God's Last Words

FAMILY IS NOT OUT OF STYLE

JOHN 15: 9-17

Three sons, who were very successful, discussed the gifts they gave their elderly mother on Mother's day.The first said, "I built a big house for our mother."

The second said," I sent her a Mercedes."

The third said, "I've got you, both beat. You know how Mom enjoys the Bible, and you know she can't see very well. I sent her a parrot that can recite the entire Bible. It took 20 monks in a monastery 12 years to teach him. I had to pledge to contribute $100,000.00 a year for 10 years, but it was worth it. Mom just has to name the chapter and verse, and the parrot will recite it."

Soon thereafter, Mom mailed her first letters of thanks:She wrote the first son, "Michael, the house you built is too large. I live in only one room, but I have to clean the whole house."

She wrote the second son, "Marvin, I'm nearly blind so I can't drive. I stay home all the time, so I never use the Mercedes."

"Dearest Melvin," she wrote to her third son, "You were the only son to have the good sense to know what your mother likes. That chicken was delicious!"

This is the third in a loosely connected theme of humanity’s story from pathetic looser to triumphant saint; from useless to right hand discipleship. We go from domesticated sheep to friends of God.

It is a remarkable journey that takes us from the Garden of Eden, to languish in sin and temptation, to the sanctification of Christ’s atoning death and resurrection where God truly delivers on the promise made to His creation.

Mother’s day has a special role in that journey for it is in that promise to Eve that her seed would triumph over the evil temptation and snares of Satan that God shows us His plan for us.

His loving development of family; the ordination of marriage as one man and one woman, and the responsibilities and obligations inherent in this natural order of parenting and love is the first step on the journey to redemption. 

Of course none of us can forget that the family institution of relatives work so effectively in creating community of support and love for children. Grandmothers in particular are well known to be almost intolerable for strangers:

For two solid hours, the lady sitting next to a man on an airplane had told him about her grandchildren. She had even produced a plastic-foldout photo album of all nine of the children.

She finally realized that she had dominated the entire conversation on her grandchildren. "Oh, I've done all the talking, and I'm so sorry. I know you certainly have something to say. Please, tell me... what do you think of my grandchildren?" 

I can’t help but think God considers His creation in a similar fashion particularly if you remember the Book of Job. Hear what Jesus says about us (John 15: 9-17):

As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. 

I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete. “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. 

You are my friends if you do what I command you. I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father. 

You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another.

We move from sheep to friends, from friends to disciples. We become the target of God’s love and the reason for Jesus’sacrifice.

This passage tells us that Jesus’ death made the disciples a society of friends forever bound in Him, just as we are when we profess faith in Him as Messiah.

This becomes the Apostle John’s idea of church that has no institutional, formal, organizational, denominational boundaries.  The disciples become friends of Jesus first and then become friends of other disciples just as we become members of our families first and members of the communities around us as we are taught how to live in love, abiding in Christ and with each other, bearing fruit.

The truth of the outcome of Easter – the death and resurrection of Jesus creates and characterizes Christian Community.

God’s plan holds motherhood and the family an essential part of how we learn to reclaim our lives.

The traditional Family, with a father and mother of the opposite sex, will never go out of style, be outdated, be politically incorrect, intolerant, or abandoned no matter how much the deceptions of Satan try to destroy it.

I heard just this week about studies that have found that growing up in a traditional family, doing things such families do, even as simple as bedtime story telling give children tremendous advantages over kids who don’t have such backgrounds.

Social scientists are dismayed at these findings because it means that children without such experiences are being discriminated against by children who do because of the potential for a successful accumulation of wealth and stuff the disadvantaged kids miss.

Sadly, these studies are dangerous because solutions rarely mean improvement, but rather the removal of positive things to reach the lowest common denominator as a leveling playing field.  (Some advocate the government should take over child raising so that no child will ever receive any advantage!) Never, you say?

You may not realize how important the upcoming Supreme Court ruling on same sex marriage and civil rights will be to churches and pastors. If the court rules in favor it is possible that every pastor will have to perform same sex marriage or go to jail. It will change our laws from “freedom of religion to freedom of worship.”

When a country expects its lawyers to control and even set standards of morality the devil is in charge.

It follows our current trend to control and manipulate freedom of speech in ways that restrict so-called discriminatory and hateful actions that violate other’s civil rights.

Friends, we don’t have much time left to reclaim our heritage or speak truth.

But the greatest irony of our times is that the most vocal supporters of traditional family who are speaking out is an organization (International Children’s Rights Institute) of children who grew up in alternative family lifestyles.

The ICRI provided several dozen briefs and pleas to the Supreme Court regarding its upcoming ruling on same-sex marriage. They claim it is harmful and dangerous to children and they have lived it. Their testimony needs to be heard by all.

  

While we still can, let us celebrate family, motherhood, and remember FDR’s inaugural speech from 1941 when he called for the country to live up to what he said where the four freedoms:

Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Worship, Freedom from want, Freedom from fear.

Not bad things for a mother to want for her children. Let me close with an unknown author’s version of 1 Corinthians 13 from a mother’s perspective:

If I live in a house of spotless beauty with everything in its place, but have not love, I am a housekeeper–not a homemaker. 

If I have time for waxing, polishing, and decorative achievements, but have not love, my children learn cleanliness – not godliness. 

Love leaves the dust in search of a child’s laugh.

Love smiles at the tiny fingerprints on a newly cleaned window. 

Love wipes away the tears before it wipes up the spilled milk.

Love picks up the child before it picks up the toys. 

Love is present through the trials.

Love reprimands, reproves, and is responsive.

Love crawls with the baby, walks with the toddler, runs with the child, then stands aside to let the youth walk into adulthood. 

Love is the key that opens salvation’s message to a child’s heart. 

Before I became a mother I took glory in my house of perfection. Now I glory in God’s perfection of my child.

As a mother, there is much I must teach my child, but the greatest of all is love.

This is what I think God wants from al mothers. Amen.