The Ultimate Valentine's Day Gift

Happy almost Valentine's Day!

I was recently chatting with my friend about how the meaning of Valentine's Day has kind of changed for me over the years.

As a child, it was one of the few Western traditions that my family partook in, because teachers request that families bring in Valentine's Day "gifts" for everyone in the class. It was really fun looking for boxes of Valentine's Day cards at Target, and I remember looking for cute ones every (elementary school) year. It felt like such a grown-up and important project to go through the class roster and make sure I wrote the cards to everyone - not a single person missed. I remember double-checking by counting how many names there were and how many cards I wrote. It was a very, precise operation that I loved, and was always a special treat to have a potluck in class after we passed out all the cards to each other.

I think junior high was when Valentine's Day kind of shifted. As we all had different classes that we rotated through, cards for everyone was not really practice anymore. The idea of Valentine grams were introduced, and suddenly, Valentine's Day began to feel lonely. It felt like in order to join in on the celebration, you either had to be in a relationship, or were "rich" enough to purchase and receive $3 roses for all your friends. I fell into neither of these categories, and I remembered the first trickle of distaste for Valentine's Day coming about during this time.

I did date in high school, and to be honest, the years where dating overlapped Valentine's Day felt very special, especially when I received a Valentine Gram. I'll be the first to admit that I wasn't one of the pretty, popular girls (I'm still not, for that matter), and getting grams in the middle of class made me feel just a teensy bit like I was a little popular. It was a statement to the whole class: "This girl is cool enough to be liked." By sophomore year, I had a couple of friends who were big on Valentine's Day grams, and I remember counting change to be able to purchase V-day grams (and other holiday grams), just so our friendship wouldn't be destroyed. It was a very delicate balance of give-and-take, and it sometimes felt more like a competition - who could give "more" and make it more creative and interesting? It felt like when I couldn't afford better gifts - whether financially or time dedication to creating something - I was seen as a "bad friend", or the lesser friend. Slowly, these friends faded from my life because I couldn't afford to keep up, and they didn't want to spend on someone who wouldn't give. It honestly made me feel worthless sometimes, but these were feelings that felt weird to verbalize - how do you say "I want to feel like one of the popular girls" without it sounding like a cringe SNL script written as a spinoff of Mean Girls?

In college, it felt a little less lonely - rather than relationships and "cool girls" being flaunted in class, most of them just vacated the dorm rooms for Valentine's and Galentine's celebrations, and that was fine. It helped that my close friend's birthday is on February 13th, so I was able to also take time to celebrate his birthday instead of focusing on my perpetual un-popularness and single-as-a-pringleness. My dad was also diagnosed with cancer when I was in college, so my focus really shifted.

I won't say that the adult years of managing Valentine's Day is "easier". I didn't grow up with social media - Instagram was only a little popular starting in college, and Facebook was mainly for communication. As an adult, social media really took off, and it became really hard not to compare. In my seasons of singleness, I felt unworthy of having friends who would do extravagant Galentine's nights that were insta-worthy. In my seasons of dating, it was easy to feel like I was unworthy of receiving beautiful roses, cute chocolates, luxury jewelry and bags. I knew in my head that these things didn't define my worthiness and the amount of love I was receiving from my friends and/or significant other, but I couldn't help to compare. If these other girls were worthy of hosting paint and sips together decked out in balloons and cute, girly decor, why was I not worthy of an invitation? How come when I try to host something for my friends, I'm not worthy of spending time with? Why were these boyfriends willing to work extra hard to afford these luxuries and take time to create something post-worthy for their girlfriends, but I can hardly get a dinner date together? It felt as though the teenage angst of desiring to be "popular" was returning 10-fold, and it was frustrating. I knew I was too old to be caught up in something so high school, and if I didn't feel like there was any way to verbalize it then, I certainly couldn't now. As my early 20's evolved into the mid 20's, and I remained unmarried while everyone else was having beautiful weddings on Instagram, I began to blame my frustration on being unmarried, as that was a more acceptable reason for being upset about Valentine's Day.

Now, 2 years deep into marriage, I think sometimes, I still do feel these urges to compare myself to others on social media. I will say that to a certain extent, the impracticality of spending our shared money on extravagant gifts has toned down my desire for a special Valentine's day, but I do still crave seeing thought put into a nice, homemade gift or card. However, a part of me knows I have to accept that while my husband isn't a creative gift giver on holidays, he is far more romantic than a day can confine him to - and there are lots of things in our relationship worth celebrating beyond February 14th. Unfortunately for my husband, that a sin I have to constantly work wrestling with, and remember to be grateful and gracious.

