In case you haven’t noticed, Valentine’s Day is coming up.
Marketers put a lot of hype into February 14 as the day of love.
But as Christians who love Jesus, should Valentine’s Day be different than any other day?
Loving others and celebrating love should be a part of our every day normal.
In the musical Rent, there is a beautiful song called Seasons of Love. It paints a picture of a life of love in such an awesome way.
Hit play on this video and follow along with the lyrics below.
Seasons Of Love lyrics
Songwriters Larson, Jonathan D
Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes
Five hundred twenty-five thousand moments so dear
Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes
How do you measure, measure a year?
In daylights, in sunsets
In midnights, in cups of coffee
In inches, in miles, in laughter, in strife
In five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes
How do you measure, a year in the life?
How about love?
How about love?
How about love?
Measure in love
Seasons of love
Seasons of love
Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes
Five hundred twenty-five thousand journeys to plan
Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes
How do you measure the life of a woman or a man?
In truths that she learned
Or in times that he cried
In bridges he burned
Or the way that she died
It’s time now, to sing out
Though the story never ends
Let’s celebrate
Remember a year in the life of friends
Remember the love
(Oh, you got to, you got to remember the love)
Remember the love
(You know that love is a gift from up above)
Remember the love
(Share love, give love, spread love)
Measure in love
(Measure, measure your life in love)
Seasons of love
Seasons of love
(Measure your life, measure you life in love)
Each year, God gives us 525,600 minutes to love Him and love people.
How many minutes do we do that?
<gulp>
I know I spend too many of those blessed minutes being frustrated, hurtful and mean-spirited.
What a waste.
We have been given so much.
I want my life to measured in love. I want others to see Jesus in me.
Don’t you?
During this month of love and ALL THROUGH THE YEAR let’s work toward loving during the 525,600 minutes we are given.
For when we love God and love his people, He is able to do His best work.
By Jessica Turner, The Mom Creative
ABOUT JESSICA TURNER
Jessica Turner blogs on The Mom Creative about motherhood,
{ 22 comments… read them below or add one }
Thanks so much for that. So appropriate for me as I’m celebrating my 30th birthday today and am in a very reflective mood. When I think about God’s love for me, and that of my husband, family and friends, I’m quite overwhelmed. It pushes all the negative aside.
God bless
Happy Birthday to you!!!
Happy Birthday, friend!
Fabulous. Just fabulous. A perfect reminder and boost for the next 525,600! :-)
wonderfully {painful} reminder. thanks jessica for sharing your heart!
i will be conscience of this today {and hopefully everyday}.
how am i spending my minutes? with my husband? children? friends? co-workers?
am i loving?????
thanks!
Lovely post! Although we should remember that it’s Saint Valentine’s day. We don’t know that much about him. The first representation of Saint Valentine appeared 1493 the text states that he was a Roman priest martyred during the reign of Claudius II. He was arrested and imprisoned upon being caught marrying Christian couples and otherwise aiding Christians who were at the time being persecuted by Claudius in Rome. Helping Christians at this time was considered a crime. Claudius took a liking to this prisoner – until Valentinus tried to convert the Emperor – whereupon this priest was condemned to death.
I like the fact that we remember St Valentine’s day, but I can’t help wishing that it was just a little bit more spiritual and less materialistic! Still, I hope you all have a lovely, and loved, day on Monday!
Thanks for mentioning St. Valentine. I too wish the focus of such holidays were on the faithful, as with Christmas.
Thank you for this today..what a great way to inspire us to measure each moment! I so enjoy your blog, please keep on keeping on, what a blessing you are!
WOW! Powerful video & message!!!
It is so true that we humans spend way to much time in bitterness, anger and judgement. We need to spend it more in love of ALL of God’s creatures!!!
Jessica,
I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart. I NEEDED this today.
peace be with you.
Amen Jessica – Love is SO “the thing”. We need to be about “the thing”.
Love is the message of Jesus all rolled up like a ball of yarn. And the funny thing about balls of yarn – leave them alone with a playful kitten and when you come back there’s yarn everywhere but no ball. Love is just like that. We unroll it little by little and soon we’re covered in it and it’s all over the place.
This was a really nice thing to read today
God Bless and Keep you and yours
Very poignant, and very true.
Just LOVE….the verb begets the noun, and the noun begets the verb, and the circle of LOVE is perpetual, unbroken.
I told my husband last nite, not to even bother with a card….we know we love each other…everyday.
I, too, waste so many minutes loving SELF, and not Jesus or others. UGH! My hope and prayer is that it turns around. Let is be so, Lord.
That song ~ a tearjerker for me. A reminder of my niece. That was one of her favorite songs. She loved her friends, she loved her family, she loved to read, she loved to learn, she loved to dance, she loved to live. Her life was measured in LOVE, and not minutes ~ for they were short, by our standards. They whiz by pretty fast when cancer erodes. Seventeen years X 525,600 = 8,935,200 minutes of LOVE. They fleeted by, but they remain….for it is the GREATEST of these.
Your post reminds me of my favorite verse, “The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love” (Galatians 5:6). Jessica, you love much and love well–and we all benefit.
Holley,
I was thinking the same verse!
Jessica,
THANK YOU for this.
and when you say “I want others to see Jesus in me.”
Please know that I can.
Have a lovely weekend!
Ida
You both are too sweet. It’s all Jesus, not me…
Friend, you are one of the best examples I know of loving in your moments. I have learned that from you… showing in even the small ways how much people matter. So grateful for all the ways you’ve done that for me!
and I am grateful for you. xo
I have always loved this song, thanks for the video! And what an awesome reminder to love each of those minutes!
Bernice
Doing the right things at the right time
Oh my!
(in)courage and Rent…together in one place!
I am swooning. Love this!
me too. :)
My son’s choir sang this song two years ago & I loved it so much I downloaded the words. Thank you sooo much for reminding me what a wonderful song it is.
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