Valentines articles to prepare your hearts for Feb 14th
February 7, 2011
Note: Thanks to your ‘dialing in’, there was over 900 people today reading these articles, the most ever in one day.
By Rev Ed Hird I will always remember Valentine’s Day, February 14th 1967 back in Grade 7. My best friends celebrated Valentine’s Day by having each of us name the 10 girls we liked best in order (1-10).
By Reverend Ed Hird On New Year’s Eve in 1976, the well-known author Michael Harper was sailing solo on Lake Taupo in New Zealand. Suddenly his boat capsized in a particularly violent squall about a mile offshore.
The famous Vancouver based author Dr. J.I. Packer once commented that “marriage, being the most delicate and demanding of relationships, as well as potentially the most delightful, is a terribly difficult topic on which to write wisely and well.”
edhird.wordpress.com
By Rev Ed Hird Is it okay to suggest in 2011 that we as men and women are equal but often different? Too often equality becomes reduced to a sterile sameness. True equality between the sexes involves a joyous celebrating of our very real differences…
edhird.wordpress.com
edhird.wordpress.com
edhird.wordpress.com
By Reverend Ed Hird My wife Janice and I will soon be celebrating our 34th Wedding Anniversary. Over three decades later, I can say without reservation that I love her more deeply with each passing year.
edhird.wordpress.com
edhird.wordpress.com
edhird.wordpress.com
By Reverend Ed Hird Valentine’s Day rolls around every year without fail. Husbands forget Feb 14th at their peril. Somehow our wives interpret our forgetting Valentine’s Day as a sign that we don’t care, that we may be putting other priorities ahead of them.
How about working on your anger as a Valentine’s Day gift?
edhird.wordpress.com
Dr John Gottman has much to teach us that will help us prepare for Valentine’s Day 2011
edhird.wordpress.com
Note: Thanks to your ‘dialing in’, there was over 900 people today reading these articles, the most ever in one day.
By Rev Ed Hird I will always remember Valentine’s Day, February 14th 1967 back in Grade 7. My best friends celebrated Valentine’s Day by having each of us name the 10 girls we liked best in order (1-10).
By Reverend Ed Hird On New Year’s Eve in 1976, the well-known author Michael Harper was sailing solo on Lake Taupo in New Zealand. Suddenly his boat capsized in a particularly violent squall about a mile offshore.
The famous Vancouver based author Dr. J.I. Packer once commented that “marriage, being the most delicate and demanding of relationships, as well as potentially the most delightful, is a terribly difficult topic on which to write wisely and well.”
edhird.wordpress.com
By Rev Ed Hird Is it okay to suggest in 2011 that we as men and women are equal but often different? Too often equality becomes reduced to a sterile sameness. True equality between the sexes involves a joyous celebrating of our very real differences…
edhird.wordpress.com
edhird.wordpress.com
edhird.wordpress.com
By Reverend Ed Hird My wife Janice and I will soon be celebrating our 34th Wedding Anniversary. Over three decades later, I can say without reservation that I love her more deeply with each passing year.
edhird.wordpress.com
edhird.wordpress.com
edhird.wordpress.com
By Reverend Ed Hird Valentine’s Day rolls around every year without fail. Husbands forget Feb 14th at their peril. Somehow our wives interpret our forgetting Valentine’s Day as a sign that we don’t care, that we may be putting other priorities ahead of them.
How about working on your anger as a Valentine’s Day gift?
edhird.wordpress.com
Dr John Gottman has much to teach us that will help us prepare for Valentine’s Day 2011
edhird.wordpress.com
Happy Valentine’s Day
February 7, 2011
By the Rev. Dr. Ed Hird
I will always remember Valentine’s Day, February 14th 1967 back in Grade 7. My best friends celebrated Valentine’s Day by having each of us name the 10 girls we liked best in order (1-10). Having only recently recovered from the “girl avoiding” phase, I felt rather hard pressed to name 10 girls I liked best, (especially as there were only 15 girls in our class). So by the time I’d named the 10th girl, I was really scraping the barrel. I figured that the girl that got No. 1 position really deserved something special on Valentines Day. So I bought her a big heart shaped box of chocolates. She was in shock, also delighted. I also invited her to our June Grade 7 graduation dance, which she accepted. Love however can be fickle, so by the time of our dance, one of my “best friends” had taken my girlfriend and squeezed me out of the picture. It was a disappointing end to Valentine’s day 1967!
Where does Valentine’s Day come from anyway? Its official title is Saint Valentine’s Day. The celebration of February 14th appears to refer not to one but two Valentines. The first Saint called Valentine was a Roman Priest martyred on the Flaminian Way under the Emperor Claudius around 269 A.D. The second St. Valentine was a Bishop of Terni in Interamna, who was taken to Rome and martyred, and whose remains were later conveyed back to Terni.