As a Christian, this mentality of having a superficial show of being "loved" feels so silly, because we believe in being so loved by God that He sent His one and only Son who died for us - but it's also a very real feeling that we feel. I know I am not the only person with these thoughts and feelings. I often have to stop and remind myself of the Kardashian memes:

And it's sad, because it's so relatable. This world is falling apart left and right, and I feel like I'm sometimes really preoccupied with how I am perceived by people I don't even know on the internet. I don't think we should invalidate the feeling of "if someone's friend/significant other goes that extra mile for them, why don't I have that?", because standards are important. However, there is a lack of gratitude in what is there. A pretty balloon will deflate, flowers will wilt, candles will run down, yummy food gets pooped out, luxury bags can remain empty along with your empty stomach, expensive jewelry lose their shine. To stay with the Kardashian reference, Kanye West reportedly gave extravagantly to Kim Kardashian, even generous in proportion to his large wealth... but we all know how that relationship went very publicly down far south. What does matter is in the day-to-day moments - and I can say I have very genuine friends that I can turn to. I have a husband who, despite his lack of conventional romantic-ness, is very romantic and dotes on me a lot. The spirit of comparison keeps me from appreciating all of those things.

I've been reflecting a lot this season about what Valentine's Day really should mean to me, as a Christian. We often say that Jesus is love, and what better day to celebrate that than a day for celebrating love? It's been a little over a month and a half since Christmas Day, where we celebrated the birth of Jesus, and I find that this is a good midpoint between Christmas and Easter to celebrate and reflect on the presence of Christ in our lives. As the political climate continues to storm and the burdens of "adulting", illness, and aging continues to weigh on those around me, I realize more and more how important it is to lean on God and remember His love. This world is so brutal, and it is unfortunately a very true statement: they don't love you. That's not to discount the love our loved ones have for us, and vice versa - but the fact is that the majority of the world does not function on "love". As Christians, we were given a very clear example of what it means to love:

but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. -Romans 5:8

That wasn't just it, though. We must remember that before he died for us, he lived for us. Instead of remaining a far away God who can bask in the riches of a perfect Kingdom came to live in this world where He had nothing, because of love. And in His life, he chose to love. While others outcasted lepers, blaming their situation on sin and fear of contamination, Jesus was not afraid to show love.

Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man [with leprosy]. “I am willing,” he said. “Be clean!” Immediately he was cleansed of his leprosy. -Matthew 8:3

Speaking of outcasts, He openly broke bread with them, shared life with them, and treated them as human. He did not conform to what the world said these people were, he saw their identity first as people - people with family, hardship, needs, desire for connection, and more.

And as Jesus reclined at table in the house, behold, many tax collectors and sinners came and were reclining with Jesus and his disciples. - Matthew 9:10

Jesus never defined someone with their sin or skin, but rather saw their humanity and needs. He never confined love and kindness to law, but rather as a way of life. We see this in multiple instances, such as the woman at the well - He spoke to a Samaritan woman who had multiple husbands. He stopped the stoning of an adulterous woman. He healed a disabled man on the Sabbath, in spite of legalistic Sabbath practices.

And He knew what His life would come to. He knew He would be blamed, shamed, and framed. He knew he would be mocked and tortured and killed. He was fearful and cried out in anguish for this to not be the case - but surrendered for our sake - He surrendered because of love.

And it got me thinking, if this is the example Jesus gave us of what love is, why does it not feel like that in this world? God showed us that love should be boundless, not restrained. As Christians, aren't we called to follow this example? But why does it feel like so many of our Christian communities uphold practices of shaming sinfulness, promoting the hiding of sin, rather than revealing it and allowing for space and grace to grow? Why are we creating unsafe spaces for others of different nationalities? Why are we all watching out for our own backs, rather than protecting the backs of others?

It is, of course, wise for us to be mindful of our safety, our financial well-being, and make sure our families are afloat. There is no sin in that. But doesn't it at one point become a sin when our lives become only about protecting ourselves, at the cost of others? As Christians, aren't we called to follow the example of being a willing sacrifice? To be shamed, blamed, framed; mocked, tortured, and killed? Hopefully not to that extent, but it happens. Just recently, a man was killed by ICE agents because he stepped up for justice and humanity. I don't know his faith or much else about him, but he was a nurse who dedicated his career to helping the sick, and he literally gave his life to protect a woman. Is that not what love is?

Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. -John 15:13

As Christians, we have all received that kind of love... but why doesn't it translate as "pass it on"? We have a God we can turn to and lay down our burdens, so how much more should we pray to take on the burdens of this world so that we can lay them down before God? How much more should we be faithful in fearlessly giving our all to others? Rather, why do we commit to hating our neighbors, hating those who are different, and even hating ourselves?

So for this Valentine's Day, I challenge myself to think about how I can love on others more, and act on it. It doesn't have to mean running head-on into the crossfires of political figures, or saving a cat stuck on a tree. But there are so many other ways that I know I can encourage others and share with them droplets and cups of this everlasting fountain that God has sprung in my life. And I challenge you to join me in finding ways to love others.