Maternal Love: Human And Divine
Children's sermon
Illustration
Preaching
Sermon
Worship
Object:
We pause in the midst of ongoing war and war crimes to think this Sunday of maternal love. As you will read in this issue of The Immediate Word, church attendance on Mother's Day typically ranks just behind that of Christmas and Easter -- and it's not even part of the liturgical church year!
In planning for May 9, team members noticed that the emphases of the lectionary texts on Christian love and on inclusiveness were appropriate for the theme of motherhood and for a compelling message on Mother's Day. We, therefore, asked Carter Shelley to reflect on the New Testament lections with respect to the operation of maternal love both on the part of humans and of God, and to emphasize the importance of cultivating appropriate human love in our families and within our communities of faith. Carter comments also more generally on motherhood in both biblical Testaments.
As usual, this issue includes team responses, illustrations, worship resources, and a children's sermon.
Maternal Love: Human and Divine
Acts 11:1-18; Revelation 21:1-6; John 13:31-35
by Carter Shelley
Mothers in the Old and New Testament
In a sacred text written in a patriarchal culture, the role of mothers is a vital one. That doesn't mean the vocations of other women were unimportant. From the Old Testament we know both the names and the deeds of the prophet Deborah and of Queen Esther, just as from the New Testament we know important details about the lives of three of Jesus' women disciples: Mary, Martha, and Mary Magdalene. But in both the Old Testament and the New, the task of bearing, loving, teaching, and training the next priest, king, prophet, or messiah falls to the mother. Thus, women who cannot readily conceive feel no compunction about calling upon their Creator God, the giver of life to hear their prayer.
The story of the barren woman recurs many times in the Old Testament, and motherhood is understood as something that is God-given and a blessing from God. Yahweh shows compassion for the barren woman by opening her womb and creating life within it: Hagar, the used and abused concubine of Sara becomes the mother of a great people; Sarah, the post-menopausal supposed matriarch of a great people finally bears and delivers Isaac; Leah, the unloved first wife of Jacob delivers six sons and a daughter; and the once-barren Hannah becomes the mother of the prophet Samuel.
In the Old Testament, the role of mothers is important and necessary but it is not schmaltzy or sentimentalized in the way that Dickens or nineteenth-century Americans tended to sentimentalize motherhood. To be a mother and a faithful follower required courage, conviction, determination, strength, and the ability to ultimately let go, as Hannah let go of Samuel so he could be trained as a prophet and as Mary had to let go of Jesus so he could serve his heavenly calling.
In the New Testament, as with everything else, God turns the traditional understanding of motherhood on its head from the very beginning. Mary, an unmarried woman not anxious about fertility or seeking motherhood, becomes pregnant. This act stands outside the norm of her society and religion and has the potential to lead to rejection, disgrace, and isolation. A young woman, betrothed to one man and found to be pregnant by another, risks stoning for adultery. Yet Mary actively agrees to be "the handmaid of the Lord." Mary commits to the Messiah even before he is born. In fact, she is his first disciple. She will also be his first teacher about God, the world, etc. She will be the first to serve him and love him. She understands herself to be blessed by God in this awe-inspiring venture as the "Mother of God" -- an ancient Christian designation of Mary
While the maternal aspects of God's nature historically and liturgically have not been front and center throughout most of the church's 2,000+ year history, biblical scholarship of the past forty years has identified more and more examples of God's maternal traits and inclinations. Compassionate, forgiving, feeding, rescuing, withholding punishment, drying tears, offering comfort and solace -- all of these words apply to God at various points in the Bible. Jesus gave his disciples permission to view God as an intimate and loving parent when Jesus encouraged the use of "Abba" ("Daddy") in the Lord's Prayer. Such a wonderful invitation into the arms of God was not offered as a means for closing down all other insights or revelations into God's nature. It was a beginning, not an end. Thus, God's feminine side can be read and understood in God's voice spoken through the prophets Hosea, Jeremiah, Isaiah, and John of Patmos in Revelation, each of whom uses maternal expressions of love, concern, and affection to describe the divine-human relationship.
Examples of God's maternal side are evident in all three New Testament lessons for this Sunday (see section 5 below).
Mother's Day 2004
Not every person who occupies a pew this Sunday will be of the same mind and place about Mother's Day. While for some it is a day of family get-together, celebration, and a time to say "Thank you" to mom with a picture drawn in Sunday school, a handprint impression on a piece of clay, or a visit home with dinner in a restaurant, there will be people present whose experience and emotions will not be so Hallmark-card happy. While every member of our congregation has had a biological mother, not every human born has had a mother who meets the Madison Avenue, Norman Rockwell idealistic picture portrayed in flower advertisements or in some Mother's Day sermons. If mom was absent, addicted to drugs or alcohol, fought daily with one's father, or never did anything but criticize her children, the offspring's thoughts are not going to be so rosy. So it's important as pastor and preacher to recognize that Mother's Day evokes a range of emotions among Christians. In acknowledging those emotions, you will be able to include and address these individuals along with their more fortunate brethren who contentedly value both their mothers and Mother's Day.
The best strategy for a homily that is both inclusive and celebrative on May 9 will be to (1) talk about some of the virtues and blessings of earthly mothers as a part of your sermon, but (2) to move on to the more universal Christian affirmation that the Triune God whom we know as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit also has breadth enough to provide motherly love and nurture to all who would be her children. I have identified the direction my own sermon will take by using numbers beside the different moves. In sections 3 and 4 I have merely listed the maternal characteristics that human mothers and God may share. I have not provided illustrations in these instances, because I believe that illustrations from the preacher and congregation's own experience will prove more effective.
Human Maternal Love
1. Introduction: A brief recognition of Mother's Day1 in American culture.
In American churches, Mother's Day has the third best worship attendance of the year, exceeded only by Christmas and Easter. This statistical detail applies across denominational lines. Thus, Roman Catholics as well as Presbyterians, Baptists, Methodists, etc., will make a sincere effort to attend church with their mothers. Since it's a secular holiday and not a Christian one, far more adult children will treat their moms to a nice dinner in a restaurant today than will occupy pews. So, if you haven't made a reservation already, you're too late to do it now!
2. Recognition that Mother's Day does not evoke happy, sentimental feelings in all children, because not all mothers are paragons of maternal love.
In many congregations it is customary to wear a red rose if one's mother is still living, and a white rose if one's mother is deceased. Those among us whose mothers have already died may use part of this day to think about our mothers. Such thoughts often lead to mixed emotions. Some of us miss our mothers and will feel sad. Others, whose mothers may have been a mixed blessing, if any blessing at all, may also feel anger, sadness, grief, or a sense of loss. Irrespective of the kind of mother one had -- loving, neglectful, inexperienced, absent, or incredibly wise and nurturing -- in American culture this day is dedicated unambiguously to mothers, the implication being that if we don't get all warm and fuzzy and grateful for our moms, we are cheapskates and insensitive cretins who didn't deserve to have one in the first place.
We know that all mothers are not exactly the same any more than all Christians are the same. Yet there are characteristics we can identify that make for a more effective and loving parent, just as there are characteristics that make for a more effective and loving Christian.
3. Some Characteristics of Human Maternal Love
* A commitment to the child begins before the child is even born. Mary agrees to give up her own will and life plan in order to be the mother of Jesus.
* A desire and willingness to listen and hear the needs of the child. "No, you may not stay out all night just because your friends are." "Yes, you may tell me how I hurt your feelings."
* The ability to teach and discipline children into independence and maturity.
* The ability to model religious faithfulness and ethical integrity (church membership, prayer, etc.).
* Love laced with understanding and forgiveness (listening, taking time to hug or hear).
* The willingness to sacrifice personal needs and comforts in order to meet appropriate needs of her child -- college tuition vs. vacation and new car.
Having identified characteristics of effective human mothers, acknowledge that even the best of mothers has days -- and sometimes weeks -- when she fails to live up to her own standards for mothering. Her own humanity gets in the way. She gets tired, angry; feelings get hurt. Her ambitions for her children may not match theirs. She worries, hovers, etc.
Characteristics of divine love include the above six items and more.
4. Divine Maternal Love: Similarities to Human Maternal Love
* The commitment to child and relationship begins before child is even born ("In the womb I knew you, Jeremiah").
* A desire and willingness to listen to and hear the needs of the child (Hagar's cry for help, Hannah's grief).
