“Are you being married?” our then four-year-old grandson asked. His whole body shoved forward to fit into a space in-between my husband and myself’s quick hug in the chaos of a kitchen swarming with grandkids.
“Don’t be married!” he whined while he huffed and puffed and wiggled his short body against our legs and into the center of our quick embrace.
We both looked down at his blonde head butting between us and grinned. Our kids did the same thing when they were little. We felt that push of little hands against our legs, shoving us apart, prying us away from each other so that a miniature being with upturned face could squeeze in.
It is not an inaccurate picture of married life. So many things want our attention, so much wants to pry us apart, and the richness of a moment of being together vanishes. Nor is it an inaccurate picture of our intimacy with Christ.
Valentine’s Day, has served far too often as one of my litmus tests as to “he loves me, he loves me not.” And quite honestly, at times the flower plucked badly for my dear husband. The date snuck up on the calendar, as if someone slapped it on while he was sleeping. In the morning, smack dab there in neon lights February 14 simply radiated accusation. Then, for the rest of the celebrated day of love it was as if that little wedge pushed us apart like a childish toddler.
It was actually kind of unlove-ly.
How easily we allow the silliest things to put separation in-between every type of human connection. After all, didn’t Satan’s first temptation go for the relationship jugular? Sin severed the intended intimacy between God and all humanity in the very first chapters of the Bible.
From Genesis to Revelation, broken, evil, selfish, and, short-lived relationships appear. Loving, kind, selfless, righteous, and deep are also exemplified in the pages of God’s Word. And in them both, we see ourselves in the mirror of truth, connected to that first intended closeness and subsequent separation from a holy God.
In the first chapters of Romans, the Apostle Paul digs us deep into that division, into our desperate need for our soul’s redemptive salvation. And in our complete lostness we find God’s love.
And then, in Roman’s 8, Paul responds to the question of “who can separate us from the love of Christ?” For you see, once where separation divided, when hopelessness was all we could offer, Christ bridged that chasm by His death on the cross.
For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8:38-39 NKJV)
How profoundly we are loved. How inseparable is His love. It is unfathomable. Yet, how little we recognize this unfailing, unchanging, immeasurable depth of such love each and every day. It’s far too easy to allow wedges of our own separations, blind us from the solid rock of God’s love.
We feel distance. Anxiety, sin, apathy, grief, confusion, and stress. What seeks to come between either pushes us away or makes us cling tighter, run harder toward Christ.
But His love for His children? Immovable. Steadfast. Constant.
Valentine’s Day gets mixed reviews from male and female, couples, singles, young and old, married and unmarried. However, a day celebrated and defined by the world and its expectations, does not reflect true love.
“This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.” (1 John 4:10 NIV)
God's love for His children? Immovable. Steadfast. Constant. Share on XSo if February 14 falls short of expectations, if it causes pain, here is something to embrace: God’s love exceeds every human replica. Limitless, steadfast, patient, and kind, it remains unmarred, pure and selfless.God’s love exceeds every human replica. Share on X
Life may shove at you this Valentine’s Day, like an insistent child. But, each and every mark which falls short, each less-than-perfect relationship, is a reminder. Nothing can separate us from the love of Christ.
My husband’s eyes met mine above the blonde head of our little interrupter. Who can separate us? Not a day on the calendar nor a squiggly little being.
The many-years-being-married couple moved apart to let him in. Then we squeezed really tight. He threw back his head in the big smushed people-sandwich and laughed with love.
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