Title:  Mary's Song

   Is this the Boy I raised?
   Is this the Son I knew?
   Is this the One I've loved?
   Why can't they love Him, too?

   What has my Son ever done to you?
   Has He caused you some pain?
   As I recall, all He's shown is love.
   Why can't you show Him the same?

   This is the Boy I raised?
   Is this the Son I knew?
   Is this the One I've loved?
   Why can't they love Him, too?

   Oh, what can I do, my Son?
   Why can't they see what I know?
   Is this the way it must be,
   Is this the way You must go?

   I'd gladly die in Your place
   If I could, save You some pain.
   But I can see in Your face
   My death would not be the same.

   You are the Boy I raised.
   You are the Son I knew.
   You are the One I've loved.
   Why can't they love You, too?

   -- Dallas Holm

See:  Isa 53:3; Mark 6:3

Title:  A Letter from Mom

   This letter was written by a woman who had aborted her child. She just assumes that he was a boy:

   My Dear Sam,
   I am so grieved that I sent you away before you took your first breath, before I could hold you in my arms and smell your sweet baby scent. I am so sorry I didn't give you a chance to play baseball or go swimming or catch frogs and lightening bugs. I am sorry you had to pay for my sin with your life. The cost was too high for you. Praise God that He gave His own son for my sin. The dear Lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world.
   Sam, I can see you standing with Jesus. I know that you are not hurting anymore and that you are not alone. That gives me such peace and comfort. I can see you with your brown curly hair and big brown eyes, dangling your toes in the Crystal River and sitting underneath the Tree of Life. How I long to see what you see. I know that Granny G. is there and that you know how special she was to me. Your sisters and I are coming soon. We pray that Jesus will come quickly. I am happy that you know no anger and hatred, only peace and love. We will be together soon.
   I love you, Mommy

   -- Letter written by the mother.

See:  Psa 139:13-16

Title:  Mother's Cooking

   How did your mother cook?
   Actor Alan Thicke, who stars in ABC's Growing Pains says this of his mother's culinary skills:
   "She would burn, she would cremate, she would nuke," Thicke recalls of the cooking of his mother, Joan. "If you are what you eat, I'd be black. Her idea of a balanced meal was one where you had a 50-50 chance of survival." Modern technology has not improved her culinary technique, he says. "She has a microwave now. She can burn faster."
   Maybe we all should play it safe and take our mothers out for dinner this Mother's Day!

   -- People Magazine, April 3, 1989.

See:  Prov 31:15,28

Title:  Wrong Number

   I read about a woman who telephoned a friend and asked how she was feeling, "Terrible," came the reply over the wire, "my head's splitting and my back and legs are killing me. The house is a mess, and the kids are simply driving me crazy." Very sympathetically the caller said, "Listen, go and lie down, I'll come over right away and cook lunch for you, clean up the house, and take care of the children while you get some rest. By the way, how is Sam?"
   "Sam?" the complaining housewife gasped. "I have no husband named Sam."
   "My heavens," exclaimed the first woman, "I must have dialed the wrong number."
   There was a long pause. "Are you still coming over?" the harried mother asked hopefully.

   -- Bobby Moore, Any Old Port in a Storm (First Baptist Informer, First Baptist Church, Mineral Wells, TX, May 13, 1981), p. 1.

See:  Isa 40:28-31

Title:  History of Mother's Day

   Did you know that the idea for Mother's Day was born in a small Methodist church in Grafton, West Virginia?
   It was 1876 and the nation still mourned the Civil War dead. While teaching a Memorial Day lesson, Mrs. Anna Reeves Jarvis thought of mothers who had lost their sons. She prayed that one day there could be a "Memorial Day" for mothers. The prayer made a deep impression on one of Mrs. Jarvis's eleven children. Young Anna had seen her mother's efforts to hold the war-split community and church together. As she grew into adulthood, the younger woman kept Mrs. Jarvis's dream in her heart. On the day of her mother's death, Anna was determined to establish Mother's Day in her honor.
   On May 12, 1907, a local observance was held which later spread to Philadelphia. By 1910, Mother's Day was celebrated in forty-five states, Puerto Rico, Hawaii, Canada, and Mexico. Elated, Miss Jarvis told a friend, "Where it will end must be left for the future to tell. That it will circle the globe now seems certain."
   On May 8, 1914, President Wilson designated the second Sunday in May as Mother's Day "for displaying the American flag and for the public expression of love and reverence for the mothers of the country."

See:  Ex 20:12; Prov 31:10,27-31; Eph 6:1-3

Title:  A mixed up Mother

   A little boy asked his mother, "Mommy, what is a lie?" His mother answered by saying, "Son, a lie is an abomination unto the Lord ... but a very present help in time of need!"
   Sad to say too often we teach a similar pattern to our children. Let's be careful to model clearly what we teach with our lips.

See:  Col 3:9

Title:  Father's Day Phone Calls

Father’s Day Phone Calls

 The Illinois Bell Telephone Co. reports that the volume of long-distance calls made on Father’s Day is growing faster than the number on Mother’s Day. The company apologized for the delay in compiling the statistics, but explained that extra billing of calls to fathers slowed things down. Most of them were “collect.”

