THE MOTHER OF US ALL

Galatians 4:21 – 5:1

     There is an old proverb that says,  “God could not be everywhere, so God made mothers.”   To a lot of kids that seems to be the truth.   And wherever we have kids, we have stories of mothers—stories that are not only funny but reveal a grain of insight as well.  

       Mother and son were in the kitchen washing dishes, while Dad and little sister Rachel were in the living room.   Suddenly from the kitchen there sounded a crash of falling dishes.   Dad and Rachel perked their ears and listened expectantly.  “It was Mom,” Rachel finally announced.  

      “How do you know?” her Dad inquired.

      “Because,” answered Rachel, “she isn’t saying anything.”

      A visitor walked up to a small boy who was mowing the lawn and asked,  “Is your mother home?”

      The boy shot back,  “You don’t think I’d be mowing the lawn if she wasn’t, do you?”

      The Sunday School teacher was describing how God ordered Lot’s family not to look back at Sodom and Gomorrah as they left the city.   If they did, they would turn into a pillar of salt.   But as they left the city, Lot’s wife did look back and suddenly turned into a pillar of salt.   Molly looked up and said,  “My mother looked back once while she was driving and she turned into a telephone pole.”

        Then there’s the poem that goes like this:

                   “He criticized her pudding.  He didn’t like her cake.

                     He wished she’d make the biscuits like his mother used to make.

                     She didn’t wash the dishes and she didn’t make a stew.

                     And she didn’t darn his stockings like his mother used to do.

                     So when one day he went the same old rigamarole through,

                     She turned and boxed his ears just like his mother used to do.”

       Truly, mothers do have to put up with a lot.   My mother did—still does sometimes.   A 5^th grader was experiencing his first week away from home at church camp.  It was no time before his mother received his first brief letter:  “Dear Mom, please send me lots of food.   All we get here is breakfast, lunch, and dinner.  Love, Ray.”

       Someone once said that “a mother is a person who, seeing there are only 4 small pieces of pie left for 5 people, quickly announces that she never did like pie anyway.”

       As Wordsworth said,  “Years to a mother bring distress, but do not make her love the less!”   How very true!

       If you haven’t yet figured it out, today is Mothers’ Day.   And already we’ve seen what some people have said about mothers.   What does God, through the prophets and through Jesus, say about mothers, the way they should be and the way we as children, fathers, husbands, should be to them?

        Finding out what the Bible says about mothers is much more difficult than finding out what it says about wives and husbands, because there are whole sections about the responsibility and treatment of wives and husbands to one another.   But there are just sentences scattered here and there about the responsibility and treatment of mothers.

       According to Isaiah, a mother comforts.   When pain and sickness and suffering strike her family, she is quick to comfort and console.   She looks after the physical and emotional welfare and health of her children.

       Proverbs tells us that a mother teaches.   She takes care to see that her children are brought up in the knowledge and love of God.  She sees that they are taught to love God because God loves them and to serve God by serving in the worshipping community, the synagogue, or, in our case, the Church.   In other words, a mother not only serves the physical and emotional health and needs of her family, but she does not neglect the important spiritual needs that make for a peaceful, joyous life.

      And another responsibility of the mother, according to Proverbs, is to discipline her children so they grow up right.  The exact words of the proverb are these:  “Disciplining a child helps the child to learn.   But left alone the child brings shame to his or her mother.   Discipline your child and your child will give you happiness and peace of mind.”

       So we see how a mother should treat her children—comforting, teaching, disciplining, guiding.    Of course, these apply equally well to fathers.   But this is Mothers’ Day.   So I ask the question--- How should children treat their mothers?   In Exodus and Deuteronomy and again in the New Testament with Jesus, it is stressed that children should honor their mother and father.   Children should honor and respect their mother, realizing that it is her from whom they came.   It is her who first nourished them and continues to nourish them in love and care.

      Children should never forsake the things their mother taught them, for a mother grieves when her children foolishly depart from them.   And not only do children grieve their mother when they depart from her teaching, but if children mistreat their mother and mock her ways and her teachings, they are a public disgrace and even dishonor themselves.   For they deprive themselves of the wisdom they have been taught and often find that it takes a whole lifetime to learn that wisdom for themselves.   Experience may be the best teacher, but it is often also the slowest.

       And finally the scriptures say that children should never despise their mother when she is old or because she is old.

       Now I come to this morning’s second scripture reading.  The key verse is the one that says the “Jerusalem above is free, and she is our mother.”   By the “Jerusalem above” the writer of Hebrews means the heavenly Jerusalem made up of all those who by faith have accepted what Christ brought, the grace of God—those who by faith belong to God.   The writer here is saying that the “Jerusalem above” is the Church.   The writer is saying that the Church is our mother.

      One of the earliest Church leaders, Cyprian, said,  “Before we can have God as our Father, we must have the Church as our mother.”   We can get into all sorts of discussions over whether or not Cyprian had a sexist attitude.   Perhaps he did.  And perhaps the writer of Hebrews did too, in calling the Church our mother.   But the point both of them are making, a legitimate point, is that before we can even know who Christ is, we must have the witness of the Church, those before us who know who Christ is—our parents, our teachers, our pastors, our friends who are a part of the Church.   The mother, the Church, gives birth to us and nurtures us.   We learn who God is and just what God is like—through the Church.

      And our mother the Church comforts.   When pain and sickness and suffering strike at one of us, we in the Church comfort.   We regard one another with affection, and care about the physical and emotional health of our church family.

      The Church teaches, taking care to see that those in the Church are brought up in the knowledge of God and God’s love.   Her children’s spiritual welfare, their relationship to God, is foremost in her mind.

       The Church disciplines her children by guarding against false ideas and seeing that we do not take God’s love, authority, and spirit for granted or too lightly.

       So how, then, should we treat the Church, our spiritual mother?  We should honor her and respect her, realizing that it was she from whom we came.   Our spiritual birth was from the Church.  It is the Church who nourished us and still does.  And we should not take her presence for granted, but still receive life from her, as long as we live.   Let God love us through the Church.

      We should never forsake the things we were taught in church.   The scripture says to us,  “As you received Christ Jesus, live in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, abounding in thanksgiving, just as you were taught.”   The church grieves when a member wanders away on his or her own and ignores “Mom,” the church.   I was talking with a mother a few months ago who was telling me of her sadness, since her children no longer keep in touch with her now that they’ve grown and moved away.   Do you know what one of the most painful parts of being a pastor is for me?   It is when people become a part of the church, a part of the church family, then quit coming.   That is something I have much trouble dealing with as a pastor—when people suddenly drop out of sight.   I have trouble with it, I grieve through it, not because I think they should still be active or because I believe they will be missing something important in life if they quit coming to worship—but simply because I miss them.   It’s like being the body of Christ in this church family, then suddenly having your hand drop off.  And it is true that people do dishonor themselves when they do drop out because they miss out on the spiritual strength God provides when we worship and fellowship together.

       And, finally, children should never despise their mother when she is old or because she is old.   Just as some people despise anything that is new or contemporary, there are those too who despise anything that is old or traditional.  If it is old, they feel it cannot be good or that it cannot help them because they are new or young.   Rather, we need to respect the church all the more because she is old and realize that her truth has stood the test of time.

      So today think of your mothers and how we should treat them because of the way they love and care for us.   But also think of the Church as your spiritual mother and remember how you should treat her, not only for her own health but your own health and happiness as well.

                                                                                         AMEN