"Woman, here is your son,” “Here is your mother"
Text: John 19:26-27
Near the cross of Jesus stood his mother, his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Cleopas, and Mary Magdalene.
When Jesus saw his mother there, and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to her, “Woman, here is your son,” and to the disciple, “Here is your mother.” From that time on, this disciple took her into his home.
Illustration:
In 1994 a miss universe beauty pageant was held in the Philippines.
In the pageant, you know, they will choose the top fifteen candidates and then down to ten and then down to five. The remaining five then will answer a question from the judges they've drawn from a receptacle. Then after that, they will answer a one final question.
In this year pageant, the one final question was asked to the five contestants and this is the question.
WHAT IS THE ESSENCE OF BEING A WOMAN? All five candidates answered the question, this is the answer of Miss India.
'Being a woman by itself the very fact that you’re a woman is a gift of God, which all of us must appreciate, the origin of a child is a mother and is a woman, and a woman is the one who shared love and showed the man what love, caring, sharing is all about'.
Wherever we are in this world there is always this problem about abortion. Even in the medical ( arena ) field if there is a complication of giving birth, to choose between life and death of a mother and child is also a choice, depends on what the difficulty is. Other nations legalized abortion but to some nation in which abortion is not legal it is a battle how to save the life of a baby who has not experience how air feels like.
But this battle is not only a struggle for one person or one leader it is a responsibility to each individual particularly to women.
At one point, when a woman got pregnant and her reason is that the pregnancy was not planned, was not meant to be, was a mistake, what goes through the mind of the woman? Abortion, because it is unwanted child. Sometimes her partner will give consent for abortion too.
When Isaiah prophesied of a virgin birth of the messiah, does Mary knows herself that she is the one Isaiah signify to be the virgin to give birth of the messiah? No. There are many potential virgin women at the time of Mary.
Until the time comes that angel Gabriel appeared to her and told her that she will conceive and give birth to a son, through the holy spirit. Even though, Mary does not know that she was the virgin to give birth of the Messiah, does not mean she does not know the prophecy, yes, she does knows the prophecy.
When angel Gabriel told her she will conceive and give birth to a son, she accepted it without any hesitation or questions.
That is why you always hear this prayer from the Catholic, 'Hail Mary full of grace the lord is with you, BLESSED ARE YOU AMONG WOMEN, even Mary said in Luke 1: 48 behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed.
When Joseph knew that Mary is pregnant he wanted to end his relationship with her. But the angel said unto him in a dream, ‘take Mary home as your wife, for she will give birth to a son and you will call him Jesus because he will save his people from their sin'. So Joseph did what the angel told him to do.
Jesus was the firstborn son of Mary and Joseph, not only with Mary and Joseph but of all men as he was present and the creator of creation.
When Jesus was born he carried with him the two characters of being a being, the son of God and the son of man.
Being a firstborn, as Jesus was the eldest in the family is much responsibility. Sometimes in life some role of the parents is handed-down to the firstborn.
After Jesus was born, according to Matthew13:55 and Mark 3:31-32 Joseph and Mary were having other children.
We can understand that in the middle of Jesus ministry Joseph his father died. I want to give you a sight on which situation Joseph died – in (look for verse) when Jesus mother and sisters and brothers were looking for him one of the disciple said your mother brother sister are outside and wanted to see you, and Jesus said my brother and sister and mother are those who do the will of God. And Jesus as the firstborn, cannot attend of his mother because he is here on earth to do his heavenly father’s business.
When Jesus begun his ministry he chose 12 disciples. Two of the 12 disciples were James and John sons of Zebedee.
Who are the Zebedee’s family? They are fishermen in business, and they fairly wealthy family. So they can hire laborers and helpers to help the family's business.
When Jesus was crucified and nearing his death he saw his mother near the cross along with the other women Clopas and Mary Magdalene, when Jesus saw his mother one of the seven's farewell words of Jesus is for his mother and to one of the disciple was we can read in John 19:25-27 “Woman, here is your son,” and to the disciple “Here is your mother.”
Jesus did not mentioned John’s name as his beloved disciple or nowhere in the bible that mentioned John's name as the beloved disciple or as the one in which he could left his mother, the text only said ' and to this disciple', but we believe it was John.
