How was your Valentines Day?

How was your Valentines Day? February can be a hard month for singles. It’s a love month. Everywhere you look there is red and pink. There’s couples and mushy love cards. There’s the pressure of tying to find someone. The pressure of not being ‘alone’.

I used to find the first couple months of a new year the hardest. January is normally a blue month for me (as mentioned previously) and then with Valentines Day the next month....it’s a tad rough.

This year Valentines Day falls on the first day of lent. Lent in the Christian calendar is the beginning of our wait for Easter. It’s the 40 days where we spend even more time with God and re-evaluate our lives.

Last year I gave up chocolate. No chocolate for 40 days...I know brave! I had to find another outlet for my chocolate cravings. I had to rely on God to remove those cravings or show me another option to chocolate. I spent more time in the word, spent more time worshipping, spent more time in general trying to remove temptation.

This year I didn’t give anything up. I wanted to be able to spend the 40 days just focusing more on my relationship with God. I wanted to spend even more time in the word, more time worshipping. Lent is not just about what we’re willing to give up. It’s a time to discover how much more of a child of God we can be.

With Easter fast approaching we can tend to forget the real meaning. If there is children involved (in my case nieces and nephews) we can focus more on the Easter bunny, egg hunts and presents. Easter is a true meaning of love.

God sent us His only Son at Christmas only to die on a tree. We are sinners and we were saved by the sacrifice and everlasting love that Jesus gave. He paid the ultimate price for us to know true love. “We love because He first loved us.” 1 John 4:19

Valentine’s Day can be hard. I get it...believe me I do. It’s a daily reminder of us missing out on what we’ve always wanted and desired. When the days are hard and we feel lost or alone we need to remember that we can show love and are loved because He first loved us.

I encourage you today to spend time loving those around you. Spend time loving yourself and knowing that God has a purpose and a plan for your life. The road was never meant to be easy. God loves us for He sent is Son. "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son"