What is at the heart of your desire to give? Today is Valentine’s Day. If you have someone you would call your beloved your gift is an expression of the love you feel for them and your commitment to the relationship. My wife’s birthday was two days ago, so as soon as Christmas gifts are given, I start saving for the second week in February. I want to not only celebrate my spouse’s birthing day, but also that she is the companion in life and love that I am committed to in Christian marriage.

In Matthew, chapter six Jesus prioritizes a number of what should be heartfelt elements for how we exercise and express our faith…almsgiving, prayer, fasting, and our treasures. 19 ‘Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal; 20 but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. 21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. There are treasures we can buy and there are people and relationships that we also treasure. Faith values them differently, especially in how our giving makes known the desires we have for them in material and relational priority.

Valentine’s Day celebrates a love that is felt, but a generous person proves that love is also something given. When we offer our gifts to the church, we aren’t just meeting a budget; we are performing an act of faith that mirrors God’s own sacrificial love. God does not value the size of the gift, but the sincerity that is found in the heart of the giver. Perhaps that is why we highly value a gift that someone made for us, instead of something storebought or ordered online. Even if it is far from perfect, we will treasure it because of the unmeasured sincerity dwelling in the heart of the giver.

Just as we might give a heart-shaped token to a loved one, our financial gifts are “heart-shaped” offerings to God. John Wesley wrote in “A Plain Account of Christian Perfection” that giving even one’s whole life to God would mean nothing without the heart: “I saw that giving even all my life to God would profit me nothing unless I gave my heart, yea, all my heart…”.

Wesley concluded with this prayerful reflection, “O grant that nothing in my soul may dwell, but thy pure love alone! O may thy love possess me whole, my joy, my treasure, and my crown! Strange fires far from my heart remove, my every act, word, thought, be love!

May all your gifts reflect the sincerity of the love that dwells in your heart. A “valentine” to the Kingdom, trusting that when you place your treasured relationships in God’s hands, your heart remains securely rooted in the love that sustains them.

“In essentials, unity; in non-essentials, liberty; in all things, charity.”
Rev. Dr. David Weatherly,
President/CEO