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I am my beloved’s, and his desire is for meSong of Sol. 7:10

Dear Lord Jesus, it’s Valentine’s Day—the day in our culture in which red hearts, overpriced cards, dark chocolates, and cut flowers abound. For some, it’s a day of incredible kindness, sweetness, and gratitude. For others, it’s a day in which brokenness, loneliness, and emptiness are magnified. For all of us, it should be a day in which our deepest longings for intimacy and connection find their way home to you—the quintessential lover.

We each have our own stories of love gained and lost, of love being alive, and love being tested, strained and fractured. I’ve experienced seasons of incredible joy, connection and intimacy in my marriage—moments when I wondered how heaven itself could be any richer, grander or fuller.

But (thankfully, as has my spouse) I’ve also discovered time and again, that no one human being (or any number of them), no human romance story, no torrid love affair can possibly fill the vacuum in my soul that’s uniquely Jesus shaped. Even the best marriage is made of two broken people, two redeemed sinners who will ultimately not be enough for the other.

Lord Jesus, “grace” me with a deeper, richer current experience of belonging to you. You are the ultimate Spouse—the One we’ve always longed for. I believe this theologically, and I want to “know” it more experientially.

My heart is fickle and fragile—still capable of being sucker-punched by sin within, and susceptible to whisperings without. Most of the time I believe you greatly love, desire, and delight in me; but then I also have moments when I can be blindsided by unbelief, temptation and discontent.

Those are the times when I place unrealistic demands on other relationships, including marriage. Instead of living as a grateful servant, I can act like a grace-less orphan—over-expecting from others and under-believing of you. Forgive me and free me from all such nonsense.

Lord Jesus, increasingly, I want to love you (and others) as you love me, until the Day our betrothal to you becomes the Day of great banqueting forever—the Day we crave more than any other—the wedding feast of the Lamb. You are more than enough. So very Amen I pray, in your tender and tenacious name.

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