Scripture
55And many women who had come from Galilee with Jesus to care for him were watching from a distance. 56Among them were Mary Magdalene, Mary (the mother of James and Joseph), and the mother of James and John, the sons of Zebedee. Matthew 27:55-56
Observation
Apart from John, it was mainly the mothers who stayed until the end with Jesus. Mary knelt there, tears streaming down her cheeks as she watched her lamb become the sacrifice for the sins of the world. The other Mary’s watched the disciples, their sons, run and scatter. They grieved with a broken heart only a parent knows when you see your child make a decision to turn their backs on Jesus. They would not abandon Jesus no matter how devastating and dangerous it was to stay there. The faith of these mother’s would not stop praying for their sons as evidenced by the fact that each one of these disciples would return to the Risen Jesus in three days and go on to change the world. “The dawn of the great new movements of God repeatedly occurs in women’s spaces,” Alastair Roberts writes. We see this repeatedly in scripture. “Over and again, redemptive history turns on a flawed but faithful mother bearing a son: Sarah and Isaac, Rebekah and Jacob, Rachel and Joseph, Hannah and Samuel, Ruth and Obed, Elizabeth and John, Eunice and Timothy — and, of course, Mary and Jesus. All these Biblical accounts illustrate the power of a praying mother and her enduring faith.”
Application
How many of us are here today because we had Mom’s who refused to give up on us? It’s actually a great question to ask when you’re in a group. You will find grown men begin to tear up as they recall the enduring faith of their Mother’s who kept praying even when they had turned their backs on God. As we approach Mother’s Day it’s important to celebrate the kind of faith unique to Mom’s. In a world that is trying to make men more like women and women more like men, Mother’s Day offers us the opportunity to celebrate the God-given gifts of a Mom. In fact, when you look at Proverbs 31 you see this amazing description of a mother’s faith serving God, her family and others. We live in a world where every Hollywood movie and show is replacing the male heroes with female ones, but notice the heroic description of a Mother in Proverbs 31. This woman is heroic NOT because she is acting like a man but precisely because she IS a woman. Peter Leithart observes the Proverbs 31 woman: “…the woman’s work is domestic, economic, craft-work, and yet the poem celebrates it in heroic terms. A heroic poem for someone engaged in domestic labor is remarkable in the ancient world, and shows something of how God regards the work of women. The great battle of the world is between the seed of the serpent and the seed of the woman—not the seed of the man! In their care for their households, wise women are on the front lines of God’s holy war.” Rather than a women being ashamed of having children or seeing them as an inconvenience, a woman of God recognizes the unique gift God has given them that a man will never know. A woman is literally a key part of the creation process and the redemption plan of Jesus to raise children who will kick the devil in the teeth. Mom’s are heroes not in denying their womanhood, but in embracing it!
Prayer
Lord, my words just aren’t enough to express my appreciation for my Mom. My Mom is my hero! Through all of my rebellions, bad attitudes, arrogant arguments, Mom never stopped calling me back to Jesus. Through all of her health and painful struggles she continued to ask me how she could pray for me. When I was lonely and just wanted to find a wife, she kept telling me to find my identity and security in Jesus and that God would bring the right one in the right time. When she met Cyndi when we were just friends she knew she was the one God had for me because she’d been praying for her before I was born. Speaking of Mom's, Cyndi is absolutely my hero too. This amazing women You’ve given me continues to find her strength in Jesus and has helped me raise five boys who are in love with Jesus and are secure in who they are as men in a very confused world. When our boys have strayed from God, she stayed on her knees contending for their calls on their lives. My boys and I wouldn’t be where we are today if not for the power of our praying mothers.
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