288 Valentines and a whole lot of love

So Valentine's Day, or the more aptly named “Singles' Awareness Day”, was less than one week ago.  China’s version of Valentine’s Day is celebrated in August, so February 14^th wasn’t marked by an excess of pink and red hearts, roses galore, or advertisements suggesting that you only truly love someone if you buy them a big enough diamond.  It was really nice to get away from the commercialization of the holiday, and I probably would’ve forgotten about it entirely if I hadn’t been teaching a lesson on it! 

The lesson I taught was somewhat superficial, considering that it wouldn’t have been entirely appropriate to teach my non-English-speaking 4^th graders about the tragic history behind the holiday or about couples and romance.  I did teach them about love and how love can be shown to family members, friends, leaders, etc.  Then I helped them make cards to give to their parents whenever they get to go home next; it was a pretty fun lesson and I made sure to take a bunch of pictures to share with my supporters back home. Valentine’s Day came and went the same as any other day. 

The next day, as I was talking with my team about our best Valentine’s Day dates, it struck me that I’ve never not had someone special to celebrate the day with; I realized that this was the 1^st time I’ve been alone on Valentine’s Day.  Over the next several days that realization started getting to me, and I was becoming pretty discontent over not having the typical American lifestyle of settling down and starting a family. 

Then I started to write this blog update about my Valentine’s Day lesson; as I was deciding which pictures to post, I started really looking at the faces of my 288 students, and I saw their smiles and thought about their lives and felt their desperate desires to be loved.  My heart broke for each of them all over again.  Father struck me with a reminder that I desperately needed: the fact that I don’t have the typical American lifestyle isn’t something to be discontent over; what I’m doing here, living and teaching in China, isn’t some huge sacrifice that I’ve made.  I have this incredible opportunity to teach, to love, and to share Hope with His children in China!  This Valentine’s Day, I got to spend the holiday with 288 special someones that I desperately love and who desperately need to be shown love.  How could I possibly be discontent over that?  Now that I really think about it, this was the best Valentine’s Day ever :-)

These are some of the many children I have the privilege to love!