A Few Thoughts For Valentine's Day

I hope you are all enjoying your special day. Here are a few things God brought my way this morning. I wanted to share them with you and I hope they encourage and uplift you:

"Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love, does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed His love among us: He sent His one and only Son into the world that we might live through Him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we ought to love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us." 1 John 4:7-12

Excerpt from Love Is Extravagant by Joni Eareckson Tada:
"As I went off on that speaking trip, I thought of the quality that marks the ministry of love. And that is its sheer extravagance. Love is extravagant in the price it is willing to pay, the time it is willing to give, the hardships it is willing to endure, and the strength it is willing to spend. And that is what God has given to us."

O God, I have tasted Thy goodness, and it has both satisfied me and made me thirsty for more. I am painfully conscious of my need for further grace. I am ashamed of my lack of desire. O God, the Triune God, I want to want Thee; I long to be filled with longing; I thirst to be made more thirsty still. Show me Thy glory, I pray Thee, so that I may know Thee indeed. Begin in mercy a new work of love within me. Say to my soul, "Rise up my love, my fair one, and come away." Then give me grace to rise and follow Thee up from this misty lowland where I have wandered so long. A.W. Tozer, The Pursuit of God