St Valentine’s Secret

This page in French (Français)

All his life, Valentine heard stories of hardship, torture and martyrdom. One day he would shed no tears. They would finally kill him, too. Yet instead of despising the God who allowed this, he just loved him more.

‘How could a God of love let innocent people like you suffer, Valentine?’

‘I’m not innocent,’ St. Valentine whispers.

‘Oh, come on, Valentine! You’re such a good man!’

‘Only one Innocent ever suffered,’ replies Valentine.

The rantings of arm-chair philosophers differ markedly from the findings of people with the deepest experience of both God and suffering. Valentine knew the power of God’s love and comfort in the midst of severe suffering. Such depth of experience does not come cheaply and cannot be passed on by words alone. Intense experience and intimacy with God is a common price. For nearly 2,000 years Valentine’s experience has been reproduced by the torment of thousands of Christian martyrs who have agonised in triumph, rejoicing in the goodness of God.

By the laws of aerodynamics bumble-bees cannot fly, it was once claimed . But people who know bumble-bees could not be hoodwinked. A scientific explanation might elude them, but they know bumble-bees fly. Similarly, people like Valentine who really know God, even those who have suffered as much as is humanly possible, know what they know: God’s love is as mind-boggling as his power. Gaining insight in this matter might not be scientifically satisfying, but it is truth proven by cold reality.

‘When you know God,’ breathed a Nazi concentration camp inmate, ‘you don’t need to know why.’ The hearts of thousands leap in agreement.

No clever argument, however, and no supposed spiritual experience can hide one unavoidable fact: a holy, all-powerful God would yearn to wipe out every cause of pain. And if he eradicated everyone who has ever caused pain by selfishness, cheating, lying, gossiping or hurtful remarks, who would be left?

‘Suffering is God’s fault!’ we sneer, conveniently forgetting times our anger, greed and lies hurt others. We spurn God’s laws, hurt each other, and then have the audacity to blame God for the resulting disaster. Naturally, there is a degree of hurt we deem excusable, and for some suspicious reason the hurt we have inflicted happens to fall within the standard we arbitrarily set. It is like failing an exam and then moving the pass mark to make our score look good. A holy God could not be partner to such hypocrisy. To wipe out some people who cause suffering and spare you and me would make God guilty of gross injustice. If there is a God of love, the people he loves and longs to place in an pain-free world are the very ones who cause humanity’s suffering.

All suffering can be tracked back to human wrong-doing - not necessarily the action of anyone presently alive, but to someone’s deliberate disregard of God and his ways. And why didn’t God strike that person dead before others could be hurt? Because to be fair he should do the same to you and me.

Only a maniac or an ego-maniac would dare demand justice from God. We have each added to humanity’s pain.

Yet humanity can boast one perfect Person. And he suffered. He appeared as the uniquely perfect human who preached impossibly high standards, claimed they were God’s requirements and actually lived them. Turning the cheek, loving his enemies, just as he had preached, Jesus yielded to abuse and torture, somehow absorbing within his mangled body the horrific consequences of all humanity’s sin. Yet our only Innocent gladly suffered the injustice to free the guilty from suffering eternal justice. In this cataclysmic exchange, the Innocent and the guilty traded places, making it spiritually legal for his suffering to end your suffering. As incredible as it seems, this has ushered us to the brink of a new world where the longing deep within us will be met - deceit, abuse, and hurtful actions will be swallowed by goodness; misery will dissolve in endless joy.

But temporary earthly pain continues for a wonderful reason. A paradise of harmony, trust, openness and love would quickly spoil if just one of its citizens acted remotely like we presently behave. To enter a perfect world without shattering its perfection, would require a personality transformation more radical than ever seen on earth. Through Jesus’ intervention, God can perform this miracle and make us fit for such a world, but he won’t abuse us by forcing a personality change upon us against our will. We must be willing to let God take our pet sins from us and let him, in his unlimited wisdom and love, rule every part of our lives.

Humanity quivers on the brink of extinction, mesmerised by sin like serpent’s prey. Each moment that God suppresses his explosive urge to extinguish evil, is a moment in which billions of us have yet another chance to come to our senses and let Jesus deliver us from our infatuation with sin. But the end of this period of grace is hurtling toward us. Soon all suffering will cease. All wrongdoing will be destroyed, along with everyone still caught in its deadly embrace.

Many of us would go to any lengths - even to accusing our Judge of injustice - in an unconscious attempt to push the spotlight away from the recesses of a dirty conscience. If only we could smear God, narrowing the gap between his perfection and our shabby behaviour, we’d feel better.

It would be the height of hypocrisy to dare criticise God for not always interfering when tragedy looms. Time after time we have each proved by our actions that we don’t want his love and wisdom cramping our style.

But there must be a Day of reckoning. All evil must be removed. Even the self-righteous have been demanding it for millennia, though they have no idea what they are asking. Our response before that awesome moment will determine whether we’ll be around to enjoy an evil-free environment.

You Can Find Love: What your Fantasies Reveal

How to repond to God’s love

More about suffering

Who was St Valentine?

Valentine Cards

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