A Mother's Share
Stories
Object:
A Mother's Share
A schoolteacher asked a boy this question about fractions: "Suppose your mother baked an apple pie, and there were seven of you -- your parents and five children. What part of the pie would you get?"
"A sixth, ma'am," the boy answered.
"But there are seven of you," said the teacher. "Don't you know anything about fractions?"
"Yes," replied the boy, "I know all about fractions, but I know all about Mother, too. She would say she did not want any pie."
You Were Always the One
Pat Conroy, the author of The Great Santini, The Water Is Wide, and The Prince of Tides, tells the story (and uses it in his fiction) that as his mother was dying she called each of her adult children to her side and said, "Don't tell the others, but you were always the one I loved the best." They discovered this after their mother died, and they responded in various ways -- with hilarity, anger, and defensiveness ("she did TOO love me best").
Shining Moments
What Jesus Means to Me
"I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you should also love one another."
John 13:34
Anne Lamott, in her book Operating Instructions (which is a journal of her son's first year), describes a time when she, as a single mother with a colicky infant, was about at the end of her rope. She writes:
"Last night I decided that it is totally nuts to believe in Christ, that it is every bit as crazy as being a Scientologist or a Jehovah's Witness.... Then something truly amazing happened. A man from church showed up at our front door, smiling and waving to me and Sam, and I went to let him in. He is... named Gordon, fiftyish, married to our associate pastor, and after exchanging pleasantries he said, 'Margaret and I wanted to do something for you and the baby. So what I want to ask is, what if a fairy appeared on your doorstep and said that he or she would do any favor for you at all, anything you wanted around the house that you felt too exhausted to do by yourself and too ashamed to ask anyone else to help you with?" 'I can't even say,' I said. 'It's too horrible.'
"But he finally convinced me to tell him, and I said it would be to clean the bathroom, and he ended up spending an hour scrubbing the bathtub and toilet and sink.... I sat on the couch while he worked, watching TV, feeling vaguely guilty and nursing Sam to sleep. But it made me feel sure of Christ again, of that kind of love. This, a man scrubbing a new mother's bathtub, is what Jesus means to me."
Good Stories
A Happy Mother's Day
by John Sumwalt
"By this every one will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another."
John 13:35
There was once an old woman by the name of Mrs. Simpson who lived all alone in a big, green house on the end of a quiet street in a small American city. Mrs. Simpson was known to the children as the flowers and cookies lady. She loved to tend the flowers in her yard, and she always had cookies for the children when they stopped to visit on their way home from school.
One Mother's Day Mrs. Simpson found herself feeling rather lonely. Her children were all grown and lived in distant places. They sent cards and they phoned, but they lived too far away to visit. How sad, she thought, not to see one's children on Mother's Day.
And then something wonderful happened. The doorbell rang. When she opened the door, there were all the children of the neighborhood. "Happy Mother's Day," they all chimed together. "We love you, Mrs. Simpson!" And then the youngest child sang out alone, "We have a surprise for you." She took her hand from behind her back and held out a slightly wilted bouquet of dandelions. Mrs. Simpson gave her a big hug. Then she hugged each of the children in turn and insisted that they all come inside for some milk and cookies.
When the children had gone, Mrs. Simpson thought to herself: "This has been one of the nicest Mother's Days I have ever had."
Scrap Pile
The Best Mama
by John Sumwalt
There was once a little girl who loved her mama with all of her heart. At night, when her mama tucked her into bed, she would throw her arms around her, kiss her on both cheeks, and say, "You're the best mama in the whole wide world."
When Mother's Day came, the little girl decided to get her mama a nice present to show how much she loved her. She thought and thought and thought about what she could give her. One day she went with her papa to the corner store, and there in the window she saw the perfect gift. It was a tiny crystal bell which tinkled ever so softly, like the wind chimes that hung outside the kitchen window. How lovely it would look in Mama's china cabinet in the corner of the parlor. Her papa helped her buy the bell, and he told her to hide it away carefully 'til Mother's Day. The little girl wrapped the crystal bell in tissue paper and tucked it away in the back of her sock drawer. Mama would never find it there.
When Mother's Day came, the little girl opened the sock drawer, took out the bell, unwrapped it carefully from the tissue paper, and was about to ring it one last time before giving it to her mama when it slipped out of her fingers, crashed to the floor, and shattered into a hundred pieces. The little girl was heartbroken. Now what would she give her mama to show how much she loved her? She began to cry, and she ran to her mama saying, "I had a nice present to give you for Mother's Day, but it broke and now I don't have anything to give you."
"There, there," Mama said as she wiped her daughter's tears. "You have already given me the best present possible. What I want more than anything else is to know that you love me."
Upon hearing this, the little girl stopped crying and began to smile. Then she gave her mama a big hug, kissed her on both cheeks, and you know what she said -- "You're the best mama in the whole wide world."
That little girl is grown up now, and she has a daughter, and a granddaughter, and a little great-granddaughter of her own. She is almost 100 years old, and she lives in a nursing home. Every Mother's Day her daughter and her granddaughter and her little great-granddaughter come to the nursing home -- and they put their arms around her and kiss her on both cheeks, and you know what they say...
Say I Love You
James Moore, in his book The Cross Walk, tells about a woman in her mid-eighties who was dying in a local hospital. Her son flew across the country to be with her. Moore says, "I happened to be present when he arrived and entered the room. He walked over to the bedside of his aged, dying mother, leaned over, and kissed her on the cheek. Then, touched by the sight of her so weak and vulnerable, he said, 'Mom, you have been such a good mother to me. And I want you to know I love you.'
"Through tears she said to him, 'Son, last Friday was your 63rd birthday, and that's the first time you've ever said that to me.' It had taken him 63 years to say 'I love you' to his mother."
Is there a word of love you need to say to someone today?
-- from a one-minute radio spot prepared for Wauwatosa Avenue United Methodist Church in Milwaukee.
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StoryShare, May 9, 2004, issue.
Copyright 2004 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to the StoryShare service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons, in worship and classroom settings, in brief devotions, in radio spots, and as newsletter fillers. 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.