* The ability to teach and discipline children into independence and maturity (Sinai covenant and law, the ministry of Jesus).
* The ability to model religious faithfulness and ethical integrity (the Ten Commandments).
* Love laced with understanding and forgiveness (Hosea 11:1-9).
* Willingness to sacrifice personal needs and comforts in order to meet needs of her child (John 3:16 God so loved the world ...).
Whether described as Mother, Father, Holy One, Savior, or Parent, God's love and care exceeds that any human parent can provide. The same holds true of God's ambitions and expectations for her children.
5. Divine Maternal Love: Differences
John 13:30-35: The writer of John's Gospel makes it clear that Jesus' death was not an act of shame or disgrace but from start to finish a glorification. It was God's plan all along that the Son should suffer, die, and be raised from the dead. In so doing Jesus not only obeys God but also glorifies God's will on earth. The injunction to his disciples to "love one another" would be familiar to them, having first appeared in Leviticus as "love your neighbor as yourself." Writing perhaps 60-70 years after Jesus' death and resurrection, the Gospel of John raises the bar even higher with Jesus' words that Christian disciples "love one another as I have loved you." The kind of love that Jesus offered them reverses the traditional ways things are done in the world. The master becomes a slave. The innocent die instead of the guilty. Mutual love is expected between Christians.
Thus the maternal love of God is reflected in Jesus' love for his disciples. While the Christians John addresses in his Gospel may be Christians who bicker among themselves, much like siblings bicker as children, such behavior is no way for a mature Christian to act. They must "love one another as I have loved you." How has God loved? God gave God's Son, and the Son proved a chip off the old block in terms of power to heal, witness, comfort, love, and sacrifice for the welfare of others.
An American reporter in Iraq shared a tragic, true story with Teri Gross on Fresh Air last week on the radio. A young man is accurately identified by his village as someone who served as an informer to the American soldiers during the early stages of the war in the spring of 2003. The young man's action is seen as a betrayal, and he must die. The village leaders approach the man's father and tell him that the son must die. If the father refuses to kill his son or allow him to be killed, then the entire family will be executed, since all must be punished for the crime of one. Rather than allow any other family members' lives to be endangered, the father painfully agrees to execute his son himself. The father shoots and kills his son. To save the lives of the rest of the family, the one son must be killed. We may view this incident as barbarism akin to the barbarism on display in the movie The Passion. Notice any parallels?
Acts 11:1-18: This vivid story relates Peter's vision from God that the old dietary laws of Judaism no longer apply to himself or to others who seek to spread the good news of Jesus Christ beyond the boundaries of Jerusalem and Palestine. Many Jews were hostile to Gentiles in the first century. In her book A Virgin Conceived: Mary and Classical Representations of Virginity, Mary Foskett notes that Jews assumed that not only would slave girls and female captives of war be women with an active sexual history, but also that the daughters of Gentiles would not be virgins when they married, when in fact the virginity of Greco-Roman daughters was just as carefully guarded as that of young, adolescent Jewish girls. So long as no one bothers to get to know someone with a different religion, culture, or native country, prejudices and misinformation are reinforced.
The response of Peter's Jewish colleagues shows that they've really grasped his message. "God has given even to the Gentiles the repentance that leads to life." Such inclusiveness comes from a God who understands herself as Mother to all her children. Divine maternal love makes no distinction between genders, race, or creed. All are lovable. All are redeemable. All are worth the effort. Perhaps the Jews' astonishment at God's incredible inclusiveness resembles that of the first-born child. First he or she has to adjust to the fact that mom and dad have a new child to love. Then he or she comes to resent and fear the time and attention the new child requires. Finally, with maturity, the older child may realize that parental love isn't limited and lessened by being shared with more than one child. Parental love expands and grows as does the family. Divine maternal love operates in a similar way.
Revelation 21:1-6: William Pender notes that Revelation is a carefully composed literary depiction of the new heaven and new earth God intends to provide for humanity if human beings will but meet God part way. Rather than originating from an ecstatic vision, the book of Revelation is inspired by a future reality that already is at work in the present world. Christ has already died, been raised, and gone to be with God. Yet Christ remains with us through the presence of the Holy Spirit and the ongoing potentialities of the Christian church and Christians. Heaven has already won the victory. Earth and its occupants just don't grasp that God enfolds both in the present and in the future.
The language that is used to describe this present and future life in God's presence is the language of motherhood and mothering. We don't even have to go looking for God; God will come to us. "The home of God is among mortals. (S)he will dwell with them as their God, they will be his peoples, and God (Her)self will be with them; She will wipe every tear from their eyes." The new heaven with the new earth signals a time when God's maternal side will be felt by those who remain true to their Lord. Yet our divine mother has already given us the tools with which to begin this earthly transformation. It's not about waiting for God to make it happen. It's about letting this already real transformation become evident through our own actions, vision, and transformation of the world in which we live. It may start with something as simple as a couple of mothers in Northern Ireland who got fed up with the killing and started a movement of peace and reconciliation several decades ago.
Divine love turns the world upside down. No more dietary laws, and no more "eye for an eye." Love one another. God will establish a new heaven and a new earth. But unlike parental love, which usually comes naturally to most fathers and mothers, Christian love challenges us to risk ourselves, extend ourselves to those we fear, hate, disagree with, or cannot understand. For most individuals who become parents, parenting is the hardest thing they will ever do. For most Christians the hardest thing we are called to do is to love one another and not let our own ways of doing things get in the way of friendship and fellowship with those who are not like us.
Some Illustrations and Musings
Carol Gilligan, in In a Different Voice, suggests that men's moral decisions are generally hierarchical whereas women's tend to be more relationally driven.
As a parent it's easier to do it yourself than to insist the child make the bed, clean up the room, etc., but it isn't good parenting. In fact, God probably has felt that way many times with us as well.
Children's time: you might use the 2 Kings' text concerning Solomon and the two mothers arguing over the one living child.
In Mary's day (the mother of Jesus), daughters were a threat when reached puberty. The risk of loss of virginity could mean the loss of dowry and shame for the family; the father might have to support her forever.
Disciples in John act a lot like cranky siblings. "Look, I'm not always going to be around to set you guys straight or protect you from your baser instincts and conduct; you are going to have to love one another."
You can't help save the world it you aren't open to those who are different from you.
"If everyone practices an eye for an eye, the entire world will be blind." (Ghandi)
Note
1. To find more information than you will need on the origins of Mother's Day, go to Google.com and type in "Mother's Day" and "origins" and you will find more information than you ever knew it was possible to gather. The top two websites provide photos, narratives, flowery backgrounds, and music.
Team Comments
George Murphy comments: In our e-mail correspondence and weekly conference call, the TIW team talked about the possibility of using the popularity of "revenge movies" ("Kill Bill," "Man on Fire," "The Punisher") as a theme, and we still may at some point. But we decided this week to go with the Mothers' Day connection. It occurred to me later that while revenge may not fit in too well with the Mothers' Day emphasis, some reflection on "Kill Bill 2" might be worthwhile.
Notice: Don't read further if you haven't seen it yet and don't want to know the ending. While the movie is primarily about revenge, it ends with Uma Thurman's character ("The Bride") driving off into the sunset with the daughter she has recovered after finally killing Bill (who is in fact the little girl's father). The reunion of the mother with her child is the note on which this violent film ends. Mothers will fight for their children, and sometimes may do it quite viciously -- an image used of David in 2 Samuel 17:8: "You know that your father and his men are warriors, and that they are enraged, like a bear robbed of her cubs in the field."
There are, of course, many biblical images of God as a warrior. Christians today sometimes feel uncomfortable about these, and there are some good reasons for that. But the idea of God as a loving parent who fights for the safety and welfare of children against the forces that threaten them is not an exclusively masculine image, and is not one that should be totally abandoned.
Human mothers are not perfect, and a relative few are not even very good. The fact that maternal images can be used for God says something about the importance and value of mothers, but the purpose of such images is not simply to validate motherhood. It is to say that, good as mothers can be, they can only be pointers to the higher goodness of God. (The same thing, of course, has to be said of paternal pictures.) These images are analogies, not descriptions. "Can a woman forget her nursing child, or show no compassion for the child of her womb? Even these may forget, yet I will not forget you" (Isaiah 49:15).
