Mothering Sunday - unconditional love...
I want to begin on this Mothering Sunday rather cheerfully (!!!) by reading a passage called "The Meanest Mother in the World"! It was written by a young mother back in 1967. It goes like this:
I had the meanest mother in the whole world. While other children ate sweets for breakfast, I had to have cereal, eggs or toast. When others had coke and sweets for lunch, I had to eat a sandwich. As you can guess, my supper was different than the others also. But at least, I wasn't alone in my sufferings. My sister and two brothers had the same mean mother as I did.
We had to wear clean clothes and take a bath. The other children always wore their clothes for days. We reached the height of insults because she made our clothes herself, just to save money. Why, oh why, did we have to have a mother who made us feel different from our friends?
The worst is yet to come. We had to be in bed by nine each night and up at eight the next morning. We couldn't sleep till noon like our friends. So while they slept-my mother actually had the nerve to break the child-labour law.
She made us work. We had to wash dishes, make beds, learn to cook and all sorts of cruel things. I believe she used to lie awake at night thinking up mean things to do to us.
She always insisted upon us telling the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, even if it killed us - and it nearly did. By the time we were teenagers, she was even wiser, and our life became even more unbearable.
None of this tooting the horn of a car for us to come running. She embarrassed us no end by making our friends come to the door to get us. If I spent the night at a friends house, she checked to see if I was really there.
Through the years, things didn't improve a bit. We couldn’t lie in bed "sick" like our friends did, and miss school. If our friends had a toe ache or a nail hanging off, they could stay home from school.
Our marks in school had to be up to par. Our friends' report cards often had beautiful colours on them, black for passing, red for failing. My mother being as different as she was, would settle for nothing less than ugly black marks. She was a mean mother !
And now some years later, I try to model myself on her - I stand a little taller and I am filled with pride when my children call me mean. Because, you see, I thank God, He gave me the meanest mother in the whole world.’
So often it’s easy to confuse spoiling someone with loving them and we all know that there are times when loving someone means not saying ‘Yes’ to their demands.
Today, Mothering Sunday, is a day of some confusion. It is often portrayed in shops as a day of chocolates and flowers. In restaurants special menus are done which seem to be a little more expensive than on other days. It is easy to get caught up in this materialistic fervour – either to partake in it, or to rebel totally against it, but one thing that we must always remember on this day is that it is a celebration of love. We celebrate the love of mothers, and those who care as mothers. And as we think about love our minds must always turn to God, because love is from God, and God is love, so in effect any celebration of the gifts of God is a celebration of the love of God.
But for some it is also a difficult day. For those without children who would love to have them, or those who have lost children or indeed mothers, this is a painful day… And when we’re giving thanks and celebrating mothers, we must always remain mindful of them…
As we focus on the love of a good mother, not just a literal mother, but also the many other people who care for someone with the love of a mother, we recognise the quality of a self sacrificing love. Mothering Sunday helps us to focus on the fact that love is about the giving of ourselves over to the demands of another unconditionally.
In our readings today we have examples of unconditional love. In the reading from Exodus (2:1-10) we hear about Moses being hidden by his mother and then ultimately giving him up for his safety. Pharaoh’s daughter sees him and recognising it was one of the Hebrew children whose lives were being threatened she still takes care of him – she didn’t need to, perhaps some would say she wasn’t wise to, but all she saw was a child in need – her love was unconditional…
And then in Paul’s 2nd letter to the Corinthians (1:3-7), we heard of the power of God’s love – a love that would accept abundant suffering and remain unchanged….
And it was that unchanging love that we witnessed from Mary the mother of Jesus (Luke 2:33-35). Excited about the birth of her child no doubt, she had taken him to the Temple and there Simeon blessed Jesus and went into that speech about Jesus being a child that was destined for the falling and rising of many and then the really challenging part of what he said, ‘a sword will pierce your own soul’ – Simeon was warning Mary that loving Jesus was going to be painful, but that didn’t change her love for him at all…
And from these readings we’re reminded that true love is unconditional, and true love is sometimes painful because we hurt when someone we love hurts or when we are parted from them. And we’re reminded that loving means taking risks for people, loving means putting ourselves out for others…
And we are commanded by Jesus to love, he said, ‘This is my commandment, love one another as I have loved you’ (John 13:34,35) and we know that Jesus, when he said to love, meant to love indiscriminately, and his example was particularly to care for those least cared for…
On this Mothering Sunday as we’re reminded of the often incredible love of mothers and those who care for others as mothers we’re reminded of our need to love, to stretch our boundaries of love wider and wider and to be encouragers and enablers of others…
The love of God is not about having his people being simple extensions of himself and doers of his wishes; it is about granting his children their individuality, their choice and their own chosen destinies. For God, as for any loving parent, this may bring heartache and pain – it may bring suffering, but it is a two sided relationship, because as God loves, he also receives the pleasure of people loving him.
And good mothers throughout the world would easily recognise this love. In so many cases, no matter what a son or daughter may do, they remain a person who is loved, and with God this is even more true... In whatever ways we may rebel against him or turn to other things or people, he continues to love us, and his arms are always open to welcome us back.
So today with all of the gifts and cards that may be around, with all of the excitement, we must take a moment to pause and thank God for the love of mothers and for the love of all who care, and for his unconditional, unbending and unchanging love, for each one of us. And we must take a moment to pledge for ourselves to love more and more. AMEN
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