I enjoy watching people, especially during the holidays. I see the rush during and even preceding Valentine’s Day, when people are trying to find the perfect gift for their special valentine.  
This is one of the holidays that causes me to reminisce about when and how I met my first real love. You see, I had a rough life during my adolescent years. I experienced abuse, hurt and rejection. I didn’t understand real love. I longed for a fairy-tale life to get away from what I was experiencing.  However, it never happened that way.  
I had come to a point where I didn’t want to live anymore. One day, I heard a man on TV talking about real, true love and how to obtain it. So there I was, crying and ready to give up, when my first true love came and embraced me. He comforted me and let me know that he knew how I felt, for he felt it too.  
He assured me that if I would trust him, he would never leave me. That he would be my protector, my guide, my friend — the true love of my life. I felt that love, and I believed what he said. So I took him at his word and became his, and he became mine.  
Since then, yes, I experienced grief, pain, abandonment and more. But he is with me just as he promised, and he walks me through it all. Why, sometimes he even walks through it for me. I now have the peace and joy that only he can give.  
I now tell others that there is a true love that can last forever. When I think of my first real love, I think of the words in a song that says, “They hung him high, they stretched him wide, he hung his head and for me he died … that’s love.”
Yes, that’s my lord and savior, Jesus Christ — my first real true love.
References: Hebrews13:5, John 15:3, 1 Corinthians 13

Edwards is the pastor of Agape Christian Center and a member of the United Ministerial Alliance.