A Ministry of Love ~ by Andi Lawrencovna

I had a really hard time writing this post today. For one, my mind is going five-hundred miles a minute on five hundred different topics and picking one was really tough.

But in the end, I had to focus, and I think I chose the right topic.

This Friday is Valentine’s Day.

Traditionally speaking, Valentine’s Day is the day of “lovers.” St. Valentine was the patron saint of affianced couples, happy marriages, love, beekeepers and plague…apparently. The saint ministered to persecuted Christians in the Roman Empire around the 200s AD and was martyred. Not sure how any of that links to marriages and beekeepers, but let’s go with it.

Over the course of years, St. Valentine has become more and more closely associated with hearts, roses, and red-pink-white colors and less with his religious ministry.

Moreover, he’s become more associated with gifts and candy, namely chocolate being given on February 14.

As children, we celebrated St. Valentine’s Day with cards to classmates that had little pieces of candy attached to them. As adults, we buy roses and jewelry mainly for women and a nice dinner for guys (and their dates…).

But in the end, we’ve actually forgotten what the day is truly about.

Not just “lovers,” but LOVE.

Ministry is a form of selfless love that we can offer to another person, and not necessarily a person who is close or related to us. It doesn’t have to be taking the coat off your back and giving it to someone who needs it – though it can be. Ministry can be as simple as offering a hug to someone who looks like they need it, or a smile to another who is having a hard time finding a smile of their own.

These are tributes of love that we should celebrate on St. Valentine’s Day. Even if you take out the “saint” part and just celebrate Valentine’s Day, it should still be about love. Loving ourselves, our relatives, our partners, our friends, our community, our world.

Love is one of the absolute greatest gifts humanity was ever given. It is a selfless expression of caring that we can offer to…ANYTHING.

In the wake of all the violence and hate polluting our world right now, I ask that on this upcoming Valentine’s Day, we celebrate with a gift of love.

Let’s post all the good things in our lives that we should show love for – from the smallest thing (that you found a pair of matched socks and don’t have to hunt for them today), to the great big things (that you got a raise, or you got engaged, or you sold 1,000,000,000,000 copies of WHATEVER), let’s take Valentine’s Day to encourage and praise those achievements. And if there is something bad out there, let’s do our best not to spread more hate, but to offer hope that those bad things will become better.

I have a project coming out on Valentine’s Day. It’s the second year I’ve been honored enough to have people join me for it. It’s called Kaleidoscope Hearts and it is a study in love, all the varied, different colors and shapes and sizes of what love means and can be to people. Self-love. Romantic love. Love of life. Love of others. The entire reason I wanted to do this project was because I wanted to spread a little bit of love with others.

So for this Valentine’s Day, enjoy that gift we are all so blessed to share. And share that gift, however great and however small, with others.

Let us minister to everyone with a smile and a warm heart this Valentine’s Day, and know that I love you, no matter what.