If you’ve followed me for any length of time, you’re well aware of how our family was formed, but in case you don’t know, I’ll fill you in with an abbreviated story.
We’d tried for seven years to start a family. Because we’d always known we wanted to have a family, our journey led us to pursue adoption. We welcomed two sweet infant boys into our family via that route — one when I was 31 years old and we were blessed with the other one when I was 33.
Feeling sure our family was absolutely complete, astonishingly I turned to my husband and at 38 years old spoke words we’d longed to realize: “I think I’m pregnant.” We were ecstatic.
After a visit to our primary care doctor, his jaw dropped when he confirmed my suspicion. He had been with us the entire way. After a thorough exam, he had pronounced our then 12-day-old son healthy. Two years later, our then three-week-old son received the same good news.
Five years later, he was the attending physician for the birth of our daughter and could not stop smiling for us when he handed our beautiful girl to me for the first time. Sweet, sweet memories.
Since becoming a mom, I read the story of Mary, the mother of Jesus, with a compassionate mother-heart. Just now, I am participating in a Bible study, which is centering on women of the New Testament. We have had a week focusing on the mother of Jesus and just what she went through.
Receiving the news she was about to become a mother must have been mind-blowing. She was a teenager and engaged to be married to Joseph. This status tells us that she certainly could have been mature enough, even at her young age, to become a wife and eventual mother.
I’m sure in her heart she must have had misgivings, but her first words, after questioning how this will be since she was a virgin (Luke 1:34), were: “I am the Lord’s servant, may your word to me be fulfilled.” (Luke 1:38). Such incredible faith and trust!
The story unfolds as she traverses to her cousin, Elizabeth, and upon hearing her greeting, the baby in Elizabeth’s womb leapt for joy. They share together for three months before Mary goes back and begins her life with Joseph.
The birth was miraculous — visitors of many ethnic groups and even lowly shepherds, came to pay their respects to her baby while Mary pondered this in her mother’s heart (Luke 2:19).
Ponder. What a word — thoughtful, meditative, reflective — she must have deeply committed all to the Father and talked it over with him often. I would have.
When it came time for the purification rites required by the Law of Moses, Joseph and Mary took the boy Jesus to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord, along with the proper sacrifice (Luke 2:22-24). There, two people prophesied Jesus’ destiny, with Simeon blessing the parents, telling Mary, “And a sword will pierce your own soul, too.” (Luke 2:34-35)
Later, when Jesus was 12, they went to Jerusalem for the Festival of the Passover, and when it was over, the caravan started back home. Unbeknownst to his parents, Jesus stayed behind, talking to the elders in the temple courts.
After two days of frantically looking, they finally found Jesus. Can you imagine Mary’s heart? She must have turned to Joseph in shock, crying, “We’ve lost God!”
The scriptures don’t give us an inside look at the life of Jesus from 12-30 years old, before He began His public ministry. So Mary and Joseph simply parented Him. Jesus was sinless, so He must never have been disobedient to them, but Mary, remembering Simeon’s words, might ponder what a sword of sorrow meant for her.
Fast forward to Mary at the foot of the cross, weeping and in agony, looking up at her precious son as he suffered, the sins of mankind on his shoulders. Whenever my kids were hurt, either physically or emotionally, I would carry that as well. Mary must hardly had been able to breathe.
She knew. She knew what he was doing and why, as when she first spoke to Elizabeth, she had broken out in song, reciting the Old Testament from memory, “As my spirit rejoices in God, my Savior.” (Luke 1:46-55)
This Good Friday and glorious Easter Sunday, remind us once again that Mary witnessed what Jesus accomplished — paying our penalty of sin completely so those that repent of their sins and accept the free gift of salvation by grace, being made righteous through Jesus, can receive the gift of eternal life with our Father. What a blessed message of hope that is.
Walking with Mary through these Bible verses have taught me that while her mother’s heart must have been pierced, yes, but what joy bubbled in her mother’s heart when he arose from the grave, conquering death once and for all.
(“The women were breathless and terrified, until the angel said to them, ‘There’s no reason to be afraid. I know you’re here looking for Jesus, who was crucified. He isn’t here — He has risen victoriously, just as He said!’” Matthew 28:5-6, The Passion Translation)
Kay Reminger was born and raised on a dairy farm, and she married her high school sweetheart, who happened to farm for a living in Leopolis. Writing for quite a few years, she remains focused on the blessings of living the ups and downs of rural life from a farm wife’s perspective.