One suggestion that has been made by those who would like to connect Mothers' Day more closely to the traditional church calendar has been to tie it in some way to the commemoration of St. Monica, the mother of Augustine of Hippo, on May 4. She was a significant influence in the conversion of her son, and the role of mothers in nurturing faith, including the faith of the church's great teachers and leaders, is something that could be emphasized. (On the other hand, I know of women who have not been too wild about some of Augustine's ideas and influences on the church. And in any case there is the possibility that any commemoration of Monica would be overshadowed by her more famous son.)
Not everybody will be preaching on maternal themes this Sunday. Two of the texts, Psalm 148 and Revelation 21:1-6, provide an opportunity to speak about the value of the world as God's creation. This note needs to be sounded during the Easter season. Easter is not just about resurrection and new life for individual humans, but about the promise of "a new heaven and a new earth," a transformation of the present creation.
Psalm 148 could be called (to borrow a title from Teilhard de Chardin) "The Hymn of the Universe." It's a song of praise from the whole creation, beginning with angelic beings and celestial bodies. Sea and earth and all their living things, weather and hills and trees, are called upon to praise God. A person might argue that this is a rather naive anthropomorphic picture, and that of course mountains and cattle can't really praise God. But this would miss the point badly. In the first place, we can speak of the inanimate works of a human artist as praising that person: Haydn's music reflects the brilliance of that composer, and the insight of Emily Dickinson shines in her poems. In the same way, all the world can laud its creator.
But the psalm doesn't end with this. It goes on to call human beings, and especially "the people of Israel who are close to him," to "praise the LORD." It's true that other animals and non-living things can't praise in the same way that we do. But we are part of that world, the world become intelligent and articulate, able to hear God's word and respond to it. We are to give voice the praises of all creation, to lead the cosmic choir in its hymn.
Revelation 21 speaks not just of creation but of a new creation in which "death will be no more" (v. 4). (And in view of that promise, the NRSV translation of anthropon as "mortals" in the previous verse is bad. "Human beings" or "humans" would be much better.)
An important thing to emphasize here is the direction of the action. The New Jerusalem comes "down out of heaven" to the renewed earth. It's a significant contrast to the common Christian image of "going to heaven when we die." In the book of Revelation heaven seems to be a refuge for the souls of the martyrs during the time of troubles on earth, but the final hope is not escape from bodily reality. The promise is God's new world which will be able to bear the holy city and God and the Lamb as its temple, a city into which "the glory and the honor of the nations" -- all the good that has been accomplished in history -- will be brought. (These themes will be expressed in next week's continuation of the reading from Revelation, 21:10 and 21:22--22:5.)
Carlos Wilton responds: Carter, your thoughtful piece on Mother's Day reflects good scholarship, and it's pastorally sensitive as well, especially on the always-delicate question of how to address the needs of listeners whose childhood experiences of their own mothers are less than ideal. There's plenty in here for Mother's Day this year, and for future years as well.
Mother's Day raises tricky questions for preachers, especially for those of us who often rely on a lectionary for guidance in choosing scripture passages. It's a civil holiday, of course, so some liturgical purists would insist it ought to have no influence on Christian proclamation. Yet pastoral needs suggest otherwise. The simple fact, as you remind us, is many of our pews are filled on that day, either because the kids are back in town to honor mom or because memories of tender or troubled times at home continue to exert a powerful influence.
I've always tried to find a way to acknowledge the day, if not in my preaching, then in other parts of the worship service. Liturgically speaking, it's a sort of elephant in the sanctuary: to fail to mention this occasion that's so important to so many -- important for a variety of reasons -- would be to miss an obvious opportunity to speak good news.
This brings to mind an incident from my own Presbyterian denomination. If memory serves, there was a time some years back when the denominational office responsible for preparing our annual Program Calendar -- which many pastors use in worship planning -- neglected to mention Mother's Day. Whether this was due to a simple oversight or because some liturgical purist had recommended against it was unclear. In any event, there was a great hue and cry at the General Assembly. In the next year's calendar, Mother's Day quietly reappeared, and has been there every year since.
One way I've sometimes dealt with the diversity of needs and feelings is, in the pre-service announcements time, to ask anyone present who's a mother to please stand, if able. Then -- asking those women to remain standing -- I ask anyone who's ever had a mother to please stand. This emphasizes the fact that Mother's Day affects us all.
One word of caution, responding to what you wrote: I'm not sure I'd be willing, as you suggest, to use the story of the Judgment of Solomon in a children's sermon. Although everything turns out okay in the end, the part of the story where Solomon orders his soldiers to cut the disputed infant in half is perhaps more shocking than some young children could handle. In the brief space of time I have available for a children's message on a typical Sunday, I'm not sure I'd be able to convey to young concrete-thinkers the nuance that Solomon was not really intending to cut the baby in half, but was merely using the threat as a ploy to reveal the impostor.
Related Illustrations
Submitted by Carlos Wilton
I was born connected to my mother. She diverted the rivers and streams from her body into my body.
And my body remembers.
It remembers my mother's singing in the rivers and streams. It remembers how she walked in a good, quick step, and how she rested, with her hands laid gently across her body and mine.
One day I was pulled kicking and screaming from the body of my mother. The long, swooping cord connecting us was cut.
But no matter. The deed was done. I am flesh of my mother's flesh, bone of my mother's bone, made according to the design that she and my father planned together.
She fashioned my large, dark eyes. He made the deep and endless space behind my eyes. She took her hand and made my lips, and my wide, bright smile. My father's hand made my tongue and laid poems and stories there, and clear, true singing. When he had finished, my mother made the tip of my tongue, for wit and plain speaking. Then she put a little wave in my hair to remind her of the sea at Bristol where she was born. And my father painted just the slightest trace of red in the wave to remind him of his red-haired mother who died when he was born.
And so it was that my father and my mother made me, according to the design that they worked out together.
But I am flesh of my mother's flesh, bone of my mother's bone. I was born connected.
I was connected before I was born. Before my mother and father were born, and their mothers and fathers, before the earth was born, and time, long, long before then, I was connected to the Spirit of God so that there never was a time when I did not exist.
And my spirit remembers the Spirit of God. It remembers how God diverted rivers and streams into my spirit. It remembers the humming of God in the rivers and streams, and how the waves rose and curled in the humming. My spirit remembers the warm breath of God over the rivers, and the name of God that rose and fell in the warm breath....
One day God who put the breath in me will call the breath back. On that day my body will lie down next to the body of my mother.
There will be two times carved in stone over me -- the time when I began and the time when I ended.
Do not believe it.
There never was a time when I did not exist.
I have always been connected to God.
Sometimes I feel the cord coming out of my center connecting me to God. Then I remember how I always was connected to God and how I always will be.
-- Joan Sauro, in Weavings magazine
***
According to a November 12, 2003 story in the Washington Times, First Lady Laura Bush recalls a visit with her husband to the home of his parents.
"George woke up at 6 a.m. as usual and went downstairs to get a cup of coffee," the First Lady says. "And he sat down on the sofa with his parents and put his feet up. And all of a sudden, Barbara Bush yelled, 'Put your feet down!'
"George's dad replied, 'For goodness' sake, Barbara, he's the President of the United States.'
"And Barbara said, 'I don't care. I don't want his feet on my table.' "
The President promptly did as he was told, for as his wife observes: "Even Presidents have to listen to their mothers."
***
"A few years ago, I read a news story set in the vast continent of Africa. A journalist was covering one of the many civil wars that seem to plague this developing wonderland, and he was touched by the witness of some very wise women. At the border of the two warring countries, he saw a fence.
And lined up on each side was a group of nursing mothers. Defying all the hatred and bloodshed that their tribal identities called for, these women were exchanging their babies over the fence -- nursing each other's children with milk -- the common, human milk of peace and friendship.
These women were giving new meaning to the cup of blessing. They were breaking down the dividing wall of hostility with the very passion of their human bodies.
This, my friends, is the power of the incarnation -- God made flesh. This is the power of the cross -- pain transformed into healing. This is the power of God's good news in Jesus Christ -- in a world of hatred, love has the final word."
-- "Conflict Management 101," A sermon preached at Bradley Hills Church, Bethesda, Maryland, July 21, 2003 by the Rev. Susan R. Andrews, Moderator, 215th General Assembly, Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). Published in Perspectives, electronic magazine of the Office of the General Assembly.
