Mary, Mercy & Me

By Jane Langham

The Lifelong Heart of a Mother

I’d like to start off today with a question: what sort of relationship do you have with your mother? Or if you have grown-up children, what is your relationship with them like? Mothers never stop being mothers, do they, whatever the age of their children. There’s always that special interest and concern for them.

A Foundation of Total Trust

I wonder how Mary felt when Jesus left home? She had always known that he was going to do or be something out of the ordinary, because of the words of the angel all those years before. Mary had submitted to God’s will in total trust “Let what you have said happen to me”.

But it all happened so fast after Jesus moved out – he had made sure that she was provided for and that the relations would be there to give her all the help and support she needed. But it wasn’t the same, she hardly ever got to see him any more, with him travelling all over the place. It was like he’d said in the temple years before, that he must be about his father’s business. She knew that, and had even encouraged him to get started on his mission when they were at that wedding at Cana.

*“Let what you have said happen to me”.*

The Sharpness of the Sword of Sorrow

But then in no time at all, it seemed, Mary heard in the early hours of that morning that Jesus had been arrested was to be sent to Pilate. She felt sick to the very core. She didn’t know what to do or where to go, but she set out anyway and soon found the crowds. There he was – her son – whipped and bleeding and carrying a cross. She walked with him the rest of the way to Calvary and watched, helpless, as they nailed her only son to the cross.

Without understanding how or why, she knew this was somehow part of the plan of what must happen – Jesus had told them several times he must suffer and die – but like this? Was this the ‘sword of sorrow’ that Simeon had warned her to expect? It felt sharp enough for a thousand swords.

“Mother, Behold Your Son”

But listen! Jesus is trying to say something, he forgives his executioners, he comforts those dying with him, and then he looks at Mary. “No son, there’s no need to say any more, I can see how much it takes out of you to speak.” But Jesus still looks at her. “Mother, this is your son; son this is your mother.” His work was not yet done, he still cared for his friends, for those others on the cross, for everyone, even his killers. And now he was giving these people to her, his mother, for her to care for them and to love them just as she had loved him. She felt the arm of John around her shoulders and the rest of that day was just a blur.

Later, much later, she started to understand what it all meant. Mary now knew that Jesus was alive and still with them, though in a very different way. She stayed with John, who was a real comfort to her, and spent time with all the followers of The Way. Jesus’ words that “here were his brothers and sisters” now made more sense to her, because she felt like a mother to them. Jesus had told her she was to be mother to John, and all these others, the ever-growing numbers, they were just as much family as he was.

*“Mother, this is your son; son this is your mother.”*

Keeping the Price of Mercy Alive

Many of these new ones had not seen the suffering her son had endured, the price he had paid to show how much he loved them. Had not seen the mercy of God in action as Jesus forgave, comforted, and ministered to others from the cross. But she knew what it had cost and she know the love and mercy that were there for each and every one of these followers of Jeus, both then and now. Her great concern was that the pain endured by her son should not be in vain, that everyone should know of the mercy there available for them. So she would take it to them, the struggling follower, in despair at having failed the master, the lost and lonely who had never heard of God’s love, in fact everyone to whom she could in any way be a mother.

Our Call to Follow the Mother of Mercy

And isn’t that what we are called to be also? Jesus has given Mary to us to be our model, and guide and helper. We look to her, not just as one we should praise and honour for her actions of 2000 years ago, but to ask her help to become like her. Because like her, we are called to take the love and mercy of Jesus to everyone around us. It is most especially in our role as mothers that we need these qualities of compassion and mercy. If our children are in need, we immediately come to their aid; we put our efforts into trying to bring them closer to Jesus, and to each other. And sometimes it is only one’s mother that a person can turn to when everything in one’s life has gone wrong. These qualities that we need so much as mothers, can also be directed to others with whom we come in contact.

The help and support we are called upon to give may not be what we would choose; we would prefer a loved one to be healed, rather than nurse them through a terminal sickness; we would prefer someone’s attitude to change, rather than have to love them through their learning and growing phases or their disagreements with us. Mary can be a model for us in this too. She can show me how to accept quietly and without fuss, God’s plan for the best working of my life and that of the world, whether I understand it or not, and whether I like it or not. She can show me how to unobtrusively work in the place that God has put me, to be a dispenser of God’s love and mercy. And she will be a comforter to me when I am struggling, she will accompany me to Jesus, to receive his merciful and healing touch.

Mary, Mother of Mercy, help us to be like you.