Love Always Perseveres

​I didn’t plan to post anything today, but yesterday as I put together little gifts for my daughters for Valentine’s Day, I kept remembering 1 Corinthians 13:6:
 
“Love always perseveres.”
 
I never thought I’d be the type of parent who likes giving little gifts on days like Valentine’s Day—I’m usually practical and cheap. And for heaven’s sake, we just had Christmas. But of course, I enjoy thinking of little gift ideas, and I think I’m wanting to make every special moment count since I didn’t get to have the girls when they were younger.
 
I didn’t write the girls a long note about how much I love them to go along with their goodie bag. I wanted to, but I knew they would be like, “Ewh, no.” So I didn’t. lol But that’s okay. I know that right now my words aren’t the main way that I need to show love. I’m still intentional about the words that come out of my mouth, just in case there’s something that will stick in their teenage minds. But right now my actions, day in and day out, are going to show that my love is real.
 
“Love always perseveres.”
 
It takes time to grow in a relationship. It takes time to build trust. One step forward, two steps back. I tell my friends that I didn’t know my heart could love so much, and I didn’t know that my heart could break in so many different ways.
 
“Love always perseveres.”
 
It takes perseverance to love well. Anyone can sprint in love, but our babies need us to be the steady marathon-runners of love. Maybe every muscle hurts in this marathon; maybe we’re gasping and exhausted and crying out to God to give us the strength to keep going strong.
 
“Love always perseveres.”
 
Lately as I’ve prayed for God to help me to be a good mom, He has reminded me of His Word in Hebrews 13:5: “God has said, ‘Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.’” The Lord has impressed this truth on my heart—this is to be my attitude right now as a mom; this is how I reflect the goodness of God’s heart to them.
Every action, on the good days and on the difficult days, needs to communicate to my daughters, “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.”
I don’t know if you think that I’m always feeling spiritual or sacrificial, but that’s not true. Sometimes I feel like all I want is to think of my own selfish desires and just escape the hard parts. And that’s when the Lord reminds me that my love is not meant to escape. My love is meant to persevere.
 
And if I try to escape the hard parts, then I will also miss all the good parts—all the sweet moments of “I’m sorry” and “I forgive you,” the cuddles on the couch, the giggles in the kitchen, the long phone calls when they haven’t seen me all day. That moment last night after the girls opened their Valentine’s Day gift and Gabby tackled me to give me a kiss because she liked the eye shadow I picked out for her. (lol if that’s the kind of affection that I’ll receive, then I should buy eye shadow for them more often!)
 
I know I’m probably making a million mistakes these days, but my number one goal is to keep remembering that Love always perseveres.
 
P.S. Gabby and I are still preparing to go on our mission trip to Honduras at the end of March! :) We have raised over half of her financial support. If you'd like to help support her in this, we still need to raise $870. If you'd like more info, please email me at mnolen@brcconline.net. Thanks! :)

You can get Mary's book She Won't Shrink Back from Amazon. :)