Good morning.  As you well know, Tuesday is Valentine’s Day.  In America it is a day of love.  It is a day for remembering one’s vows of love to one another.  It’s a day that Hallmark truly loves.  And it’s a day for those who are desperate to try to win the affection of another male or female by enticing them with fattening gifts like chocolate.  Now we know it as a day of love, but what is love?

Last week we looked at some of the qualities that God desires our love to take, but today we look at love from a different perspective.

Before we begin, let’s open with a word of prayer

We have discussed this question before, but I want to refresh our memories real quick.  In the New Testament, godly love is called Agape, which is unconditional love.  The type of love that places a condition on being received is called Eros, which is the word for physical desire.  So, what type of love would you say is usually thought of on Valentine’s Day?  The answer would probably be Eros, which is a conditional love.

One figure who is usually associated with Valentine’s Day is Cupid.  “Cupid has always played a role in the celebrations of love and lovers.  He is known as a mischievous, winged child, whose arrows would pierce the hearts of his victims causing them to fall deeply in love.  In ancient Greece he was known as Eros the young son of Aphrodite, who by the way was the goddess of love and beauty.  To the Romans he was Cupid, and his mother was Venus.”

Based on Cupid’s Greek name, we get an idea of how the world understands love.  Cupid’s name is “Eros” in Greek.  The world’s understanding of love is of the physical and conditional nature – the love of self-seeking and self-gratification.  Cupid has nothing to do with the real meaning behind Valentine’s Day.  He is just part of the secularization or distortion of a Christian holiday.  Remember that the word “holiday” comes from the 2 words “holy” and “day.”

This morning we are going to hear some of the real story behind Valentine’s Day.  We are going to come to an understanding that Valentine’s Day truly is to be a “holy day,” when we discuss the true nature of the love that is to be remembered and practiced on this holiday.

Turn in your Bibles with me to I John 3:16-23.  Here in this passage, John is proposing to us that we should love one another.  Let’s see what he has to say.  Here in I John 3:16-23 it says, “1”

The first thing that we see about love comes in verse 16 and is the fact that Love Is Laying Down One’s Life.

Jesus stated the essence of love in John 15:13 when He said, “Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s own life for his friends.”

You see, our Savior didn’t just say this to impress His disciples; He literally acted it out.  As verse 16 says, “He laid down His life for us.”  Jesus Christ died on the cross that we might have life.  He did this because He considers those of us who believe in him His friends.  He became the sacrifice to take our place in death when we should be the ones to die for our sins.

The very word “sacrifice” portrays the meaning of Agape love.  The word sacrifice means, “something given up or lost.”  When we love someone unconditionally, it means we will sacrifice or give up our own welfare that another person will gain or prosper.  This is the kind of love that we are to remember and practice on Valentine’s Day and all the days of the year.  This is the same kind of love that St. Valentine practiced.

According to church tradition St. Valentine was a priest near Rome in about the year 270 A.D..  At that time the Roman Emperor was imprisoning Christians for not worshipping the Roman gods.  During this persecution Valentine was arrested.  Some say he was arrested because he was performing Christian marriages, but others say it was for helping Christians escape prison.

During the trial they asked Valentine what he thought of the Roman gods Jupiter and Mercury.  Of course Valentine said they were false gods and that the God that Jesus called Father was the only true God.  So the Romans threw him in prison for insulting their gods.

While in prison Valentine continued to minister.  He witnessed to the guards, just as Paul did in the Bible.  One of the guards was a good man who had adopted a blind girl.  He asked Valentine if his God could help his daughter.  Valentine prayed and the girl was given her sight.

The guard and his whole family, 46 people total, believed in Jesus and were baptized.  Because these people had come to know Jesus, Valentine praised God right there in his prison cell.  When the emperor heard about this he was furious that Valentine was still making converts even in prison, so he had Valentine beheaded.  So that is the story of St. Valentine.

Now to the second part of 1 John 3:16.  The second part says, “And we also ought to lay down our lives for our brothers.”
Valentine knew that he might get caught in his Christian activities.  He knew that if he told the court the truth about the Roman gods that he would be thrown in prison.  And he knew that if he continued to witness about Christ in the prison that he would make his captors very angry.  But he despite all of these horrible things, he continued, because he loved the Lord and his fellow humans.  He was willing to risk his own life to free the prisoners and spread the Good News of Jesus Christ to those who needed to hear it.

We just read, “No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.”  God showed us this love by coming in the form of Christ to die for our sins.  And St. Valentine demonstrated this love when he died for his friends.

This is the kind of love that Valentine’s Day is really about, and not so much the physical attraction that the day has been stereotyped with.

In case you are concerned about laying down your own life, and you believe I am saying to go out and get yourself killed to show that you love others, then just relax.  Laying down one’s life is a demonstration of sacrifice.  We can make sacrifices in many different ways.  We can sacrifice of our time, or we can sacrifice of our resources such as food, clothing, and money.  It is just saying that true love is willing to sacrifice for others.

Showing love to another person; loving someone in the name of Christ is a very rewarding experience.  When we show someone the love of Christ we receive a feeling of fulfillment and completeness in our lives.  J. I. Packer, in his book Knowing God, provides us with a definition of love from a man named James Orr.

James Orr’s definition of love is this: “Love, generally is that principle which leads one moral being to desire and delight in another, and reaches its highest form in that personal fellowship in which each lives in the life of the other, and finds his joy in imparting himself to the other, and in receiving back the outflow of that other’s affection unto himself.”

