We love because He first loved us!

One thing we are trying to be intentional about  is teaching our kids (and ourselves!) to look for opportunities to show God's love.

We try to remember to ask God every morning, "Who do you want me to show Your love to today?" 

Why? Because when we are on the lookout for opportunities to show God's love, we are less likely to miss them. God showed me a metaphor for this concept the other day as I was reading Usborne's Farmyard Tales with my kids. We had read through several chapters before I remembered that the illustrator hides a little yellow duck on each page. We hadn't noticed any up until that point: they got lost in the rest of the picture. But when we went back we found that, sure enough, they were on every page we had looked at. We had just missed them, because we weren't looking for them.

I LOVE Valentine's Day!! It is a holiday for expressing your love. And not just your love, but it is the perfect opportunity to express God's love to those who need it most.

Thanks for this idea, Tina Ambler!

We all need His love, but who are the Father's precious sons and daughters created in His image that may be without hope this Valentine's Day? A neighbor going through a divorce? A single mom in your child's class? A lonely resident in a nursing home? The homeless person you pass on your way to work? A forgotten inmate in your county jail? A soldier far from home?

I have a feeling that if we ask God to reveal to us a person in special need of His love this Valentine's Day, we won't have to look very long or very hard.

A fun idea God gave me several years ago was to host an annual Valentine's party. I pull out all my fun card making supplies, invite a bunch of girlfriends over, and enjoy fellowship while we create Valentines for our husbands, our friends, sisters, etc... The best part is the inspiration we get from each others' creations!
I was having a hard time justifying spending the money on some fun supplies this year, but after some prayer I felt okay about it because:
1. It is creating an opportunity for fellowship.
2. It is supporting marriages by creating an opportunity for wives to put some TLC into a special hand-made Valentine for their man.
3. It is promoting God's love.
4. God is the one who put this idea on my heart, so it would be DISobedient not to go out and buy some cute card making supplies for the party (right? ;) )

Hope the ladies will have some fun with all this!

My sweet daughter has a very loving and generous heart and loves crafty things. She wants to host a party for some of her girlfriends, too. They can come over and have a snack and create some beautiful Valentines. We will present the option of making some extras for either the homeless or the nursing home. Probably the homeless, because Madison has a very special place in her heart for the homeless. In fact, last year she used $40 of her own money  to purchase little cardboard heart boxes and made them into prayer boxes, which she had the privilege of  hand delivering on Valentine's evening. Some of the recipients assured her that they were going to keep it forever :) I regret that I forgot to take pictures of such a sweet memory.

The final thing we hope to do to take full advantage of this Valentine's holiday is a tradition we started last year. The kids made and decorated adorable heart cookies, which we passed out to our friends at a local nursing home.We go with the intent of spreading God's hope and joy, but we always end up receiving more than we give.

Making Valentine cookies for our nursing home friends last year.

As you can see, they took their work seriously!

Ms. Ollie gave us flowers!

Isn't that the way it always works? We go to share God's love and joy..and come home with hearts full of love and joy!

I pray that God will be glorified as we remind each other of His undying love for each of us. I pray that He will use us to be vessels of His hope and that we will make the most of every opportunity to give the reason for the things we do.

"We love because He first loved us."

How could we keep this extravagant love all to ourselves?