Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

From the Dig, but for every Kingdom Mother…

0 Flares 0 Flares ×

Now there stood by the cross of Jesus His mother, and His mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus therefore saw His mother, and the disciple whom He loved standing by, He said to His mother, “Woman, behold your son!” Then He said to the disciple, “Behold your mother!” And from that hour that disciple took her to his own home (John 19:25-27)

“From that hour at the cross, he took her into his own home” signifies that this relationship was for as long as Mary lived. We are fairly certain John outlived her because he was the most aged of all disciples, as far as we know, at his death on Patmos. We know that he was faithful in all things, and especially in persecution, both from the epistles he wrote and especially from Revelation. The fact that he took her into his own home permanently seems to me to indicate that they both would have looked back on the statement from the cross when they first beheld each other as mother and son, as the beginning of something very wonderful, instigated—even commanded—by the little boy she raised, who was, simultaneously, the Son of God.  

Who gets to physically care for the mother of the Lord? I KNOW John felt the privilege. But, additionally,  what Mother would not look back with fondness when she knew her son had the whole world on his shoulders—all the sin and sorrow—and, yet, He looked down and connected Mary and John. Wouldn’t that be a very dear relationship forged by her son? 

Jesus  had said “I must be about my Father’s business,” and “My hour is not yet come,”  and “For this hour I have come.” Yet, in all the import of the establishment of the kingdom , He settled her with the most trusted disciple. If she was there on Pentecost, and she, almost assuredly, was, then she surely came there with John. When she became old or sick, John was the one who made sure she had the elder-care that she needed. I just think this had to be an amazing relationship. 

John was at the tomb, outrunning Peter. Don’t you know that Mary, living in the house of John, from the hour at the cross, knew he was going and was anxiously waiting to hear about the “state of the tomb.” I just think so…and I think Jesus, after the resurrection, had to see his mother. We know he saw John and he would have made sure the situation He provided was what he wanted it to be. 

These are just some thoughts relevant to a portion of our dig this month. Just thoughts. But I think there’s evidence in the very words “from that hour.” There was a lot ahead of Mary and John and they were destined to look back at this moment at the foot of the cross as they faced the days of triumph (Acts 2) together and then almost immediately the persecution of John began in Acts 3-5. 

I also have to remember another mother (Matthew 20:20) who asked Jesus if her two sons, James and John, could have the places of preeminence in the kingdom of Jesus. Salome’s  presumption was pointed out by Jesus who made her aware that she did not even know anything about what she was asking: 

You do not know what you ask. Are you able to drink the cup that I am about to drink, and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?”

In Mark 15:40, we see that Salome, ironically, did come to know the suffering Jesus spoke about in Matthew 20:21. She was looking at the cross from a far-away vantage point, while John and Mary were apparently close enough to hear his voice clearly; likely close enough for Mary to see her son’s blood as it ran down his face and poured forth from his hands and feet. Salome was also one of the first to peer into the empty tomb in Mark 16.  Her request that her sons be elevated in the kingdom had been granted. She didn’t know that, in the asking for the top spots in the Lord’s kingdom, she was asking for servant positions and the agony of persecution. But she was.  In a kingdom where service equals greatness, her son John, was to be baptized with the suffering to which Jesus alluded when she asked if her sons could sit on the right and left hands of Jesus in the kingdom. And what greater place at the right hand of the Lord than the servant’s honor of caring for the sweet mother who had given the Lord birth?  

This digging has enriched my mother’s heart! If my son is ever ridiculed or chastised for his faithful heart (…and sometimes he is, though in much more benign ways), may I rejoice in this kingdom privilege that honors him. 

0 Flares Facebook 0 Twitter 0 Google+ 0 Email -- Pin It Share 0 0 Flares ×

You Might Also Like

    0 Flares Facebook 0 Twitter 0 Google+ 0 Email -- Pin It Share 0 0 Flares ×