I remember over two years ago at camp, my LDC leader talked about how at the high school he taught at their bible study made valentines for everyone in their school. A school of over 2000 students all received homemade valentines with bible verses on them.It took over two months of preparation and a team of over thirty people. I was amazed. Here was a group of high school students who wanted to share the love of Christ within their own schools.
Years later I sat in a coffee shop with the two other leaders of my schools bible and we read through all the comment cards from our members about what they wanted to change about the bible study, it was rough. There was a lot of things people wanted to change, which for us was disheartening. We were lost, confused, and we lacked a clear direction from God. At just the perfect time on of the guys I was with say one of his friends who was an old youth pastor in the Midwest. We told him our situation and he gave us advice on unifying our group and have them strive towards one goal. While he was talking the idea sparked in my head which hadn't been ignited since camp years ago, the valentines. After the man left our booth, I asked the guys what they thought of the idea, they loved it. We were all passionate about the idea and knew nothing would stand in our way, or so we thought.
A few days later, we proposed the idea to our principle, he was on board. When asked about what was going to be on the cards, we didn't entirely say we were doing bible verses. We figured it wouldn't be a big deal and if we got in trouble, well it was for the sake of the Gospel which made it okay. With everything seeming to be set, we told everyone else in the bible study the news and they were all on board for helping us in every way possible. We had a lot to do in a week, over 1600 valentines had to be made. Everything was going great, we were half way done with everything when one of the guys in leadership went to show our principle one of the finished cards, he said we couldn't have bible verses on them...separation of church and state. We had five days left until Valentine's day and out of ideas on how to save this project. We had to rip off all of the bible verses and come up with a new plan. We decided to do a label with the saying "you are loved the same yesterday, today and forever" to express God's unending love for us (Romans 8:38-39) without actually saying it. The labels were donated by my church and they were all placed on the valentines over the ripped of pieces of leftover paper from the verses. We finished them, in two weeks. Truly a miracle, in all honesty.
Thursday night we went a hung them all up, anxiety burned inside of me for the uncertainty of how many cards we actually had. We had leftovers. We stood in awe of our God. Leftovers? God you are amazing. It was only through Him that any of this was even possible, and it was all to see His glory be magnified within our Jerusalem.
And you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. -Acts 1:8
On Valentines day morning the bible study celebrated with pancakes and prayer for the school.