Why do I still enjoy Valentines Day many years later? It’s because all of us have a need to feel loved, even when you’re married. So often romantic love can fade imperceptibly from a marriage. In the busyness of children, work, school and sports, our marriage can easily get lost in the shuffle. Marriage counsellors tell us that romantic love is one of the greatest lacks in modern marriages. The bible reminds each husband to love his wife as his own body, to love his wife as he loves himself, to love his wife just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her (Ephesians 5).
Husbands, let’s surprise our wives on February 14th and make our family homes the most romantic spot on Planet Earth!
The Rev. Dr. Ed Hird, Rector, BSW, MDiv, DMin
St. Simon’s Church North Vancouver
Anglican Mission in the Americas (Canada)
http://stsimonschurch.ca
-previously published in the Deep Cove Crier
-award-winning author of the book ‘Battle for the Soul of Canada’
http://www.battleforthesoulofcanada.blogspot.com
p.s. In order to obtain a copy of the book ‘Battle for the Soul of Canada’, please send a $18.50 cheque to ‘Ed Hird’, #1008-555 West 28th Street, North Vancouver, BC V7N 2J7. For mailing the book to the USA, please send $20.00 USD. This can also be done by PAYPAL using the e-mail ed_hird@telus.net . Be sure to list your mailing address. The Battle for the Soul of Canada e-book can be obtained for $9.99CDN/USD.
-Click to download a complimentary PDF copy of the Battle for the Soul study guide : Seeking God’s Solution for a Spirit-Filled Canada
You can also download the complimentary Leader’s Guide PDF: Battle for the Soul Leaders Guide
My Beloved on Valentine’s Day
January 15, 2011
by the Rev. Dr. Ed Hird
Valentine’s Day’s full title is St. Valentine’s Day, because it was named after two St Valentines. They were both Italian clergy martyred in the 3rd century AD for their Christian faith. Because of their sacrificial love, it has become one of the most popular annual events celebrated by hundred of millions around the world. It has become a traditional date night where a wise husband remembers to take his wife out for dinner, followed perhaps by a movie or theatre production. (Husbands, please note that such dates are much less expensive than divorce lawyer’s fee; so put Feb 14th in your IPhone or Blackberry).
Nineteen years ago in a Deep Cove Crier article about marriage, I wrote the following words: “Inside the heart of each and every one of us there is a longing to be understood by someone who really cares. When a person is understood, he or she can put up with almost anything in the world.” After being posted (unbeknown to me) on hundreds of Romance websites, I was approached to write a chapter for the upcoming Canadian anthology “Hot Apple Cider 2’ about this romantic quote. In Hot Apple Cider 2, I commented that my beloved wife “Janice and I are learning afresh the joy of ordinary pleasures: taking regular time together for peaceful walks, chatting over a cup of tea, listening to each other’s daily experiences, watching a video together, going out for dinner, and even reading together.”
Recently I picked up the North Shore News, read Martin Millerchip’s article about Presentation House, and on a whim said to Janice: “Let’s go out on a date night to see Antony Holland’s St Mark’s Gospel.” Being remarkably adaptable, Janice agreed. What a wonderful evening. Unplanned, unexpected, and totally memorable. Happy marriages need to have that sense of adventure, of the unexpected. Boredom in marriage is the devil’s best tool.
Sadly many husbands stop dating their wives after they marry them. “What happened to the man I married?”, many wives wonder. Why was he so attentive before marriage, and now he would rather hang out on the golf course or stay late at work? Our wives deeply need to be romanced, pursued, won over every week. That is one reason why the romance novels are a Billionaire dollar industry, because we husbands are not always putting our wives first. My wife Janice needs to know that she is more important than my work, my hobbies, my writing, my sports. She needs to be Number One under God in my life.
I love to hold my beloved Janice’s hand when we are out on a date. Sitting there in Presentation House, watching Antony Holland perform St Mark’s Gospel, I often reached out to her and gently squeezed her hand when something was really moving. Many people don’t know that Mark’s Gospel is high drama, and when done by a gifted artist, can bring you to tears. Antony Holland, at age 91, is literally North America’s oldest leading actor. If I have half as much energy when I am in my nineties, I will be deeply grateful. As Martin Millerchip of the North Shore News put it, Holland’s ‘hard to resist, perhaps like Jesus’. Holland directed plays throughout the Middle East for the WWII Allied forces, and founded Studio 58 at Langara College where my parents attended his plays for many years. (My mother tells me that Studio 58 initially rehearsed its play in our St. Matthias Oakridge church basement.)
I first became aware of Antony Holland from watching his phenomenal acting in ‘Tuesdays with Morrie’. No one dances quite like Holland in the final ‘Morrie’ scene. Antony Holland is the quintessential actor. He loves what he does. At age 91, he has just started. Love is what motivates him. Love of acting and love of people. In both St Mark’s Gospel and Tuesdays with Morrie, the love of God overflows through Holland.
edhird
