Never More Loved -

Flowering Cherry Tree in Xi'an, China. March 19, 2016

This morning I get several sweet texts & messages from friends either wishing me
a Happy Valentine's Day or saying they were praying for me, hoping I knew I was loved. 

Oh yeah. Valentine's. I forgot for 10 hours since "Galentine's" last night. 

 It's "Singles Awareness Day" (hahaha, that always cracks me up).

I'm single for Valentine's 2017 but I plan on liking or loving or hearting every happy, beautiful Valentine's post,
every flower bouquet picture, every sappy, glittery, pink & red post, every "my one true love",
every "the one my soul loves", every "my Valentine every day" picture there is in my feed. 

I plan on doing on so (and have all day long) not because it doesn't make me twinge a wee bit in
sadness or wistfulness but because I remember the day that God set His extreme love on me...

and it's never gone away. 

Friends....you're not unloved today. You're never more loved than today. 

You're never more loved because His love is steady and unshakeable. It is continuous, everlasting.

Never more loved by anyone on this entire earth than by Jesus. 

Even those who have their "one true love" could never surpass or know a greater love than God's. 

You.are.not.missing.out.on.the.world's.greatest.love.story.by.being.single.

If you know Jesus, you already are being known & loved by the most perfect love. 

Think back to one of the moments you felt most loved....for some of you, it might have been that first "I love you",
or when your spouse took care of you while you were ill, or the day you said "I do". 

For others, it's the time a friend reached out and spoke love to you, or a trip planned just to be with you...
a surprise party to celebrate you!...or a phone call to say you are loved. 

There's millions of times, right? We have been loved well in our lifetimes. We've also been hurt by love. 

But there is One who perfects love, because He IS LOVE, and He is worth knowing every single day. 

"And we have known and believed the love that God has for us. 

God IS love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him." 

~ 1 John 4:16 ~ 

Y'all, consider the mystery with me for a little bit....throw singleness & marriage out the window....

The Creator of space and time, of moons, stars, sun, endless galaxies, earth, dark and light, 

Ruler of war and peace, Giver of Life, birth, babies, King over all He has created, Savior of nations....

looks at you every.single.day. and says "My Beloved."

You will never BE more loved in your lifetime than you are RIGHT NOW by God. 

I think every day is Valentine's Day when we rejoice and rest in being loved like that. 

"Could we with ink the ocean fill, and were the skies of parchment made,

were every stalk on earth a quill, and every man a scribe by trade;

to write the love of God above would drain the ocean dry;

nor could the scroll contain the whole, though stretched from sky to sky." 

~ Frederick M. Lehman (1917) ~ 

I love you, friends!!! 

Big hugs! 

- JM -