I Love a Good Love Story

I must start this beautiful month of God’s great love with a love story. I admit it. I’m a hopeless romantic so I love hearing people’s love stories. In fact, that’s one of my “asks”, not just for table-talk, but I sincerely love hearing how couples met, fell in love and got married. Maybe I’m living vicariously through their stories, and while I love a good on-screen love-story movie, there is nothing like real life ones.

Like most widows, I appreciate responding to someone who asks about the story of my sweetheart and me. Might I suggest that you give a widow or widower, and even couples you know, a real joy by requesting that they tell you their “story”! You’ll see a twinkle in their eyes when they start sharing. In fact, those embers in their fireplace just might be set a blaze again!

But, better than our own personal love stories, is our”Jesus” love story that changed everything in our lives. We might have had some very disappointing and untrustworthy “dates” in the past, but then we hear about a “guy” who is perfect in every way. “What? No way!” we say. We’re hesitant about meeting another guy who could let us down and disappoint us. But, we realize we have so much in common. He knows disappointment and rejection too. He is kind and generous and forgiving.

The day comes when we get to meet him. He’s everything that we heard him to be. We start to get some emotions we can’t explain. We really, really like him…..a lot. By now, we’ve met some of his family members — and they are warm and welcoming and we like hanging around them, too. But, we’re not making a quick decision, especially when we think about a long-term relationship. By now, we can’t stop thinking about him because he seems to be everything we hoped for, dreamed for, and waited for. We spend even more time with him and when we do, we see that he’s a friend that we can talk to about any and everything. He “gets us”. He understands what we mean when we speak and he even knows what we’re thinking before we speak.

Then, the day comes when he asks if we’ll be his forever love, and there is no way we can say “no”. He has captured our mind, heart, and soul. We say, “Yes – I believe in you. My life is in you. My hope is in you. You are my beloved and I am yours.”

Honestly, this is MY Love Story. Jesus is my everything — my hope for today and tomorrow. He never leaves me or forsakes me. And, I assure you, that this could be your Love Story, too!

Indeed, the greatest story ever told is that LOVE STORY – the story about God’s Son who left the portals of heaven to become one of us, first, as a little baby, then grow up and set the pattern for loving and living and serving others, and then to die for us so that our Love Story lives on forever. The Bible tells us to “give thanks to the Lord, for He is good, for His steadfast love endures forever” Psalm 136:1. “Steadfast love” describes a love that is unconditional and unchanging.

So as we enter into this holiest of seasons that we hear that Love Story over and over again, how should we respond? We can respond like the shepherds did on that first Christmas night, and like the Wise Men when they arrived at their home. They worshipped Him. We can rekindle this romance as we lean in closer to Him and bow our lives to Him in adoration for Who He is and all He has done for us. We can fall in love with Him again and determine to keep the “flames” of that first love we had for Him burning as brightly as the star that announced His coming over 2,000 years ago. Indeed, it is the “Greatest Love Story Ever Told” and I just kept keep from telling it!