Now, I'm adopted and was not flesh of her flesh, but in all ways important, she was my mother just as I'm sure Joseph felt about his son. A greater love hath no woman for child.
My mother had an eighth-grade education, wasn't sure about a lot of things in her life that I was always absolutely sure about, but she was loved by many. She prayed many years that God's will would be done in her child's life. My mother was no Mary, but she was a mother equal in tenacity with Mary. But she could never have kept things inside the way Mary did, for she spent way too much of her time being like the shepherds and telling all about her baby.
The point?
A mother's love is unique in this world. True love wasn't known in this world till Jesus came.
But I must tell you that for good or bad, my mother's love must have been close. When I was born, no shepherds showed up, no wise men came riding in, and there were no celebrations in the sky. But when I was adopted three months later, a mother's love was born in a heart and it wasn't extinguished until my mother passed about 1 a.m. on Dec. 23, 2006.
When the baby born in Bethlehem bled while hanging on the cross, it is instructive that no one from the Nazareth Day Care was there. There was no one from the Nazareth Elementary or the Nazareth Middle School or even those close friends of Jesus' from Nazareth High School there. No friend. No enemies even. No, not one as they sing.
But there was Mary. Mother Mary. All of Rome, all of its soldiers and its might, all of Herod's brood, all the Sadducee's and those remarkably religious Pharisees could not have stopped her from being there.
Christ's love is amazing. The closest we can come, I suspect, is a mother's love -- for a good child, a bad child, a child who returns that love or one who is cold as December's heel.
We call that love, unconditional. Maybe we should just call that a mother's love, for it describes that special. Only pets come close on the planet to the love God showed when he sent his only Son to die for us.
It is how God chooses to love you, me, us, all of us even those who choose to never return that love to Him.
We could call it a mother's love and be done with it. The strength of the link isn't weakened by death. Perhaps, just perhaps, it is strengthened. I miss my mother in death much more than I ever missed her in life, sad to say.
My mother had an eighth-grade education, wasn't sure about a lot of things in her life that I was always absolutely sure about, but she was loved by many. She prayed many years that God's will would be done in her child's life. My mother was no Mary, but she was a mother equal in tenacity with Mary. But she could never have kept things inside the way Mary did, for she spent way too much of her time being like the shepherds and telling all about her baby.
The point?
A mother's love is unique in this world. True love wasn't known in this world till Jesus came.
But I must tell you that for good or bad, my mother's love must have been close. When I was born, no shepherds showed up, no wise men came riding in, and there were no celebrations in the sky. But when I was adopted three months later, a mother's love was born in a heart and it wasn't extinguished until my mother passed about 1 a.m. on Dec. 23, 2006.
When the baby born in Bethlehem bled while hanging on the cross, it is instructive that no one from the Nazareth Day Care was there. There was no one from the Nazareth Elementary or the Nazareth Middle School or even those close friends of Jesus' from Nazareth High School there. No friend. No enemies even. No, not one as they sing.
But there was Mary. Mother Mary. All of Rome, all of its soldiers and its might, all of Herod's brood, all the Sadducee's and those remarkably religious Pharisees could not have stopped her from being there.
Christ's love is amazing. The closest we can come, I suspect, is a mother's love -- for a good child, a bad child, a child who returns that love or one who is cold as December's heel.
We call that love, unconditional. Maybe we should just call that a mother's love, for it describes that special. Only pets come close on the planet to the love God showed when he sent his only Son to die for us.
It is how God chooses to love you, me, us, all of us even those who choose to never return that love to Him.
We could call it a mother's love and be done with it. The strength of the link isn't weakened by death. Perhaps, just perhaps, it is strengthened. I miss my mother in death much more than I ever missed her in life, sad to say.
I wish she could have seen the churches I've been privileged to serve. I wish she could see her grand children growing up. I wish she could have met her son-in-law, Blaine. I wish she could see Blaine and Carrie's daughters, Mia, Karli and especially little Emma. I wish she could have seen Jason and Becky's daughter Livvy and seen a grown up beautiful Parker, her older sister. And I wish she could have met the wise but/and funny Gavin. She loved the oldest of the lot, Gabe with an intensity that only grand mothers can show. Shanna's new love Al and his children Lyrik and Skye would make my mother cackle, also.
I wish she could be here for this Christmas, though my great Fall of Pneumonia would have worried her terribly.
"Mary kept all these things to herself...."
Do you realize that Mary out-lived that child she knew would be the Christ?
And we sing "Mary did you know?"
I wish she could be here for this Christmas, though my great Fall of Pneumonia would have worried her terribly.
"Mary kept all these things to herself...."
Do you realize that Mary out-lived that child she knew would be the Christ?
And we sing "Mary did you know?"
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