So, do we love in a way that is sacrificial to others, or do we focus more on the physical desire.  Hopefully this Valentine’s Day we can begin to focus on the type of love that God shows us, and we can begin showing having that kind of love for others.

Moving on.  In verses 17-19 again John writes, “1”

From these verses we see that we are to Love Not In Word But In Actions and Truth.

If we have the goods or resources to give to those in need, but we keep them to ourselves, how does the love of God abide in us?  Over in I John 4:20 it says, “If someone says, ‘I love God,’ and hates his brother, he is a liar . . .”

If we do not help those in need, but we say that we know God and love Him, then we are nothing but liars, and we really don’t know God at all.  Let us not love in word or in tongue, but in actions and in truth.

Someone once said, “I must do something,” is always better and will solve more problem than by saying, “Something must be done.””

Charles Lowery, the pastor of a Church in Albuquerque, New Mexico said that one of his staff members told him that if it would help someone come to know Christ that he would be willing to be re-baptized.  Charles found out that people, who wouldn’t normally be baptized, would be baptized if the pastor would be willing to do it with them.  He then went back to that staff member who said he would be re-baptized and asked him if he was serious, and he said, “No that’s just talk.”

That’s just talk.  For how many of us is our claim to have Christian love just talk?  We all know the expression: “Actions speak louder than words.”

We have to show our love in deed, in our everyday lives, not just when we greet each other in church on Sunday mornings.  By showing love every day of our lives we know that we are God’s children, and it becomes our daily assurance that we are saved indeed, and that the Lord is always with us.

A Chinese proverb says, “Talk don’t cook rice.”  We cannot love in word or with our tongues, it takes actions.

Last weeks NFL Playoffs place the best teams for the AFC and the NFC in a battle for the Super Bowl Championship.  At the beginning of this years playoffs, people said that the Pittsburgh Steeler’s had no chance of making it to the Super Bowl.  Despite the odds of a wild card winning the Super Bowl, that is exactly what the Steeler’s did.

Many years it is impossible to predict who is going to win it all.  But early on, the NFC (then called the NFL) dominated the Supper Bowl.  NFC teams won the first 2 contests.  Heading to Super Bowl 3 in the Miami, Florida, Orange Bowl, most agreed that he Baltimore Colts were sure to win.

The NFC Colts had lost only once in 16 games all season, and were 17 Point favorites against the AFC’s New York Jets.  But somebody must have forgotten to tell that to Jets quarterback Joe Namath.  On the Thursday before Super Bowl Sunday, Namath boldly guaranteed that the Jets would win the game.

Many football fans laughed at Namath’s prediction, but the daring quarterback backed up his words with his actions.  Leading a balanced Jets attack, Namath passed for 10 first downs.  New York also rushed for 10 first downs as they kept the Colts defense off balance.  The Jets built up a 16-0 lead early in the fourth quarter.  And after Johnny Unitas came off the bench to lead the Baltimore Colts to a late touchdown, the game ended at 16-7 in favor of the Jets.  For his part, Namath completed 17 of 28 passes for 206 yards and was named the Super Bowl Most Valuable Player.  And if you watched the game last week, he was honored with the rest of the Super Bowl MVP’s.

Modern day athletes often run their mouths and guarantee victory.  In fact one of the players from the Seahawks this past week did that very thing.  But when Joe Namath guaranteed victory in 1968, his boast shocked the sports news.  And when he backed up his prediction with his actions on the field, Namath proved that his words meant something.

God wants our words to mean something as well.  If we say one thing and do another, people lose respect for us.  People judge you by your actions.  St. Francis of Assisi once said, “Preach the gospel at all times, and when necessary use words.”  That means our actions speak louder than our words.  And if we happen to open our mouth and say something, we need to make sure that our actions match what we say and that we can back up our words.

And the last verse that I want to look at is verse 23.  Here in verse 23 it says, “1”

From this verse we learn about The Lord’s Commandment.

We have seen that we are expected to show the love of Christ to others.  Right here is the key to having Agape, or unconditional love.  The first thing we have to do is “believe on the name of [God’s] Son Jesus Christ.”  And the second thing we need to do is “love one another.”  These are the 2 great commandments as found in Matthew 22:37-39. These verses say, “You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.  This is the first and great commandment.  And the second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

The way we show our love toward God is to show our love and obedience to Jesus Christ.  Jesus is the means through which we communicate with the Lord and are connected to Him, because He is our mediator.  In I Timothy 2:5-6 it says, “For there is one God and one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself as ransom for all . . .”  Until we know Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior, we can never know what unconditional love is.

Now people often as why this is?  I John 4:10 tells us, and it says, “In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He first loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.”  God loved us first.  We could not love first, because we do not know what love is.  We learn love by the example that God gave us in his Son Jesus Christ whom gave His life for us.

Jesus gave us the example of unconditional love when He died on the cross.  When we accept what He did for us, and feel the forgiveness of our sins, then we will produce that kind of love in our lives.  We will know how to forgive when we ourselves are forgiven.  We will know how to love when we ourselves are loved.

And that brings us to our Final Time of Reflection

How many of us truly know what love is?  An even better question is have we experienced true love ourselves?  Have we experienced the love of Jesus Christ, and His blood that cleanses us from all sins?  If we have never experienced unconditional love, how can we know what to share with others?

Those of us who know Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior know the meaning of unconditional love.  We say we love each other, but I want to encourage each of us to put those words into action each and every day.

If there is anyone here who does not know the love of Jesus, you can experience his love right now.  Trust and believe that Jesus died to take your place.  Believe it and confess it before all people and put it into action.  Do this and you will be saved, and you will learn how to love as Christ loves.

Let’s Pray