Valentine – The Story of a Man Who Fought to Protect Marriage

Someone was knocking on the door – a common enough occurrence if it hadn’t been the middle of the night. Caius turned over in his bed, saw, at a glance, that the sky was still dark and wondered if he had been dreaming.

No, there it is again. Up through the floorboards rose the sound of a knock, or rather a tap, on the wooden door below.

With a sigh, Caius pushed off his covers and rose to his feet. Someone must be in need of help. He made his way down the stairs without pausing to light a candle. They had better be in need of help!

The sound repeated just as he was reaching for the latch to open the door. In the doorway, stood two figures - a man and a woman, silhouetted against the night sky.

“Come in.” He whispered and they readily complied. 

Caius groped through the contents of a nearby table, searching for a candle. “What brings you here at this hour?”

“We want to get married.” The young man said. “If anyone would help us, I was told it would be you.”

Caius turned to face the couple. The light of the candle in his hand, showed the girl’s worried expression and glinted off the young man’s armour.

Rome, 269 A.D.

An emperor named Claudius. A growing army of Roman soldiers. An ambitious campaign.

The Roman Empire was the leading world power for centuries. The powerful Roman army was its calling card and Emperor Claudius the First intended to increase and strengthen it’s ranks.

This was his strategy:

Outlaw marriage.

Claudius had a hypothesis – he believed unmarried soldiers fought better than married ones.  Married men were less willing to go off to war and when they did, their service was more likely to be inhibited by fear. Fear not only for themselves, but for their families. What would become of their wives and children if they died?

Emperor Claudius determined that he could improve his army by banning marriage. Thus, the edict went out and it became illegal for Romans to be married and for anyone to marry them.

In an already promiscuous society, this didn’t seem like a big deal for anyone but the Christians.

Rome was home to a young but growing church. A church that was calling believers to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord Jesus Christ, fully pleasing to Him (Colossians i.10). In the area of relationships between a man and a woman, that meant they were called to be married – husbands of one wife. Christians had to be obedient to a command that had suddenly become against the law.

An Attack on Marriage

We live in a generation in which marriage is under attack. We may not be the subjects of an Emperor who decided to outlaw marriage in order to expand his army, but we face more subtle attacks each day, messages undermining the importance of this God –made institution.

Society tells us that anyone who is 'in love' should be allowed to get married and that 'acts of love' shouldn't be restricted to the confines of marriage. The truth is that God designed marriage to be a picture of love, but as Christian we should constantly be reminding ourselves what love really is. 

Is it a feeling? An attraction?  A choice?

Or is it something much greater than them all?

"In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins." (1 John iv.10)

Marriage is designed to be a picture of true love, in other words it is to be a picture of the gospel. 

God put the confines of marriage – one man with one woman, after they have become one before God – in place for our good. But, more importantly, He made it that way to remind us that Jesus Christ lay down his life to purchase and sanctify for Himself one bride – the church.

Marriage as God defines it is important because it depicts the gospel to a lost and promiscuous world. Which is why we should always pay attention when it comes under attack.

 Enter Saint Valentine

Valentine was a leader in the church. He was a man who believed strongly in the importance of following Christ and obeying His commands. He had a heart to see the people of the pagan society in which he lived transformed by the light and life of Christ.

It was because of this that Valentine, despite the Emperor’s law, continued to unite young people in marriage. He did so secretly and he successfully married many couples.

 Eventually, he was discovered and on Febuary 14, 270 A.D. – the first Valentine's Day - Valentine was executed. He died for defying the Emperor, he died obeying God and defending marriage as God intended for it to be.  

There is a need in this generation, as in 269 A.D., for marriage to be upheld regardless of men’s opinions. Will Christians, like Saint Valentine, rise up to the task?

Happy Valentines Day!

In Christ

Quiana

Whatever My Lot – The Man Who Discovered Unworldly Peace

When peace like a river attendeth my way.  Even as the pen scribbled the words onto the empty sheet, the writer’s hand trembled. He looked out over the rail at the still sea and gripped the pen even tighter.

“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives, do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.” He quoted the verse aloud, for at least the tenth time that day. 

But how could he keep his heart from being troubled? How could he not be afraid?

Setting the pen down on the table, he rose and made his way to the end of the deck. The waters over which the ship sailed sparkled in the afternoon light. They looked so still. So pretty. So calm. But Horatio knew those sparkling waters were his daughters’ grave.

He closed his eyes to pray and once again pictured a dark sea, it’s waters cold and choppy. He could almost feel the boat rocking to and fro, hear the wind whipping the sail, see the dark shadow of another boat mere feet away. Then a crash - a sudden shock, the splintering of wood,  people screaming.