***
"By and large, mothers and housewives are the only workers who do not have regular time off. They are the great vacationless class."
-- Anne Morrow Lindbergh
***
"The most important thing a father can do for his children is to love their mother."
-- Anonymous
***
"Every mother is like Moses. She does not enter the promised land. She prepares a world she will not see."
-- Pope Paul VI
***
One day a little girl was sitting and watching her mother do the dishes at the kitchen sink. She suddenly noticed that her mother had several strands of white hair sticking out in contrast on her brunette head. She looked at her mother and inquisitively asked, "Why are some of your hairs white, Mom? "
Her mother replied, "Well, every time that you do something wrong and make me cry or unhappy, one of my hairs turns white."
The little girl thought about this revelation for a while and then said, "Mama, how come all of grandma's hairs are white?"
Worship Resources
by Chuck Cammarata
The psalm for this week is a great one for liturgical use. You could use it to begin your worship service by simply reading it with some passion. Or you could use is as a dramatic reading done by several readers. I have organized it as such a reading in our first option for this week. I have used the name of God but, if your congregation is unused to this, just replace "Yahweh" with "God": or "the Lord."
CALL TO WORSHIP
READER 1: Praise Yahweh,
READER 2: Praise Yahweh from the heavens,
READER 3: Praise Yahweh in the heights above.
READER 4: Praise Yahweh, all you angels,
READER 5: Praise Yahweh, all you heavenly hosts.
READER 1: Praise Yahweh, sun and moon,
READER 2: Praise Yahweh, all you shining stars.
READER 3: Praise Yahweh, you highest heavens
READER 4: And you waters above the skies.
READER 5: Let them praise the name of Yahweh,
READER 1: At whose command they were created.
READER 2: Praise Yahweh, you great sea creatures,
READER 3: Lightning and hail, snow and clouds,
READER 4: Mountains and hills,
READER 5: Fruit trees and mighty cedars,
READER 1: Wild animals and all cattle,
READER 2: Small creatures and flying birds,
READER 3: Kings of the earth and all nations,
READER 4: Young men and maidens,
READER 5: Old men and children.
READER 1: Let them all praise the name of Yahweh,
READER 2: The name that alone is exalted;
READER 3: The name of splendor above the earth.
READER 4: Praise Yahweh,
READER 5: All you people, praise Yahweh!
or
CALL TO WORSHIP
LEADER: Jesus said, "This is my commandment: Love one another."
PEOPLE: We come to worship the God who is love, that we may learn to love one another.
LEADER: Jesus said, "No longer do I call you servants; but now I call you friends."
PEOPLE: We come to worship the God whose friends we are through Jesus.
LEADER: Let us sing praise to God,
PEOPLE: And live in love and friendship toward all people,
LEADER: Through Jesus Christ. Amen.
The first confessional prayer reflects John's challenge to love one another and the emphasis in Acts that God's grace extends to Jew and Gentile alike. It challenges us to understand that Christ's love is not just for Christians who are like us but for all Christians and, in fact, all people.
PRAYER OF CONFESSION
LEADER: God of all nations,
PEOPLE: We praise you that in Christ the barriers that separate us are torn down.
LEADER: Yet we confess our slowness to open our hearts to those of other lands, tongues, and races.
PEOPLE: Deliver us from the sins of fear and prejudice,
LEADER: That we may move toward the day,
PEOPLE: When all are truly one in Jesus Christ. Amen.
or
PRAYER OF CONFESSION
Ask your congregation the following questions:
Think for a minute about these things:
When, in the past week, did you show someone the love of God? Not the easy, sugary love of this world, but the love that goes the extra mile; the love that loves the enemy; the love that forgives the one who has hurt you. When did you offer God's love to someone this week?
Pray with me.
God of true love, forgive our acceptance of the weak, watered down love of our culture, and our subtle rejection of true love. Forgive us for loving only those who love us back; for loving only those who are similar to us; for loving only the beautiful and the handsome.
Forgive us, and teach us to love with the love that is so strong -- so amazing -- that it would dare to die for another. We ask it all in the name of the one who embodies love, Jesus Christ. Amen.
ASSURANCE OF PARDON
LEADER: Hear now the words of John's first epistle:
PEOPLE: If we confess our sins,
LEADER: God is faithful, and just,
PEOPLE: And will forgive us and cleanse us.
LEADER: All those who are in Christ are forgiven!
PEOPLE: Praise God!
PRAYER FOR ILLUMINATION
In John's glorious vision of the heavens the one who sits on the throne says, "Write down all my words, for they are trustworthy and true."
Let us pray: Speaker of truth and truth alone -- enable us now -- in these few moments together -- to hear the truth of these words read, sung, and preached. Amen.
PASTORAL PRAYER
To become the people you, O Lord, made us to be, we must take seriously the command to die to ourselves. Show us what must die. Reveal to us the prejudices that have to go; the bitterness that we must let go of; the fears that prevent us from reaching out to those who are different and even frightening; the baggage that weighs us down and needs to be tossed overboard; the laziness that keeps us rooted to the sofa instead of stoking the fires of divine love that the world around us so desperately needs.
Show us what must die, and then move us, motivate us, set us ablaze with the deep desire to eradicate that in us which is not of you; which brings death to our souls and our world.
Show us, move us, and finally strengthen us for the work of dying, for it is not easy work, but it is necessary work. As the cross was necessary to the resurrection, so dying to the self is necessary to abundant life.
Show us Lord, move us Lord, and strengthen us Lord. For our heart's desire is conformed to your image within us. Amen.
HYMNS AND SONGS
For the Beauty of the Earth
Now Thank We All Our God
O Perfect Love
They Will Know We Are Christians by Our Love
Blest Be the Tie That Binds
The Bond of Love
Jesus Loves the Little Children
Thy Loving Kindness
Freely, Freely
A Children's Sermon
by Wesley T. Runk
John 13:31-35
Text: "I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another." (vv. 34-35)
Object: a long piece of rope, long enough that each child present can hold onto it at the same time and some smaller pieces of rope that they can take with them
Good morning, boys and girls. Today is a special day for all of us. What do we call this special day? (let them answer) That's right, it is Mother's Day. What do we do different on this day than we do on other days? (let them answer) We make it a special day by honoring our mother and showing her how much we love her. Some of us draw a special picture; others give flowers and other gifts. We all want our mothers to know how much we love them.
Mother's Day is all about love. We think about the love our mothers have shared with us. We remember how she cared for us before we were born. Does anyone remember when we lived in our mother's tummy? (let them answer) No one does! Does anyone remember when our mother's fed us and changed us and kept us warm? (let them answer) Probably not when we were babies, but we know what good care she takes care of us today. Our mothers have a special love for us and we have a special love for our mothers.
Where does all of this love come from? (let them answer) Can you buy love? Can you pick it off of a tree or dig it up in the back yard? I don't think so. This love comes from God.
Jesus also talked a lot about love. He said his love came from God and he shared it with his disciples and everyone who knew him. Jesus loved people that did not love him. He loved people who tried to hurt him. He even loved the people that put him on the cross. This kind of love changes everything.
I brought with me this morning a big piece of rope. I want everyone to hold this rope so that he connects all of us together. (take out the rope and beginning at one end have each child put both hands on the rope) Let's pretend that the rope is filled with love and that as soon as we put our hands on the rope we are filled with love. We are all sharing one love. Suppose that God was holding the end of the rope so that he could send us his love. That would be wonderful wouldn't it? (let them answer) But you and I know that God isn't holding the rope and there is nothing in the rope except what we believe is there.
Let's try something else. Instead of holding a rope let's hold each other's hands. (have the children hold the hand of one friend and the hand of another friend) Do you feel something different than when you were holding the rope? Your friend's hand is warm, the friend is alive and there is love in every hand. Now let's make a circle so that every hand is touching another hand. Love is really there and we are friends. I want you to imagine that Jesus is standing in your circle and is holding everyone's hand. Do you feel his love? (let them answer) In our circle we are feeling great love and sharing it with one another.
Today we celebrate the love of our mothers and the love she receives from God. It is a love that we learn to share with others as we grow in faith and in joy with the Living God. Amen.
* * *
The Immediate Word, May 9, 2004, issue.
