The Best Mother's Day Ever

We all know what mothers are supposed to want on Mother’s Day. A card is great, whether professionally made, with a beautiful picture on the front and a sentimental poem on the inside, or maybe home made, decorated inside and out with crayons that are handled with more love than professional skill.

Mothers like a break from cooking. Breakfast in bed is great, even if the milk is running all over the tray by the time it gets up the stairs. Restaurants will be swamped in a couple of hours with families treating mom to a dinner out.

This week the Tribune had an article that said some mothers are getting gift certificates for Botox treatments and iPods for mother’s day. But most of us get off much easier than that.

We get off real easy. Salary.com calculated what you would have to pay to hire someone to do what stay-at-home mothers typically do. They do the work of cooks, child care providers, housekeepers, van drivers, nurses, and home managers. Salary.com figured that their base salary should be $43,000 a year. But that’s base salary, for a 40 hour week. Have you ever heard of a mother of small children who worked just a 40 hour week? They figured mothers average 60 hours of overtime a week, putting a fair salary up to $130,000. And moms who have outside jobs still put in huge hours at home, on top of their outside work.

Motherhood is an important job. And even in the best of circumstances, a demanding job.

But not many mothers get to attempt mothering in the best of circumstances. And this morning I want us to take a few minutes to try to look at the world through the eyes of mothers in difficult circumstances. So much of our news comes to us through the eyes of the interests of party politics, who came out ahead in the last skirmish on capital hill, or the interests of big corporations, where power and profits are the primary focus. How much wiser we would be to see the world through the eyes of mothers. No person should be seen as a mere statistic or just a potential customer, or a social problem to get out of the way.

Mothers look at their children and want the best for each one. And that’s not far from the way that God looks at this world, each person as his child, wanting the best for each and every one.

How different this world would look if we could learn to see those around us through a mother’s eyes, or the eyes of God, one person at a time.

To help us do that, I’ll ask Ed to come and read our scripture for us, Luke 4:16-21, a key incident in the life of our Lord Jesus. Please stand for the reading of God’s word.

16 When he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, he went to the synagogue on the sabbath day, as was his custom. He stood up to read, 17 and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written: 18 "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, 19 to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor." 20 And he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant, and sat down. The eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. 21 Then he began to say to them, "Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing."

Our God, like a mother, cares deeply for those who are poor, held captive, blind or oppressed.

Let me tell you about one of my favorite members from a church I served in another town. Her mothering was never easy. Her husband was an alcoholic and he took on their son as a drinking buddy until he was an alcoholic, too. And that put their son in a horrible position. He really needed serious treatment for his drinking. But because he was an alcoholic he couldn’t hold a good job. And because he couldn’t hold a good job he didn’t have insurance to pay for the treatment he needed. He did stupid things when he was drunk. He was in and out of jail repeatedly. And he would sober up in jail, but there was no serious program to help him get to the root of his problems. So he was caught in this endless cycle. Sober up in jail. Get out and find a crummy, shady job. Start drinking. Then back to jail. And of course, this isn’t an isolated case. Most of those in our prisons are there due to substance abuse problems, trapped in the same cycle.