We can, but we don’t, so we do …

There’s a common theme among people who complain about the observance of various holidays. It sounds something like this …

Christmas: “We should focus on the spiritual significance of Christ’s birth every day, not just on one designated holiday. December 25th isn’t even His real birthday.”

Easter: “Every Sunday is a celebration of Christ’s resurrection, so the emphasis should be on living out our faith daily rather than solely on Easter Sunday.”

Valentine’s Day: “Love should be expressed and celebrated every day, not just on a commercialized holiday. Our focus should be on genuine, sacrificial love rather than materialistic gestures.”

Many of the arguments people use to downplay observing such “holidays” have some truth to them. The problem is that, yes, we can be mindful of God’s gift of His Son to the world on any day … but we usually aren’t. Yes, any Sunday can be a celebration of Christ’s resurrection … but it usually isn’t. And certainly love can (should!) be expressed and celebrated every day … but we fail miserably at that (at least, with consistency).

We’re really good at forgetting even the most important stuff, like God’s love being so vast that He gave His one and only Son so that we might be saved from sin and reconciled to God. In fact, Jesus instituted the observance of Communion as a perpetual reminder that His sacrifice on our behalf required the breaking of His body and shedding of His blood. We can remember that every day, but we routinely forget even such unparalleled sacrifice and love until Communion is served in a church service.

And we can express, and proclaim, and celebrate the love we have for God, and for spouses, and children, and parents, and friends, and church family, and others every single day of our lives, but most of us are better at taking each other for granted each day than we are at loving each other the way Jesus loved us.

So maybe we need a day for which the great emphasis is to refocus us on love and loving.

“If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn’t love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God’s secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn’t love others, I would be nothing. If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it; but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing,” 1 Corinthians 13:1-3.

Scotty