Copyright 2004 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to The Immediate Word service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons and in worship and classroom settings only. No additional permission is required from the publisher for such use by subscribers only. Inquiries should be addressed to permissions@csspub.com or to Permissions, CSS Publishing Company, Inc., P.O. Box 4503, Lima, Ohio 45802-4503
In planning for May 9, team members noticed that the emphases of the lectionary texts on Christian love and on inclusiveness were appropriate for the theme of motherhood and for a compelling message on Mother's Day. We, therefore, asked Carter Shelley to reflect on the New Testament lections with respect to the operation of maternal love both on the part of humans and of God, and to emphasize the importance of cultivating appropriate human love in our families and within our communities of faith. Carter comments also more generally on motherhood in both biblical Testaments.
As usual, this issue includes team responses, illustrations, worship resources, and a children's sermon.
Maternal Love: Human and Divine
Acts 11:1-18; Revelation 21:1-6; John 13:31-35
by Carter Shelley
Mothers in the Old and New Testament
In a sacred text written in a patriarchal culture, the role of mothers is a vital one. That doesn't mean the vocations of other women were unimportant. From the Old Testament we know both the names and the deeds of the prophet Deborah and of Queen Esther, just as from the New Testament we know important details about the lives of three of Jesus' women disciples: Mary, Martha, and Mary Magdalene. But in both the Old Testament and the New, the task of bearing, loving, teaching, and training the next priest, king, prophet, or messiah falls to the mother. Thus, women who cannot readily conceive feel no compunction about calling upon their Creator God, the giver of life to hear their prayer.
The story of the barren woman recurs many times in the Old Testament, and motherhood is understood as something that is God-given and a blessing from God. Yahweh shows compassion for the barren woman by opening her womb and creating life within it: Hagar, the used and abused concubine of Sara becomes the mother of a great people; Sarah, the post-menopausal supposed matriarch of a great people finally bears and delivers Isaac; Leah, the unloved first wife of Jacob delivers six sons and a daughter; and the once-barren Hannah becomes the mother of the prophet Samuel.
In the Old Testament, the role of mothers is important and necessary but it is not schmaltzy or sentimentalized in the way that Dickens or nineteenth-century Americans tended to sentimentalize motherhood. To be a mother and a faithful follower required courage, conviction, determination, strength, and the ability to ultimately let go, as Hannah let go of Samuel so he could be trained as a prophet and as Mary had to let go of Jesus so he could serve his heavenly calling.
In the New Testament, as with everything else, God turns the traditional understanding of motherhood on its head from the very beginning. Mary, an unmarried woman not anxious about fertility or seeking motherhood, becomes pregnant. This act stands outside the norm of her society and religion and has the potential to lead to rejection, disgrace, and isolation. A young woman, betrothed to one man and found to be pregnant by another, risks stoning for adultery. Yet Mary actively agrees to be "the handmaid of the Lord." Mary commits to the Messiah even before he is born. In fact, she is his first disciple. She will also be his first teacher about God, the world, etc. She will be the first to serve him and love him. She understands herself to be blessed by God in this awe-inspiring venture as the "Mother of God" -- an ancient Christian designation of Mary
While the maternal aspects of God's nature historically and liturgically have not been front and center throughout most of the church's 2,000+ year history, biblical scholarship of the past forty years has identified more and more examples of God's maternal traits and inclinations. Compassionate, forgiving, feeding, rescuing, withholding punishment, drying tears, offering comfort and solace -- all of these words apply to God at various points in the Bible. Jesus gave his disciples permission to view God as an intimate and loving parent when Jesus encouraged the use of "Abba" ("Daddy") in the Lord's Prayer. Such a wonderful invitation into the arms of God was not offered as a means for closing down all other insights or revelations into God's nature. It was a beginning, not an end. Thus, God's feminine side can be read and understood in God's voice spoken through the prophets Hosea, Jeremiah, Isaiah, and John of Patmos in Revelation, each of whom uses maternal expressions of love, concern, and affection to describe the divine-human relationship.
Examples of God's maternal side are evident in all three New Testament lessons for this Sunday (see section 5 below).
Mother's Day 2004
Not every person who occupies a pew this Sunday will be of the same mind and place about Mother's Day. While for some it is a day of family get-together, celebration, and a time to say "Thank you" to mom with a picture drawn in Sunday school, a handprint impression on a piece of clay, or a visit home with dinner in a restaurant, there will be people present whose experience and emotions will not be so Hallmark-card happy. While every member of our congregation has had a biological mother, not every human born has had a mother who meets the Madison Avenue, Norman Rockwell idealistic picture portrayed in flower advertisements or in some Mother's Day sermons. If mom was absent, addicted to drugs or alcohol, fought daily with one's father, or never did anything but criticize her children, the offspring's thoughts are not going to be so rosy. So it's important as pastor and preacher to recognize that Mother's Day evokes a range of emotions among Christians. In acknowledging those emotions, you will be able to include and address these individuals along with their more fortunate brethren who contentedly value both their mothers and Mother's Day.
The best strategy for a homily that is both inclusive and celebrative on May 9 will be to (1) talk about some of the virtues and blessings of earthly mothers as a part of your sermon, but (2) to move on to the more universal Christian affirmation that the Triune God whom we know as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit also has breadth enough to provide motherly love and nurture to all who would be her children. I have identified the direction my own sermon will take by using numbers beside the different moves. In sections 3 and 4 I have merely listed the maternal characteristics that human mothers and God may share. I have not provided illustrations in these instances, because I believe that illustrations from the preacher and congregation's own experience will prove more effective.
Human Maternal Love
1. Introduction: A brief recognition of Mother's Day1 in American culture.
In American churches, Mother's Day has the third best worship attendance of the year, exceeded only by Christmas and Easter. This statistical detail applies across denominational lines. Thus, Roman Catholics as well as Presbyterians, Baptists, Methodists, etc., will make a sincere effort to attend church with their mothers. Since it's a secular holiday and not a Christian one, far more adult children will treat their moms to a nice dinner in a restaurant today than will occupy pews. So, if you haven't made a reservation already, you're too late to do it now!
2. Recognition that Mother's Day does not evoke happy, sentimental feelings in all children, because not all mothers are paragons of maternal love.
In many congregations it is customary to wear a red rose if one's mother is still living, and a white rose if one's mother is deceased. Those among us whose mothers have already died may use part of this day to think about our mothers. Such thoughts often lead to mixed emotions. Some of us miss our mothers and will feel sad. Others, whose mothers may have been a mixed blessing, if any blessing at all, may also feel anger, sadness, grief, or a sense of loss. Irrespective of the kind of mother one had -- loving, neglectful, inexperienced, absent, or incredibly wise and nurturing -- in American culture this day is dedicated unambiguously to mothers, the implication being that if we don't get all warm and fuzzy and grateful for our moms, we are cheapskates and insensitive cretins who didn't deserve to have one in the first place.
We know that all mothers are not exactly the same any more than all Christians are the same. Yet there are characteristics we can identify that make for a more effective and loving parent, just as there are characteristics that make for a more effective and loving Christian.
3. Some Characteristics of Human Maternal Love
* A commitment to the child begins before the child is even born. Mary agrees to give up her own will and life plan in order to be the mother of Jesus.
* A desire and willingness to listen and hear the needs of the child. "No, you may not stay out all night just because your friends are." "Yes, you may tell me how I hurt your feelings."
* The ability to teach and discipline children into independence and maturity.
* The ability to model religious faithfulness and ethical integrity (church membership, prayer, etc.).
* Love laced with understanding and forgiveness (listening, taking time to hug or hear).
* The willingness to sacrifice personal needs and comforts in order to meet appropriate needs of her child -- college tuition vs. vacation and new car.
Having identified characteristics of effective human mothers, acknowledge that even the best of mothers has days -- and sometimes weeks -- when she fails to live up to her own standards for mothering. Her own humanity gets in the way. She gets tired, angry; feelings get hurt. Her ambitions for her children may not match theirs. She worries, hovers, etc.
Characteristics of divine love include the above six items and more.
4. Divine Maternal Love: Similarities to Human Maternal Love
* The commitment to child and relationship begins before child is even born ("In the womb I knew you, Jeremiah").
* A desire and willingness to listen to and hear the needs of the child (Hagar's cry for help, Hannah's grief).
* The ability to teach and discipline children into independence and maturity (Sinai covenant and law, the ministry of Jesus).
* The ability to model religious faithfulness and ethical integrity (the Ten Commandments).
