My First Love

Mention the phrase “first love” and people often think of a significant other. During grade school, there were numerous girls I liked. One who I consider my first real girlfriend was named Kathy. We were first-grade classmates at Riverside Elementary School in Moorhead, Minnesota. Then I got transferred to a different school but came back to Riverside for sixth grade. Once again, Kathy and I were in the same class. We started exchanging notes and calling each other.

On February 14th of that school year, I received two valentines from Kathy. I also received valentines from kids that made fun of our relationship or discouraged it. Nevertheless, Kathy remained an off and on girlfriend throughout my junior high years before she broke up with me for good. We remained friends during high school. Kathy always smiled at me whenever we passed each other in the hallway. 

The last time I saw Kathy was in 1983 when I was 19. My dad sent me to Godfather’s Pizza one night to pick up dinner for the family. Kathy happened to be working behind the counter. After I picked up the pizza, Kathy gave me that beautiful smile. Although I was still attracted to her, I knew we weren’t meant to be a couple.

Over the next eight years, I went through a variety of relationships until I became a born-again Christian in 1991. Nine years after that, I got married on Valentine’s Day. Unfortunately, that marriage was short-lived. My new wife left me for a man that had been my best friend. She subsequently filed for divorce.

Not long afterward, I decided to search for Kathy online and found her bio on her employer’s website. I sent Kathy an email and she replied with an update on her life. Since Kathy had also become a Christian, I started sending her my monthly newsletter. Eventually, we drifted apart again due to theological differences.

Fortunately, there is One who will never leave us or forsake us. Regardless of your marital status, Jesus wants to be the lover of your soul. Often people look to other individuals or things for fulfillment. The Lord rebuked the church of Ephesus for leaving their first love in Revelation 2:4.

The Lord is saying to everyone today, “Be My Valentine.” Will you let Him be the first place in your heart?

“We love Him because He first loved us.” - 1 John 4:19

Out on a Limb

English preacher John Scotland often says at his meetings, “For those of you taking notes…save the trees.” This is meant to be a humorous jab at people who jot down too many notes during church services. 

Sadly there are environmentalists who do ridiculous things like chain themselves to trees they don’t want chopped down. In this creepy YouTube clip, members of a radical advocacy group are hysterically bawling over dead trees…  

Tree huggers who really want to take their cause to the extreme shouldn’t read books, live in wooden houses with wooden furniture or use paper money, Kleenex and toilet paper. If God valued trees as much as humans, He wouldn’t have told Noah to built an ark out of gopher wood (Genesis 6:14) or instructed His people to use wood for various sacrifices.

God is certainly not worried about earthly shortages. One time I was driving through Yellowstone National Park and saw a mountain range with a huge amount of trees. At that moment, the Lord spoke to my heart and reminded me of how He has supplied the earth with an abundance of natural resources.  

Yet some folks have this idea that trees are an endangered species. While in elementary school during the 1970s, I was taught a poem that went something like this…

Oh, can’t you plainly see?

That we are running out of trees?

Chop! That was the last one.

It was also around this time I watched an animated TV special called “The Lorax”, based on a Dr. Seuss book of the same name. The title character kept saying he “speaks for the trees.” A motion picture based on the book later came out in 2012. It was one of the top grossing movies of that year.

For any environmentalists reading this, please note that the Son of God died on a tree but not for a tree. When you stand before His throne, He won’t ask about how many trees you saved but if you yourself are saved.

“Men, why are you doing these things? We also are men with the same nature as you, and preach to you that you should turn from these useless things to the living God, who made the heaven, the earth, the sea, and all things that are in them.” - Acts 14:15