“And he saith unto me, Write, Blessed are they which are called unto the marriage supper of the Lamb. And he saith unto me, These are the true sayings of God.” (Revelation 19:9)
Last Saturday night we held a Valentine’s Day banquet at the church. We have done a few of these in the past, but with the recent move it has been a couple of years since we have done this. Like every church, we have dinners all the time, but this one is usually special. Most church dinners are pot luck or buffet style where everyone goes through the line with their paper plate and dishes up whatever mass produced thing we can come up with. It is usually pretty good food, but still, when you are trying to feed large groups it is not always easy to prepare something like you would find at home or in a nice restaurant. But with our dinner last Saturday, we pulled out all the stops for a special evening. No buffet line. It was a sit down dinner with real plates and silverware prepared by our head chef Kevin Benton and served by some of our youth. The menu was roast brisket au-jus with salad and rolls, garlic mashed potatoes, and Kevin’s world famous Root Beer green beans. For desert, we had the main fare from the Cheesecake Factory, and Kevin’s wife Paula made German Chocolate cake from scratch that was absolutely to die for. The room was decorated with real table cloths and centerpieces, and a band from our sister church in Piper entertained with some awesome music. It was truly a magical evening. Kudos to Anita Clark and our Women with Heart ministry for the planning and preparations. We had more raves about this event than we have had for anything else lately.
As nice as the evening was, it pales in comparison to an event that is on our calendar as believers in the Lord Jesus Christ. The Bible likens our relationship with Christ as a bride / bridegroom according to II Corinthians 11:1-3 and Ephesians 5:22-33, along with others. Someday, those who have placed their trust in the Saviour will be called to the wedding reception and the feast of the ages. Our recent church banquet was to commemorate the world’s holiday of “love” called Valentine’s Day. The banquet described in Revelation 19 will be the celebration of the greatest love story of the ages. I John 4:10 says, “Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.” “Propitiation” is a fancy term we don’t use commonly, which means “a provision for mercy.” When a person is convicted of a crime, sometimes he will “fall upon the mercy of the court” in order to try to reduce or eliminate his sentence. In a truly just legal system (none on earth today), mercy can only be granted if there is a valid reason. The court cannot extend mercy just because a man happens to wear a certain color shirt. There must be some provision given to the court to extend mercy. We see a small picture of that in our legal system when a “first offence” is given a lesser sentence. But God’s “court of law” cannot operate like that. Perfect justice requires perfect prosecution and sentencing for sin. But there is a provision for God to grant his mercy – the death of his Son on the cross.
Every love story of the world contains a bit of human selfishness. We love our spouse because of what they can do for us. We love our children for the joy they bring us. “But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8) The only pure love this world has ever seen or ever will see was displayed at Calvary. Once we access that love by trusting Jesus as our Saviour, we can have God’s perfect mercy. The only real “Valentine’s Day” in history happened on a hill far away outside of Jerusalem on a Passover evening nearly 2,000 years ago. Have you experienced it?
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