* Love laced with understanding and forgiveness (Hosea 11:1-9).
* Willingness to sacrifice personal needs and comforts in order to meet needs of her child (John 3:16 God so loved the world ...).
Whether described as Mother, Father, Holy One, Savior, or Parent, God's love and care exceeds that any human parent can provide. The same holds true of God's ambitions and expectations for her children.
5. Divine Maternal Love: Differences
John 13:30-35: The writer of John's Gospel makes it clear that Jesus' death was not an act of shame or disgrace but from start to finish a glorification. It was God's plan all along that the Son should suffer, die, and be raised from the dead. In so doing Jesus not only obeys God but also glorifies God's will on earth. The injunction to his disciples to "love one another" would be familiar to them, having first appeared in Leviticus as "love your neighbor as yourself." Writing perhaps 60-70 years after Jesus' death and resurrection, the Gospel of John raises the bar even higher with Jesus' words that Christian disciples "love one another as I have loved you." The kind of love that Jesus offered them reverses the traditional ways things are done in the world. The master becomes a slave. The innocent die instead of the guilty. Mutual love is expected between Christians.
Thus the maternal love of God is reflected in Jesus' love for his disciples. While the Christians John addresses in his Gospel may be Christians who bicker among themselves, much like siblings bicker as children, such behavior is no way for a mature Christian to act. They must "love one another as I have loved you." How has God loved? God gave God's Son, and the Son proved a chip off the old block in terms of power to heal, witness, comfort, love, and sacrifice for the welfare of others.
An American reporter in Iraq shared a tragic, true story with Teri Gross on Fresh Air last week on the radio. A young man is accurately identified by his village as someone who served as an informer to the American soldiers during the early stages of the war in the spring of 2003. The young man's action is seen as a betrayal, and he must die. The village leaders approach the man's father and tell him that the son must die. If the father refuses to kill his son or allow him to be killed, then the entire family will be executed, since all must be punished for the crime of one. Rather than allow any other family members' lives to be endangered, the father painfully agrees to execute his son himself. The father shoots and kills his son. To save the lives of the rest of the family, the one son must be killed. We may view this incident as barbarism akin to the barbarism on display in the movie The Passion. Notice any parallels?
Acts 11:1-18: This vivid story relates Peter's vision from God that the old dietary laws of Judaism no longer apply to himself or to others who seek to spread the good news of Jesus Christ beyond the boundaries of Jerusalem and Palestine. Many Jews were hostile to Gentiles in the first century. In her book A Virgin Conceived: Mary and Classical Representations of Virginity, Mary Foskett notes that Jews assumed that not only would slave girls and female captives of war be women with an active sexual history, but also that the daughters of Gentiles would not be virgins when they married, when in fact the virginity of Greco-Roman daughters was just as carefully guarded as that of young, adolescent Jewish girls. So long as no one bothers to get to know someone with a different religion, culture, or native country, prejudices and misinformation are reinforced.
The response of Peter's Jewish colleagues shows that they've really grasped his message. "God has given even to the Gentiles the repentance that leads to life." Such inclusiveness comes from a God who understands herself as Mother to all her children. Divine maternal love makes no distinction between genders, race, or creed. All are lovable. All are redeemable. All are worth the effort. Perhaps the Jews' astonishment at God's incredible inclusiveness resembles that of the first-born child. First he or she has to adjust to the fact that mom and dad have a new child to love. Then he or she comes to resent and fear the time and attention the new child requires. Finally, with maturity, the older child may realize that parental love isn't limited and lessened by being shared with more than one child. Parental love expands and grows as does the family. Divine maternal love operates in a similar way.
Revelation 21:1-6: William Pender notes that Revelation is a carefully composed literary depiction of the new heaven and new earth God intends to provide for humanity if human beings will but meet God part way. Rather than originating from an ecstatic vision, the book of Revelation is inspired by a future reality that already is at work in the present world. Christ has already died, been raised, and gone to be with God. Yet Christ remains with us through the presence of the Holy Spirit and the ongoing potentialities of the Christian church and Christians. Heaven has already won the victory. Earth and its occupants just don't grasp that God enfolds both in the present and in the future.
The language that is used to describe this present and future life in God's presence is the language of motherhood and mothering. We don't even have to go looking for God; God will come to us. "The home of God is among mortals. (S)he will dwell with them as their God, they will be his peoples, and God (Her)self will be with them; She will wipe every tear from their eyes." The new heaven with the new earth signals a time when God's maternal side will be felt by those who remain true to their Lord. Yet our divine mother has already given us the tools with which to begin this earthly transformation. It's not about waiting for God to make it happen. It's about letting this already real transformation become evident through our own actions, vision, and transformation of the world in which we live. It may start with something as simple as a couple of mothers in Northern Ireland who got fed up with the killing and started a movement of peace and reconciliation several decades ago.
Divine love turns the world upside down. No more dietary laws, and no more "eye for an eye." Love one another. God will establish a new heaven and a new earth. But unlike parental love, which usually comes naturally to most fathers and mothers, Christian love challenges us to risk ourselves, extend ourselves to those we fear, hate, disagree with, or cannot understand. For most individuals who become parents, parenting is the hardest thing they will ever do. For most Christians the hardest thing we are called to do is to love one another and not let our own ways of doing things get in the way of friendship and fellowship with those who are not like us.
Some Illustrations and Musings
Carol Gilligan, in In a Different Voice, suggests that men's moral decisions are generally hierarchical whereas women's tend to be more relationally driven.
As a parent it's easier to do it yourself than to insist the child make the bed, clean up the room, etc., but it isn't good parenting. In fact, God probably has felt that way many times with us as well.
Children's time: you might use the 2 Kings' text concerning Solomon and the two mothers arguing over the one living child.
In Mary's day (the mother of Jesus), daughters were a threat when reached puberty. The risk of loss of virginity could mean the loss of dowry and shame for the family; the father might have to support her forever.
Disciples in John act a lot like cranky siblings. "Look, I'm not always going to be around to set you guys straight or protect you from your baser instincts and conduct; you are going to have to love one another."
You can't help save the world it you aren't open to those who are different from you.
"If everyone practices an eye for an eye, the entire world will be blind." (Ghandi)
Note
1. To find more information than you will need on the origins of Mother's Day, go to Google.com and type in "Mother's Day" and "origins" and you will find more information than you ever knew it was possible to gather. The top two websites provide photos, narratives, flowery backgrounds, and music.
Team Comments
George Murphy comments: In our e-mail correspondence and weekly conference call, the TIW team talked about the possibility of using the popularity of "revenge movies" ("Kill Bill," "Man on Fire," "The Punisher") as a theme, and we still may at some point. But we decided this week to go with the Mothers' Day connection. It occurred to me later that while revenge may not fit in too well with the Mothers' Day emphasis, some reflection on "Kill Bill 2" might be worthwhile.
Notice: Don't read further if you haven't seen it yet and don't want to know the ending. While the movie is primarily about revenge, it ends with Uma Thurman's character ("The Bride") driving off into the sunset with the daughter she has recovered after finally killing Bill (who is in fact the little girl's father). The reunion of the mother with her child is the note on which this violent film ends. Mothers will fight for their children, and sometimes may do it quite viciously -- an image used of David in 2 Samuel 17:8: "You know that your father and his men are warriors, and that they are enraged, like a bear robbed of her cubs in the field."
There are, of course, many biblical images of God as a warrior. Christians today sometimes feel uncomfortable about these, and there are some good reasons for that. But the idea of God as a loving parent who fights for the safety and welfare of children against the forces that threaten them is not an exclusively masculine image, and is not one that should be totally abandoned.
Human mothers are not perfect, and a relative few are not even very good. The fact that maternal images can be used for God says something about the importance and value of mothers, but the purpose of such images is not simply to validate motherhood. It is to say that, good as mothers can be, they can only be pointers to the higher goodness of God. (The same thing, of course, has to be said of paternal pictures.) These images are analogies, not descriptions. "Can a woman forget her nursing child, or show no compassion for the child of her womb? Even these may forget, yet I will not forget you" (Isaiah 49:15).
