The Rev. Dr. Austin Leininger
Sermon of the 7th Sunday of Easter
Mother’s Day
13 May 2018
Readings:
Acts 1:15-17, 21-26
1 John 5:9-13
John 17:6-19
Psalm 1
Had Mother’s Day come a couple weeks sooner, I’d have gotten to preach with my mom here in the congregation… but perhaps it’s also easier to share some stories about her without her here to catch my eye and make me cry.
I know not everyone has great memories of their own biological mothers, but I hope there are memories for all of us of someone who cared for us as a mother, and who, on this day, we can honor with gratitude in our hearts.
I’ve been blessed with a biological mother who raised me and who has been one of my biggest cheerleaders throughout my life. My earliest memories include her watching over me, taking care of me, praying for me, and placing herself between me and harm’s way.
But one of my favorite memories of her is from when I was four years old.
I had woken early on a Saturday morning, likely when the first filtered light of dawn came into my room—much like my own children now do to me—and decided I was going to make the family breakfast. So, still in my pajamas, I crept quietly down the dark stairs to the kitchen, climbed under the squeaky half-height louvered swinging kitchen doors—a happily forgotten artifact of early 1970s home décor that rather resembled saloon doors from the old west—and got to work. Since, as I had observed, everything that is baked requires flour, eggs, and milk, I started with those ingredients. I remember feeling very grown up when I dropped an egg on the floor and took great care to clean it up. I still remember how hard it was to get the paper towel to remove all of the sticky viscous egg white off of the waxed linoleum, but I persevered and eventually made it back to my task. Having added the requisite ingredients for every baked delicacy, again, as I had observed, one could next add whatever else they wanted. So I added in some Pepsi and 7-Up. I used the spiral spring-shaped egg beater, which still serves as my Mom’s favorite whisk, to carefully combine my ingredients, making sure there were no lumps, of course—because that’d be gross.
It was about that time that my mom came downstairs and found me in the kitchen.
The reason this is one of my favorite memories of her is because instead of scolding me for being up too early, or chastising me for wasting food, she saw past her worry and concern in that moment to see, instead, my heart and my intention. She helped me put my “batter” into a pan and baked it. And while I’m sure she made something edible to “go with it,” what I remember is that she helped me serve some of it to everyone to try. Of course, we did also have a conversation later about cooking together instead of on my own, but her care and foresight in that early morning moment still inspires me as a parent—that I too might encourage and nourish my children’s hearts and intentions instead of choosing the wrong moment to scold.
Today we encounter the mothering Christ, as Jesus prays for his disciples’ care and protection—the last act he’ll take and the last words he’ll speak before being taken into custody in the Garden of Gethsemane.
This was the closing prayer of the last supper. Jesus had begun the evening by washing his disciples feet, had exhorted them to love one another as he loved them, had eaten with them, had promised to send them the Holy Spirit as their advocate, intercessor, and aide and that he would not leave them orphaned. Leaving from the table and walking into the night toward the garden, he taught them about the true vine, which story we heard a couple weeks ago, he warns them of the world’s hatred and reminds them again of the advocate that he will send in the Holy Spirit. He tells them of the coming sorrow that will turn into joy, and then prays, in today’s part of the story, passionately, desperately and wholeheartedly for them before arriving at the Garden of Gethsemane where John’s Gospel records no further conversation until Judas’ and the authorities’ arrival.
We frequently talk about Jesus’ compassion and love for others, but perhaps more than anywhere else in the gospels we get a glimpse in today’s gospel of the deep, abiding love and compassion that Jesus has for his closest friends as he reassures them as much as himself in their closing hours together.
So often in the gospels we see Jesus as teacher, as guide, and as the one who corrects the disciples when their perceptions of God and their ministry with Christ are inaccurate. But what we hear in this long prayer at the close of Jesus’ and the disciple’s last supper together is the concern Jesus has for his friends as he is about to leave them on their own to continue the work he started with them. Much like a parent preparing his or her children for a prolonged absence, Jesus frets over whether or not they are truly ready to carry on without him, over what he may not have told them, and trying to make everything clear and make everything right before leaving them. And he prays for their protection, for their joy, for their safety, and their unity.
We are invited to be present for a very touching and intimate moment with Christ this morning as he prays for them in what he knows will be his final words with his disciples before his separation from them in death. Even after his resurrection, their relationship will necessarily have changed as their perception of him will never again be the same, and he wants desperately for them to know how deeply he cares for them before being parted.
Appropriately for the day, we are invited today, with the disciples, to take the peace and joy of the Mothering Christ into our hearts, to know him as eternal and loving comforter, life giver, and as the one who frets so over our wellbeing that he would spend his final hours in this world thinking only of us.
It is not by accident that the relationship between Jesus and his disciples should be similar to that between us and those who have served as Mothers and Fathers to us. The incarnation of God in Christ Jesus was God’s opportunity to walk amongst us as one of us. To be the enfleshed presence in our lives that we need to truly come to know God and to truly come to know who we are in this world in relationship with God. And just as our childhood understanding of our most influential role models continues to inspire us as new layers of experience add new layers of wisdom and understanding to their early teachings to us, so too our relationship with God through the Holy Spirit continues to deepen and unfold as we continue to develop in our spiritual maturity. This is the great gift that Christ spoke of in the Advocate, in the Holy Spirit, in the placing within us of his everlasting peace that continues to ripen in us as a planted seed coming to flower and fruition. Yet not, as he says, as is true to our experience of the world where time eventually spoils the fruit, but as is true of God – an ever ripening, ever deepening, ever unfolding fruit that’s eternal nature we will never exhaust and never fully explore in this lifetime.
Yesterday we celebrated Mother’s Day at our house, since today Jane wouldn’t get to sleep in or enjoy the morning rituals attached to Mother’s Day. So yesterday morning, Luke woke up at 5:40, too excited to go back to sleep. He excused himself from our bed, where he had come to spend the second half of his night, to “use the bathroom,” and, returning a few minutes later, he announced that he had roused his siblings and that they were going downstairs to make breakfast for Jane. And so, on another dimly lit Saturday morning, in the filtered light of the dawn, it was my turn to choose between scolding out of my own worry and tiredness or to encourage the amazing heart and enthusiasm of my youngest son. I got up with him. The twist yesterday was when we found that his siblings had gone back to sleep. I thanked him for being so excited to do something nice for mama, and he graciously accepted his sister’s offer to get up at 7. Even then, it was his enthusiasm that won out when Marie didn’t want to get up at 7 either. The four of us came downstairs and I helped them make her a breakfast shake and hot chocolate. Then we let her go back to sleep while I made pancakes, hollandaise sauce, poached eggs, and asparagus—which as we know, means eggs, milk, flour, and whatever else I wanted.
My prayer for my children is the same prayer my mother continues to say for me. It is an echo of Christ’s own prayer for his beloved disciples. It is for peace, joy, safety, protection, and for this world to not take from them the enthusiasm and love that motivate their dreams.
May this Mother’s Day be a day to remember and give thanks for those who have prayed for us, those to have cared for us, and those in whose example we follow as we carry on our Mothering Christ’s example in the world.
Amen.
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