Valentine's Day is on the horizon. It is a time of expressing love, through cards, gifts and other acts of kindness. In a recent sermon, I shared a love story that has been requested by many people. So as we approach Valentine's Day, reflect upon this story. It is indeed a love story.
It is the experience of Dr. Richard Seller, a Surgeon at Yale University Medical School. Dr. Seller is also a creative writer. Dr. Seller shares with us a Love Story that inspires, encourages and teaches us the meaning of real love. The story is communicated in the words of Dr. Seller.
"I stand beside the bed where a young woman lies her face post operative, her mouth twisted in a palsy, clownish manner. A tiny twig of a facial nerve, the one to the muscles of her mouth has been severed. She will be thus from now on. The Surgeon had followed the curve of her flesh. Nevertheless, to sever the tumor from her cheek and to save her life I had to cut the little nerve. Making rounds late in the afternoon, I walked into her room as the sun was going down. I noticed that she and her husband were enjoying a moment of quiet intimacy as he sat on the bed. I stopped as I entered the room not wanting to interrupt their time together. I knew almost at once that I was standing on Holy Ground. Her husband was now standing on the other side of the bed. They seemed to dwell there in the evening lamp light isolated from me. 'Who are they', I asked myself, he and this crooked mouth that I have made, who gaze and touch each other so generously, so greedily? The young woman speaks, 'Will my mouth always be like this?' she asked me.
'Yes, it will, because I had to cut the nerve'.
She nods and is silent. But the young man smiled and said, 'I like it'.
Then he added, 'It's sort of cute like you'.
All at once, I know who he is. I understand and lower my gaze. One is not bold in such an encounter. Unmindful of me he bends to kiss her crooked mouth and I am so close that I can see how he twists his own lips to accommodate hers, to show her that their kiss still works".
As I first read the story, I thought that is a powerful portrait of Jesus coming to us just like we are and sharing His unconditional love. Dr. Seller shared a powerful love story but the greatest of all love stories is God clothing Himself in human flesh and coming not only to teach us but to show us what real love is all about. "NOW ABIDETH FAITH, HOPE, LOVE THESE THREE, BUT THE GREATEST OF THESE IS LOVE." I ENCOURAGE YOU TO ATTEND CHURCH ON VALENTINE'S DAY AS WE CELEBRATE THE GREATEST OF ALL LOVE STORIES, THE STORY OF JESUS AND HIS LOVE.
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