One suggestion that has been made by those who would like to connect Mothers' Day more closely to the traditional church calendar has been to tie it in some way to the commemoration of St. Monica, the mother of Augustine of Hippo, on May 4. She was a significant influence in the conversion of her son, and the role of mothers in nurturing faith, including the faith of the church's great teachers and leaders, is something that could be emphasized. (On the other hand, I know of women who have not been too wild about some of Augustine's ideas and influences on the church. And in any case there is the possibility that any commemoration of Monica would be overshadowed by her more famous son.)
Not everybody will be preaching on maternal themes this Sunday. Two of the texts, Psalm 148 and Revelation 21:1-6, provide an opportunity to speak about the value of the world as God's creation. This note needs to be sounded during the Easter season. Easter is not just about resurrection and new life for individual humans, but about the promise of "a new heaven and a new earth," a transformation of the present creation.
Psalm 148 could be called (to borrow a title from Teilhard de Chardin) "The Hymn of the Universe." It's a song of praise from the whole creation, beginning with angelic beings and celestial bodies. Sea and earth and all their living things, weather and hills and trees, are called upon to praise God. A person might argue that this is a rather naive anthropomorphic picture, and that of course mountains and cattle can't really praise God. But this would miss the point badly. In the first place, we can speak of the inanimate works of a human artist as praising that person: Haydn's music reflects the brilliance of that composer, and the insight of Emily Dickinson shines in her poems. In the same way, all the world can laud its creator.
But the psalm doesn't end with this. It goes on to call human beings, and especially "the people of Israel who are close to him," to "praise the LORD." It's true that other animals and non-living things can't praise in the same way that we do. But we are part of that world, the world become intelligent and articulate, able to hear God's word and respond to it. We are to give voice the praises of all creation, to lead the cosmic choir in its hymn.
Revelation 21 speaks not just of creation but of a new creation in which "death will be no more" (v. 4). (And in view of that promise, the NRSV translation of anthropon as "mortals" in the previous verse is bad. "Human beings" or "humans" would be much better.)
An important thing to emphasize here is the direction of the action. The New Jerusalem comes "down out of heaven" to the renewed earth. It's a significant contrast to the common Christian image of "going to heaven when we die." In the book of Revelation heaven seems to be a refuge for the souls of the martyrs during the time of troubles on earth, but the final hope is not escape from bodily reality. The promise is God's new world which will be able to bear the holy city and God and the Lamb as its temple, a city into which "the glory and the honor of the nations" -- all the good that has been accomplished in history -- will be brought. (These themes will be expressed in next week's continuation of the reading from Revelation, 21:10 and 21:22--22:5.)
Carlos Wilton responds: Carter, your thoughtful piece on Mother's Day reflects good scholarship, and it's pastorally sensitive as well, especially on the always-delicate question of how to address the needs of listeners whose childhood experiences of their own mothers are less than ideal. There's plenty in here for Mother's Day this year, and for future years as well.
Mother's Day raises tricky questions for preachers, especially for those of us who often rely on a lectionary for guidance in choosing scripture passages. It's a civil holiday, of course, so some liturgical purists would insist it ought to have no influence on Christian proclamation. Yet pastoral needs suggest otherwise. The simple fact, as you remind us, is many of our pews are filled on that day, either because the kids are back in town to honor mom or because memories of tender or troubled times at home continue to exert a powerful influence.
I've always tried to find a way to acknowledge the day, if not in my preaching, then in other parts of the worship service. Liturgically speaking, it's a sort of elephant in the sanctuary: to fail to mention this occasion that's so important to so many -- important for a variety of reasons -- would be to miss an obvious opportunity to speak good news.
This brings to mind an incident from my own Presbyterian denomination. If memory serves, there was a time some years back when the denominational office responsible for preparing our annual Program Calendar -- which many pastors use in worship planning -- neglected to mention Mother's Day. Whether this was due to a simple oversight or because some liturgical purist had recommended against it was unclear. In any event, there was a great hue and cry at the General Assembly. In the next year's calendar, Mother's Day quietly reappeared, and has been there every year since.
One way I've sometimes dealt with the diversity of needs and feelings is, in the pre-service announcements time, to ask anyone present who's a mother to please stand, if able. Then -- asking those women to remain standing -- I ask anyone who's ever had a mother to please stand. This emphasizes the fact that Mother's Day affects us all.
One word of caution, responding to what you wrote: I'm not sure I'd be willing, as you suggest, to use the story of the Judgment of Solomon in a children's sermon. Although everything turns out okay in the end, the part of the story where Solomon orders his soldiers to cut the disputed infant in half is perhaps more shocking than some young children could handle. In the brief space of time I have available for a children's message on a typical Sunday, I'm not sure I'd be able to convey to young concrete-thinkers the nuance that Solomon was not really intending to cut the baby in half, but was merely using the threat as a ploy to reveal the impostor.
Related Illustrations
Submitted by Carlos Wilton
I was born connected to my mother. She diverted the rivers and streams from her body into my body.
And my body remembers.
It remembers my mother's singing in the rivers and streams. It remembers how she walked in a good, quick step, and how she rested, with her hands laid gently across her body and mine.
One day I was pulled kicking and screaming from the body of my mother. The long, swooping cord connecting us was cut.
But no matter. The deed was done. I am flesh of my mother's flesh, bone of my mother's bone, made according to the design that she and my father planned together.
She fashioned my large, dark eyes. He made the deep and endless space behind my eyes. She took her hand and made my lips, and my wide, bright smile. My father's hand made my tongue and laid poems and stories there, and clear, true singing. When he had finished, my mother made the tip of my tongue, for wit and plain speaking. Then she put a little wave in my hair to remind her of the sea at Bristol where she was born. And my father painted just the slightest trace of red in the wave to remind him of his red-haired mother who died when he was born.
And so it was that my father and my mother made me, according to the design that they worked out together.
But I am flesh of my mother's flesh, bone of my mother's bone. I was born connected.
I was connected before I was born. Before my mother and father were born, and their mothers and fathers, before the earth was born, and time, long, long before then, I was connected to the Spirit of God so that there never was a time when I did not exist.
And my spirit remembers the Spirit of God. It remembers how God diverted rivers and streams into my spirit. It remembers the humming of God in the rivers and streams, and how the waves rose and curled in the humming. My spirit remembers the warm breath of God over the rivers, and the name of God that rose and fell in the warm breath....
One day God who put the breath in me will call the breath back. On that day my body will lie down next to the body of my mother.
There will be two times carved in stone over me -- the time when I began and the time when I ended.
Do not believe it.
There never was a time when I did not exist.
I have always been connected to God.
Sometimes I feel the cord coming out of my center connecting me to God. Then I remember how I always was connected to God and how I always will be.
-- Joan Sauro, in Weavings magazine
***
According to a November 12, 2003 story in the Washington Times, First Lady Laura Bush recalls a visit with her husband to the home of his parents.
"George woke up at 6 a.m. as usual and went downstairs to get a cup of coffee," the First Lady says. "And he sat down on the sofa with his parents and put his feet up. And all of a sudden, Barbara Bush yelled, 'Put your feet down!'
"George's dad replied, 'For goodness' sake, Barbara, he's the President of the United States.'
"And Barbara said, 'I don't care. I don't want his feet on my table.' "
The President promptly did as he was told, for as his wife observes: "Even Presidents have to listen to their mothers."
***
"A few years ago, I read a news story set in the vast continent of Africa. A journalist was covering one of the many civil wars that seem to plague this developing wonderland, and he was touched by the witness of some very wise women. At the border of the two warring countries, he saw a fence.
And lined up on each side was a group of nursing mothers. Defying all the hatred and bloodshed that their tribal identities called for, these women were exchanging their babies over the fence -- nursing each other's children with milk -- the common, human milk of peace and friendship.
These women were giving new meaning to the cup of blessing. They were breaking down the dividing wall of hostility with the very passion of their human bodies.
This, my friends, is the power of the incarnation -- God made flesh. This is the power of the cross -- pain transformed into healing. This is the power of God's good news in Jesus Christ -- in a world of hatred, love has the final word."
-- "Conflict Management 101," A sermon preached at Bradley Hills Church, Bethesda, Maryland, July 21, 2003 by the Rev. Susan R. Andrews, Moderator, 215th General Assembly, Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). Published in Perspectives, electronic magazine of the Office of the General Assembly.
***
"By and large, mothers and housewives are the only workers who do not have regular time off. They are the great vacationless class."
-- Anne Morrow Lindbergh
***
"The most important thing a father can do for his children is to love their mother."