Title:  Origin of Mother's Day

 The “Mother’s Day” concept has a long history of religious connections which in modern times seem to have been predominantly Christian.

 In ancient Greece, the idea of paying tribute to motherhood was given expression with a regular festival tantamount to mother-worship. Formal ceremonies to Cybele, or Rhea, the “Great Mother of the Gods,” were performed on the Ides of March throughout Asia Minor.

 For Christianity, the concept seems to date back to establishment of England’s “Mothering Sunday,” a custom of the people which provided that one attend the mother church in which he was baptized on Mid-Lent Sunday. Gifts were to be offered at the altar to the church and to worshippers’ mothers. The concept was divorced of any “mother worship,” but nevertheless perpetuated its religious association.

 U. S. observance of Mother’s Day, too, has been characterized by church ties from the start. The first general observance of the occasion was in the churches of Philadelphia after Miss Anne Jarvis campaigned for a holiday for mothers more than 50 years ago.

—Christianity Today

Title:  Mother's Pain

 Leland Wang, the Chinese evangelist, told of an incident of his childhood which vividly illustrates the substitutionary work of Christ. On one occasion he had been very naughty and his mother, with a stick in her hand, called him to her to be punished. But he ran off, taunting his mother because she could not catch him. She had little chance of catching her small, lively son.

 So she stood still and said, “I feel ashamed of myself that I have brought up a boy who is not willing to be disciplined by his mother when he does wrong, so I must punish myself,” and she began to whip her bare arm. This so touched Leland’s heart that he ran back to his mother, threw himself into her arms, and pleaded with her not to hurt herself but to punish him. But no further punishment was necessary.

 Mr. Wang says that, as he grew older, the memory of this incident helped him to understand the great love of the Lord Jesus Christ who willingly took our place on the cross.

—Sunday School Times

Title:  "Are You Hurt, My Son?"

 A daring story has been told of a young Frenchman who loved a courtesan. This woman hated her lover’s mother, and when, in his passion, he offered her any gift in return for her love, she answered: “Bring me then your mother’s bleeding heart.”

 And he, in his madness, killed his mother and, plucking out her heart, hurried by night through the streets, carrying it to the cruel woman to whom he had given his soul. But as he went he stumbled and fell, and from the bleeding heart came an anxious voice, “My son, are you hurt?” Not even murder could kill that mother’s love; it lived on in the torn heart.

—Ministers’ Research Service

Title:  Love You Forever

Submitted by Charlie Ellison

A mother held her new baby and very slowly rocked him back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. And while she held him, she sang:

I'll love you forever, I'll like you for always,

As long as I'm living my baby you'll be.

The baby grew. He grew and he grew. He grew until he was two years old, and he ran all around the house. He pulled all the books off the shelves. He pulled all the food out of the refrigerator and he took his mother's watch and flushed it down the toilet. Sometimes his mother would say, "This kid is driving me CRAZY!" But at night time, when that two-year-old was quiet, she opened the door to his room, crawled across the floor, looked up over the side of his bed; and if he was really asleep she picked him up and rocked him back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. While she rocked him she sang:

I'll love you forever, I'll like you for always,

As long as I'm living my baby you'll be.

The little boy grew. He grew and he grew. He grew until he was nine years old. And he never wanted to come in for dinner, he never wanted to take a bath, and when grandma visited he would say bad words. Sometimes his mother wanted to sell him to the zoo! But at night time, when he was asleep, the mother quietly opened the door to his room, crawled across the floor and looked up over the side of the bed. If he was really asleep, she picked up that nine-year-old boy and rocked him back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. And while she rocked him she sang:

I'll love you forever, I'll like you for always,

As long as I'm living my baby you'll be.

The boy grew. He grew and he grew. He grew until he was a teenager. He had strange friends and he wore strange clothes and he listened to strange music. Sometimes the mother felt like she was in a zoo! But at night time, when that teenager was asleep, the mother opened the door to his room, crawled across the floor and looked up over the side of the bed. If he was really asleep she picked up that great big boy and rocked him back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. While she rocked him she sang:

I'll love you forever, I'll like you for always,

As long as I'm living my baby you'll be.

That teenager grew. He grew and he grew. He grew until he was a grown-up man. He left home and got a house across town. But sometimes on dark nights the mother got into her car and drove across town. If all the lights in her son's house were out, she opened his bedroom window, crawled across the floor, and looked up over the side of his bed. If that great big man was really asleep she picked him up and rocked him back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. And while she rocked him she sang:

I'll love you forever, I'll like you for always,

As long as I'm living my baby you'll be.

Well, that mother, she got older. She got older and older and older. One day she called up her son and said, "You better come see because I'm very old and sick." So her son came to see her. When he came in the door she tried to sing the song. She sang:

I'll love you forever, I'll like you for always....

But she couldn't finish because she was too old and sick.

The son went to his mother. He picked her up and rocked her back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. And he sang this song:

I'll love you forever, I'll like you for always,

As long as I'm living my Mom you'll be.

When the son came home that night, he stood for a long time at the top of the stairs.

Then he went into the room where his very new baby daughter was sleeping. He picked her up in his arms and very slowly rocked her back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. And while he rocked her he sang:

I'll love you forever, I'll like you for always,

As long as I'm living my baby you'll be.

--