It's Who We Are
by Katie Harding on February 14, 2022
I always say I was born in Illinois, but I’ve grown up in Northern Virginia. And it’s days like today that remind me of women who God brought to my path in the early days of moving into the area. Among those was Jane, who lived in our neighborhood for just a short time because of the Foreign Service, but when she departed, she left a life-long impact.
It was from Jane I received the recipe for Applesauce Bread, a favorite treat of our family’s and others for decades now. It was Jane who said she always threw away sales papers so she wouldn’t be tempted to want things she really didn’t need, and it was Jane who one day asked a question that left me wrestling with the answer. She asked, “If you believe in Jesus, then you know where you are going when you die, right?” I remember saying, “Right,” with my lips but feeling something totally different in my heart. At the young age of twenty-two, I didn’t feel the assurance she did, but Jane’s question set me on the path to discovering it for myself.
It was Jane who also demonstrated that there’s more we can do on Valentine’s Day than purchase cards for our kids to give to their classmates, which was the tradition in my family. Jane was all about Jesus, so her focus for the holiday wasn’t really about celebrating Valentine’s Day as much as it was about celebrating love — especially the love she had for her family and the love they had for others.
Every Valentine’s Day she would decorate their table for dinner with a pretty white tablecloth, pink and red candles, and construction paper hearts sprinkled around. For each child’s place she made a special treat using the cardboard tubes from empty toilet paper rolls. She filled them with a special message for each child, added a few pieces of candy and then wrapped them with tissue paper and tied the ends with yarn, so it looked like a huge tootsie roll by each plate. But what touched my heart most were the paper hearts tied to the chandelier that hung above the table. On each heart was the name of someone they would be praying for that evening. What a great reminder that sometimes one of the most powerful ways we can love people is to pray for them.
But this year on Valentine’s Day, what strikes me most is that loving others isn’t just something we do, it’s who we are, because we’re God’s children. And as the Apostle John said in his first letter to other believers, “…God is love” (1 John 4:8). Love isn’t what God does, it’s who He is. That’s what was so wonderful about meeting Jane and the lessons I learned from watching her life and listening to her stories. Jane didn’t just do loving things in certain circumstances, Jane was a loving person in all circumstances. It’s who she was — loving.
As we celebrate Valentine’s Day today by making calls or sending messages to those we love, may we remember that love isn’t just something we do, but love is who we are.