-- Anonymous
***
"Every mother is like Moses. She does not enter the promised land. She prepares a world she will not see."
-- Pope Paul VI
***
One day a little girl was sitting and watching her mother do the dishes at the kitchen sink. She suddenly noticed that her mother had several strands of white hair sticking out in contrast on her brunette head. She looked at her mother and inquisitively asked, "Why are some of your hairs white, Mom? "
Her mother replied, "Well, every time that you do something wrong and make me cry or unhappy, one of my hairs turns white."
The little girl thought about this revelation for a while and then said, "Mama, how come all of grandma's hairs are white?"
Worship Resources
by Chuck Cammarata
The psalm for this week is a great one for liturgical use. You could use it to begin your worship service by simply reading it with some passion. Or you could use is as a dramatic reading done by several readers. I have organized it as such a reading in our first option for this week. I have used the name of God but, if your congregation is unused to this, just replace "Yahweh" with "God": or "the Lord."
CALL TO WORSHIP
READER 1: Praise Yahweh,
READER 2: Praise Yahweh from the heavens,
READER 3: Praise Yahweh in the heights above.
READER 4: Praise Yahweh, all you angels,
READER 5: Praise Yahweh, all you heavenly hosts.
READER 1: Praise Yahweh, sun and moon,
READER 2: Praise Yahweh, all you shining stars.
READER 3: Praise Yahweh, you highest heavens
READER 4: And you waters above the skies.
READER 5: Let them praise the name of Yahweh,
READER 1: At whose command they were created.
READER 2: Praise Yahweh, you great sea creatures,
READER 3: Lightning and hail, snow and clouds,
READER 4: Mountains and hills,
READER 5: Fruit trees and mighty cedars,
READER 1: Wild animals and all cattle,
READER 2: Small creatures and flying birds,
READER 3: Kings of the earth and all nations,
READER 4: Young men and maidens,
READER 5: Old men and children.
READER 1: Let them all praise the name of Yahweh,
READER 2: The name that alone is exalted;
READER 3: The name of splendor above the earth.
READER 4: Praise Yahweh,
READER 5: All you people, praise Yahweh!
or
CALL TO WORSHIP
LEADER: Jesus said, "This is my commandment: Love one another."
PEOPLE: We come to worship the God who is love, that we may learn to love one another.
LEADER: Jesus said, "No longer do I call you servants; but now I call you friends."
PEOPLE: We come to worship the God whose friends we are through Jesus.
LEADER: Let us sing praise to God,
PEOPLE: And live in love and friendship toward all people,
LEADER: Through Jesus Christ. Amen.
The first confessional prayer reflects John's challenge to love one another and the emphasis in Acts that God's grace extends to Jew and Gentile alike. It challenges us to understand that Christ's love is not just for Christians who are like us but for all Christians and, in fact, all people.
PRAYER OF CONFESSION
LEADER: God of all nations,
PEOPLE: We praise you that in Christ the barriers that separate us are torn down.
LEADER: Yet we confess our slowness to open our hearts to those of other lands, tongues, and races.
PEOPLE: Deliver us from the sins of fear and prejudice,
LEADER: That we may move toward the day,
PEOPLE: When all are truly one in Jesus Christ. Amen.
or
PRAYER OF CONFESSION
Ask your congregation the following questions:
Think for a minute about these things:
When, in the past week, did you show someone the love of God? Not the easy, sugary love of this world, but the love that goes the extra mile; the love that loves the enemy; the love that forgives the one who has hurt you. When did you offer God's love to someone this week?
Pray with me.
God of true love, forgive our acceptance of the weak, watered down love of our culture, and our subtle rejection of true love. Forgive us for loving only those who love us back; for loving only those who are similar to us; for loving only the beautiful and the handsome.
Forgive us, and teach us to love with the love that is so strong -- so amazing -- that it would dare to die for another. We ask it all in the name of the one who embodies love, Jesus Christ. Amen.
ASSURANCE OF PARDON
LEADER: Hear now the words of John's first epistle:
PEOPLE: If we confess our sins,
LEADER: God is faithful, and just,
PEOPLE: And will forgive us and cleanse us.
LEADER: All those who are in Christ are forgiven!
PEOPLE: Praise God!
PRAYER FOR ILLUMINATION
In John's glorious vision of the heavens the one who sits on the throne says, "Write down all my words, for they are trustworthy and true."
Let us pray: Speaker of truth and truth alone -- enable us now -- in these few moments together -- to hear the truth of these words read, sung, and preached. Amen.
PASTORAL PRAYER
To become the people you, O Lord, made us to be, we must take seriously the command to die to ourselves. Show us what must die. Reveal to us the prejudices that have to go; the bitterness that we must let go of; the fears that prevent us from reaching out to those who are different and even frightening; the baggage that weighs us down and needs to be tossed overboard; the laziness that keeps us rooted to the sofa instead of stoking the fires of divine love that the world around us so desperately needs.
Show us what must die, and then move us, motivate us, set us ablaze with the deep desire to eradicate that in us which is not of you; which brings death to our souls and our world.
Show us, move us, and finally strengthen us for the work of dying, for it is not easy work, but it is necessary work. As the cross was necessary to the resurrection, so dying to the self is necessary to abundant life.
Show us Lord, move us Lord, and strengthen us Lord. For our heart's desire is conformed to your image within us. Amen.
HYMNS AND SONGS
For the Beauty of the Earth
Now Thank We All Our God
O Perfect Love
They Will Know We Are Christians by Our Love
Blest Be the Tie That Binds
The Bond of Love
Jesus Loves the Little Children
Thy Loving Kindness
Freely, Freely
A Children's Sermon
by Wesley T. Runk
John 13:31-35
Text: "I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another." (vv. 34-35)
Object: a long piece of rope, long enough that each child present can hold onto it at the same time and some smaller pieces of rope that they can take with them
Good morning, boys and girls. Today is a special day for all of us. What do we call this special day? (let them answer) That's right, it is Mother's Day. What do we do different on this day than we do on other days? (let them answer) We make it a special day by honoring our mother and showing her how much we love her. Some of us draw a special picture; others give flowers and other gifts. We all want our mothers to know how much we love them.
Mother's Day is all about love. We think about the love our mothers have shared with us. We remember how she cared for us before we were born. Does anyone remember when we lived in our mother's tummy? (let them answer) No one does! Does anyone remember when our mother's fed us and changed us and kept us warm? (let them answer) Probably not when we were babies, but we know what good care she takes care of us today. Our mothers have a special love for us and we have a special love for our mothers.
Where does all of this love come from? (let them answer) Can you buy love? Can you pick it off of a tree or dig it up in the back yard? I don't think so. This love comes from God.
Jesus also talked a lot about love. He said his love came from God and he shared it with his disciples and everyone who knew him. Jesus loved people that did not love him. He loved people who tried to hurt him. He even loved the people that put him on the cross. This kind of love changes everything.
I brought with me this morning a big piece of rope. I want everyone to hold this rope so that he connects all of us together. (take out the rope and beginning at one end have each child put both hands on the rope) Let's pretend that the rope is filled with love and that as soon as we put our hands on the rope we are filled with love. We are all sharing one love. Suppose that God was holding the end of the rope so that he could send us his love. That would be wonderful wouldn't it? (let them answer) But you and I know that God isn't holding the rope and there is nothing in the rope except what we believe is there.
Let's try something else. Instead of holding a rope let's hold each other's hands. (have the children hold the hand of one friend and the hand of another friend) Do you feel something different than when you were holding the rope? Your friend's hand is warm, the friend is alive and there is love in every hand. Now let's make a circle so that every hand is touching another hand. Love is really there and we are friends. I want you to imagine that Jesus is standing in your circle and is holding everyone's hand. Do you feel his love? (let them answer) In our circle we are feeling great love and sharing it with one another.
Today we celebrate the love of our mothers and the love she receives from God. It is a love that we learn to share with others as we grow in faith and in joy with the Living God. Amen.
* * *
The Immediate Word, May 9, 2004, issue.
Copyright 2004 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to The Immediate Word service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons and in worship and classroom settings only. No additional permission is required from the publisher for such use by subscribers only. Inquiries should be addressed to permissions@csspub.com or to Permissions, CSS Publishing Company, Inc., P.O. Box 4503, Lima, Ohio 45802-4503
