Month 11:21, Week 3:6 (Sheshi/Kippur), Year 5935:308 AM
Gregorian Calendar: Monday 13 February 2012
Valentine Illusions
Know Exactly What Yahweh Thinks
Continued from Part 1
"When Yahweh your Elohim (God) cuts off from before you the nations which you go to dispossess, and you displace them and dwell in their land, take heed to yourself that you are not ensnared to follow them, after they are destroyed from before you, and that you do not inquire after their gods, saying, 'How did these nations serve their gods? I also will do likewise.' You shall not worship Yahweh your Elohim (God) in that way; for every abomination to Yahweh which He hates they have done to their gods" (Deut.12:29-31, NKJV).
I do loathe having to speak out against pagan practices that have been sugar-coated to make them palitable to believers and I know that each year people who come across my writings about this subject react negatively to them. After all, they say, what's wrong with romance? Why be such a kill-joy?
It's really very simple. If you claim to belong to Messiah, then He expects you to behave as though you do. If you are a worshipper of the true Elohim (God), then He expects you to worship Him in the way that He demands. In today's passage He explicity warns us not to copy the worship practices of His enemies, the false gods who are, in truth, demons. It is a painful insult and a blasphemy to Yahweh to worship Him in the way that His arch-enemy demands worship for himself.
Valentine's Day is not about the true, pure and clean love relationships that Yahweh expects of His people but about pagan lust and fornication. It was orginally called the Lupercalia. Valentine's day, with its symbols and practices, is squarely rooted in the worship of false gods - and in particular, Pan - and their filthy, lewd, and perverse sexual practices.
If you don't know about the pagan background of this festival, please take the time to read our materials here. Then, having done that, you need to honestly ask yourself the question: Does Yahweh care whether I observe this day or not? Do I care that He cares? And do I really love Him and show respect and worship for Him by imitating what most of my neighbours are doing on 14 February this year?
Valentine's Day is, of course, good business for card manufacturers and Post Offices thoughout the world because about a billion cards are exchanged. They are still ahead of the internet where about 15 million electronic cards are exchanged each year. Surprisingly, perhaps, is the fact that it is used the least by singles. Some have derisively called the day SAD, meaning, Singles Awareness Day. Yet children aged between 6 to 10 exchange more than 650 million Valentine's cards with their teachers, classmates and family members - that's 65% of all card purchases.
Valentine's is good business like the other pagan festivals of Christmas, Boxing Day, Easter, Halloween and other feasts and observances dishonouring Yah'shua (Jesus).
Not surprisingly, men spend nearly twice as much as women celebrating this day, with many no doubt hoping for some one-night-stand conquests. Single Christian women (and Christian men for that matter) deserve better than this. Young Christian and Messianic men in particular, please don't cheapen Yahweh's single women by involving them in this unseemly behaviour. There are ways to find and get the women He has promised you if you are faithful to Him so that you can be absolutely sure that you have found the right ones.
Yahweh has already told us how we are to honour and worship Him. He has given us all the communal festivals and observances we need and put a hedge of safety around them. He has also taught unmarried people how to enter into safe and Yahweh-honouring relationships that do not violate the mitzvot (commandments). You can find out more about this on our Marriage Page.
It is a tragedy that Muslims regard Valentine's Day as a 'Christian' day, despise it for its moral laxity, and therefore despise Christians too. It doesn't do much for the reputation of the Besorah (Gospel) and our witness to them. Ironically, Valentines Day is popular in many Muslim countries precisely because it is decadent which has provoked some countries like Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Iran to either ban or limit the day and its practices.
Valentine's Day is rank idolatry. It honours Baal the sun-god, not Yahweh the Elohim (God) of true ahavah (love). Whatever loyalties you may feel toward this Catholicised pagan festival dressed up in Christian garb, consider the mitzvot (commandments) to be an overcomer and to resist every carnal tendency. Why? Because it is right, because it is Yahweh-honouring, because it will qualify you to be a part of the unblemished Bride, and because it will spare you the pain that must be experienced when all that is not of Yahweh is necessarily burned out of us:
"He who overcomes shall not be hurt by the second death" (Rev.2:11, NKJV).
So this evening and tomorrow I pray that you will have a blessed Sabbath, focus on Yahweh and ignore the revamped Lupercalia! Do you want to honour your husband or father? Do something special for him on Rosh Chodesh! Do you want to honour your wife or mother? Do something special for her on the Sabbath!
Comments from Readers
"I just found out about this last year. There are no traditional holidays that did not come from pagan worship (except those which G-d had instituted in Scripture). What underlies these so-called holidays is so repulsive once one knows the truth about them. YHWH is the one and only L-rd and G-d, and we shall have no other gods before Him. It is Him and only Him" (LLM, USA, 13 Fevruary 2012).
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