“When sorrows like sea billows roll.” He whispered to himself.  “Oh Lord,” he prayed aloud, “Lord, how can we bear this?” 

Horatio knelt a long time on the deck, tears streaming down his hidden face. His shoulders rose and fell as he struggled to contain his grief. He thought of his four little girls - Annie, Maggie, Bessie, Tanetta - four sweet, precious souls, swallowed up in cold, dark waves.

 Suddenly he felt a hand on his shoulder. “Are you well, Mr. Spafford?”

 Horatio looked up to see a young man, one of the ship’s crew. He nodded. “I am well.”

“I’m very sorry, Sir. The Captain told me about your loss.”

Horatio nodded again and turned to look out at the sea. He hadn’t even the words to thank the boy. I am well.  He repeated to himself, his knuckles turning white as he held tightly to the railing. It is well. Whatever my lot, Thou hast taught me to say, it is well…it is well with my soul.

Returning to the table at which he had sat, he picked up the pen and completed the stanza. 

Then his eyes drifted to the corner of another paper that he had tucked inside his bible. He pulled it free. It was a telegram from his wife, its edges worn by frequent handling. In the print of the typewriter, he once again read: Saved alone. What shall I do?

What should we do? He picked up his pen and placed it to the sheet of paper again. Though Satan should buffet, though trials should come, let this blest assurance control, that Christ hath regarded my helpless estate, and hath shed His own blood for my soul. He nodded. That’s our first step. First, we remember what our Savior hath done.

My sin, he wrote, oh, the bliss of this glorious thought!— My sin, not in part but the whole, is nailed to the cross, and I bear it no more, praise the Lord, praise the Lord, O my soul!

He picked up his bible and leafed through its pages. In the words of Matthew, he found another storm.

The wood of the boat creaked and groaned. The wind howled and tore at the sails. The rain came down in a torrent. A dark night. A tossing sea. A dark shadow on the waves.   

           

“It’s a spirit!” Someone cried.

But then the shadow spoke, “Be of good cheer; it is I; be not afraid.”

Horatio could almost feel the relief they would have felt in finding the dark shape to be their Lord, instead of danger as they had feared - but he wondered at the apostle Peter’s response:

“Lord, if it be thou will, bid me come unto thee on the water.”

Why would he choose a position of greater difficulty? As if the danger they faced within the boat was not great enough, he asked to be allowed to forsake the safety of the vessel and venture out into open waters. Why? And why did the Lord not stop him? He didn’t say “Peter, do you know what you are asking?” He simply said, “Come.”

Then the miracle – Peter walked on the waters. He rose above. The storm, the waves, they didn’t overcome him.

 “I long, O Lord.” Horatio Spafford prayed, “to rise above this storm. To walk above these waters and not be overcome.”

But how? He opened his eyes and kept on reading.

“When Peter saw the wind was boisterous, he was afraid; and beginning to sink, he cried, saying, ‘Lord, save me’. And immediately Jesus stretched forth his hand, and caught him.”

That was it! He could walk on water when his eyes were on Jesus. But when he focused on the circumstances instead, he sunk.

“Jesus said to him, “O thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt?”

Lord, I too have doubted you. Help me henceforth to keep my eyes on you.

Horatio flipped through the pages of his bible again,  stopping in Philippians this time. His eyes skimmed through the verses till he found what he was looking for.

“For me to live is Christ and to die is gain.” He read. So began his next verse, For me, be it Christ, be it Christ hence to live: if Jordan above me shall roll, no pang shall be mine, for in death as in life Thou wilt whisper Thy peace to my soul.

Until two years ago, Horatio Spafford had thought that peace was the absence of suffering, a state of harmony and undisturbed calm. But he was learning that it is so much more than that; it is a grace that transcends difficulty; a quiet, a stability that allows one to stand even in the midst of a storm. Now, he knew how to find it. By fixing his eyes on Jesus, regardless of the circumstance, by focusing on his Lord no matter what waves might come.

But, Lord, ’tis for Thee, for Thy coming we wait, the sky, not the grave, is our goal. His eyes returned to the lapping waves. Here they had died, all four of his little girls, but here they would not remain. The sky, not the grave, is our goal. He repeated. Oh, trump of the angel! Oh, voice of the Lord! Blessed hope, blessed rest of my soul! And Lord, haste the day when the faith shall be sight, the clouds be rolled back as a scroll; the trump shall resound, and the Lord shall descend, even so, it is well with my soul.

In Christ

Quiana

*It Is Well With My Soul, lyrics by Horatio Spafford

Scripture References in ESV: John xiv.27, Matthew xiv. 24- 33, Philippians i.21