Knowing that this article will be published around Valentine’s Day made me reflect on my past experiences on this holiday. Throughout much of my dating and married life, I have celebrated it by getting a gift and taking my significant other to a dinner and maybe a movie (no one ever accused me of being very creative).
Year after year, this has been my typical way of celebrating Valentine’s Day—with one notable exception.
About eight or nine years ago, my wife and I came home after our typical dinner out. We had planned to just watch a movie at home since Valentine’s Day that year was in the middle of the work week. But instead, we found that our refrigerator’s ice machine wasn’t working.
Without going into too much detail, we needed to empty out all of its contents and then defrost it. This typically took at least a couple hours. Needless to say, neither of us were too thrilled with the change of plans, but we both dove in together.
During that time, we also had a family friend and her 15-year-old daughter living with us. I vividly remember her telling her daughter, “Honey, this is what love looks like after 30 years of marriage.”
This has continued to echo in my mind every year each time I planned our dinner out for that night. The interesting thing is that after cleaning the fridge that night, I felt more in love with my wife than I did after the dinner.
There is something that happens to you when you serve one another. In a book called “The Law of Love,” written by former 49ers’ quarterback, Steve Young, he defines it as “loving as God loves, seeking another’s healing, expecting nothing in return.”
Christ in the New Testament commanded His disciples to “love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another (John 13:34-35).”
So, how did he love his disciples? He served them.
Whenever someone comes to me as their ecclesiastical leader looking for how to improve their relationship with their spouse, I ask them what they have done lately to serve each other. In most cases, they have been living their own lives, but haven’t considered doing something for their partner.
I then challenge them to do one thing for their spouse every day that meets Steve Young’s definition. If they do this, my promise to them is that they will find that love isn’t something you fall into or out of; it requires you to act in some way.
Love is like a tender plant. It needs to be nourished and cared for every day. Acts of service, no matter how small, water and fertilize it, giving it the nourishment it needs to grow and flourish.
Matt Deakin is the Bishop of the Morgan Hill Ward of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He is a member of the Interfaith Clergy Alliance of South County. Bishop Deakin can be reached at bi**********@gm***.com.
