In fact, two "St. Valentine's Day massacres" have occurred on that day in the last 100 years - one with U.S. organized crime, another at a Florida high school. If anything shows what happens when you go without love for a day, those events should.

We should indeed, as that article states, "show love as God instructs." But saying you shouldn't do it on Valentine's Day is illogical and extreme. God's love is non-stop. Ours should be as well.

So we did what we did in an attempt to follow church teaching strictly - but also to teach a lesson to anyone who might see it. (And it cost us money, as we had a losing night in the casino.) Love should not be governed by the calendar. It should follow the instructions of the Bible, which nowhere states love takes a day off on February 14. If you see it there, please let us know where you found it.