Why John? Who is John? Why Jesus chose him to takes care of his mother? What about the other children of Mary? Are they not capable of taking care of their own mother?
Why John? There are four reasons why we believe it's John:
1. Joseph, Mary's husband was a carpenter in Nazareth. Nazareth was a small town and far away from a big city, far away from masses. A carpenter business then will not survive if you are in a small town with few people lives in the land. How can it help for the family' s livelihood?
And as Jesus can see, John has the capacity to take care of his mother. Why? What about the other disciples? Are they not able to take care of Mary?
I have two reasons why not the other disciples:
A. We know that Peter's family, Zebedee's family are avid followers of Jesus. There are some families who are financially able but do not believe in Jesus. So do you think they will feed Mary? They may say ' where are his brothers and sisters, aren't they quiet a few? Or they may say ' aren't he a savior, a miracle maker, then why not he will takes care of her? What kind of Messiah is he if he just left his family to just anybody?
B. Look around us and how people are living now, there are some people who are rich, some people are poor. Now, try to place a person in a house who doesn't have much to show for, see if that person will not say ' extra person to feed'.( do you have more food to spare for this person the rest of his life?) Do you have more food to feed? You know, they may not approach Mary that way because Jesus was good to people. And he does miracles to help people. But we may let some of the unbelieving family of the other disciples alone.
Yes, God will provide, but you have to exert yourself to earn for the family also.
Jesus cannot just send Mary back to Nazareth and wait for his blessings, like why not send a raven to feed her, or send quails, what about one of his sister to take care of her, or send an angel to guard her at night, and yes, we ask God to protect us all the time, but there are also a situation in which when you know there is a bomb or a violent person with machete's or armed individual exchanging bullets, perhaps, you run, or call an authority to stop the chaos, because it's not like you don't have to do anything for yourself, you also need to be watchful.
So, Mary, she is a woman, his mother, she needs to be protected, needs to be well cared for. She is not only a woman but a blessed woman because of him, Jesus.
2. If you have a friend or beloved one , or else maybe you are fond with someone because you may have the same thing in common like in interest, in nature. Not only that, John likes to lean on Jesus breast (chest ) just like two lovers that if possible no one can separate you, your satisfied, feel secured being around him, that
no matter what, he is always there for you that you cannot have anybody else but him or her.
In which, that is what God wants us to do, that you don't have any other gods you love but him only.
3. John was also a man of action and ambitious one. If John could do more and give more for his dying Master than just being a disciple that is to agree to take good care of Jesus mother.
4. When Jesus was still here on earth, he had seen and understand how people specially mothers to express out what is beneficial and advantageous for her children. For this reason, the mother of James and John was desiring greatness for her children. We read in Matthew 20:20 that their mother asked Jesus a favor, and when Jesus ask what does she wants, she said, 'Grant that these my two sons may sit, the one on thy right hand, and the other on the left, in thy kingdom. And that desire, was granted in Matthew 19:28-29.
You know, parents specially mothers wants to see that their children achieve greater things in life,( so James and John's mother did just that even if it means remoteness from other disciples that makes the other disciples angry to both of them.)
Mary was not asking for greatness, but, she found favor to carry out the task of giving birth of Jesus - the Messiah. As to wife of Zebedee, Jesus saw how mothers will challenge, if possible, so that their children is prominent than the others.
To end this message.
There are families in this world who are broken family, some are bond together, if you look at this two families, what can you say? you might say, I wonder what their mother is like?
If they are bond together, you might say, perhaps, their mother is a good mother.
If broken family, you might say, perhaps, their mother is lack of burden as to how to be liable as a mother. Because if it is the father who committed an unpleasant act, usually, some people ask, what happen to the mother? ( Or the other way round ) If not the mother, perhaps, the father is just an irresponsible man.
You always look at the mother on how she brought up her children. And you know, whatever will happen, the only thing that a mother can do is to give her best, loving care to her family.
In spite of this, this is what the Proverbs 31:30 said about a woman, ' Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting; but a woman who fears the LORD is to be praised.
End
