There’s a certain irony in asking a single woman to write a blog entry on St. Valentine’s Day.
The same sort of irony found in celebrating St. Valentine’s Day during Lent. It has got to be a Ghirardelli nightmare. I mean, who gives up red roses or diamonds for Lent? Nobody! People give up chocolate for Lent. Like I said, a Ghirardelli nightmare.
Perhaps it’s that a single woman won’t be busy on St. Valentine’s Day. Or that this single woman won’t be busy on St. Valentine’s Day. It makes me smile!
Back when I was still young and full of dreams (when the earth’s crust was still cooling), I attended a Bible institute as my choice of higher education. Those were the days when one of the primary goals of higher education for a young woman was to land a husband, so there was considerable pressure to find a mate. One joke observed that this particular school was like Noah’s ark: people came in single and left in pairs. And it was at this school that I first heard single women described as “unclaimed blessings.” Granted, it was mostly the old codgers—those silver-haired men who considered themselves silver-tongued rascals—who found this description affectionate and clever.
Despite all efforts, I finished school still single, a state that bothers me remarkably little as the years pile up. Though of course, I’ve never forgotten the words of those old men, I suppose because I remain an “unclaimed blessing.” Funny what you remember, isn’t it.
Lent. Right. Here’s my question on February 14, nine days into Lent: Is there such a thing as an unclaimed blessing?
Am I someone’s unclaimed blessing? Not likely. But are there blessings waiting for me that are yet unclaimed? I’d bet the answer is yes.
Though Lent is a penitential season, a season when we go without, where we repent and “forswear our foolish ways,” it is also a time of great blessing, of renewed gratitude, of fresh awareness. It is a time to remember our first Love, the One who loved us, who claimed us, who died for us.
This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins (1 John 4:10).
Dearest Lord, Please open my heart to recognize and receive the blessings that You in your great love have prepared for me. And thank you.
2 comments:
"Unclaimed Blessings." I love that phrase. Maybe not in the way you first originally heard it (I am constantly amazed by the number of people who make statements like that and who think they are so very clever).
But I look at my life and wonder, how many unclaimed blessings are there every day, that I am too self-absorbed to notice, much less receive.
Hmmmm.
I think unclaimed blessings are extremely common and not just in the every day. I think, as the ancient hymn puts it, "the clouds ye so much dread are big with mercy and they will break in blessings on your head."
God has put some rather large, scary looking clouds above us, but we need to see them for what they are and embrace them. God gives us so much but we still have to receive and own what he gives and not deny that we have it under some kind of false humility. You are absolutely right that we all have unclaimed blessings.
By the way, technically, St. Valentines day is a feast day and that means that you can break your fast... ; )
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