We hear one say, “My son is so devoted to me, for my birthday he gave me an all-expenses-paid cruise around the world.”
The second pipes in, “That’s nothing. Mine threw a huge catered affair for me, and he flew in all my friends from the East.”
The third woman smirks at them both. “Without a doubt, my son is the most devoted. Three times a week he goes to his therapist. A hundred and thirty dollars a session he pays. And what does he talk about the whole time? Me!”
No doubt, huh?
When I worked with homeless families I saw first hand how awful lots of mothers really are.
Pam is a large, rotund, roly poly mother of three ... though her 14 year old daughter Nicki is tall, thin, straight, pretty and obviously in charge of the family.
Entering their room for the first time Nicki exclaims, "Wow this is nice Mom?"
That's sad itself isn't it? ... a homeless shelter is nice?
Pam doesn't respond. She's too overwhelmed by losing the boyfriend they lived with ... her addiction to crack cocaine ... the tremendous debt she's amassed trying to be a good mother ... and the understanding somehow that deep in her clouded mind ... Nicki is the one running the family because she's totally incapable.
They go on to become a success ... sort of anyway.
Pam kicks her habit for a while, gets a job, finds housing and moves her family to a decent place with a new man.
Nicki graduates High School.
A couple of years later the whole sad episode happens again except, this time ... Nicki's the Mom.
Sometimes it's a shame what Hallmark has done to Mother's Day.
Buy a $7 card to honor your Mother ... and next month buy another one for your Dad.
It's gotten crazy.
Yesterday I posted a new Face Book profile picture of me holding Che.
Immediately someone quips, "This does not look like a Mother's Day picture."
"What's that got to do with anything?" I wonder. "Like any other man who's worth his salt I can get in touch with my feminine side and express Mother tendencies ... just as any woman can muster up her masculinity.
Beside, my mother loves the picture posting 5 hearts to prove it!
Like much in the world, it's all gotten so out of hand.
"Honor your Father and Mother! Then you may live a long full life in the land the Lord God has given you" (Exodus 20:12).
Why?
God knows we've sentimentalized the Hell out of it but honestly speaking it's not always the easiest of relationship ... Mom and child.
Jesus himself seems to have had a strange one with his Mom.
The first thing he does when he get old enough is run away from home.
After three days, they back track until they find him and Mother Mary tells him, "Behold, thy Father and I have sought thee sorrowing" (Luke 2:48) ... or in today's vernacular ... "I thought it was my fault losing you but now I see it's yours and ..."
Well, lets be honest ... our mothers would have beaten the tar out of us ... but today's mother's would threaten taking away his phone from him ... but never actually do it.
The Bible doesn't say what Jesus' punishment was but he's not heard from again for 19 years so I imagine it was pretty extreme.
Then when he's 30, Jesus attends a wedding with his family and they run out of wine.
We all know there's nothing worse than being anywhere ... especially a wedding not involving an immediate member of your family ... and running out of wine.
Mary tells her son to do something about this and turn water into wine so nobody feels bad about this horrific happening.
"Woman what have you to do with me?" John 2:4), is how Jesus responds.
Not even calling her Mom, Jesus is obviously perturbed at his ol' lady wanting him to do things he doesn't want to do ... we've all been there.
"Go tell the Police it was you," my Mom demands after officers beat on our door demanding to know if I was involved in stealing 15 fire extinguishers from a local plant.
Apparently Mr. Gnann who lived across from the plant believes he saw me with my best friend Gene Prevatt and Robert Mixon carrying fire extinguishers to the fort we have built in the woods for a fight to end all fights.
Somehow the police investigative team found the empty cans with our fingerprints on them.
Just like Jesus I say to my Mom, "Woman what have you to do with me?"
Unlike Jesus, my Mom backhanded me across the room, told the police I did it and there went my summer vacation.
Jesus listened to his and turned the water into wine but it took me a long time to forgive mine.
The next time Mary wants Jesus, things only get worse.
Jesus is flying high, everybody wants him, his popularity is through the roof and he's famous, adored, sought out and beloved by all.
Just when things couldn't have been going any better for Jesus, his mother shows up demanding to see him ... "Tell him his Momma needs to see him right now," Mary says so the message is conveyed to her boy.
"Who?" Jesus replies (Matthew 12:46). "Who is my mother?"
Hallmark still hasn't figured out how to use this on a card.
"Our mothers, like our fathers, are to be honored, the Good Book says. But if Jesus is to be our guide, honoring them doesn't mean either idealizing or idolizing them. It means seeing them both for who they are and for who they are not. It means speaking the truth to them. It means the best way of repaying them for their love is to love God and our neighbor as faithfully and selflessly as at their best our parents have tried to love us. It means seeing they are taken care of to the end of their days" (Frederick Buechner).
Let me be straight, I've tried to be pretty good whenever I talk to my Mom but, Lord knows she gets upset with me to this day ... when I cuss in public though she herself has done so ... made bad choices when she's done that too ... or screwed up badly because she's done her fair amount of screwing up.
The reason we honor our mothers ... our fathers too for that matter ... is because they gave us our life.
We wouldn't be here without them and even if they were the worst parents ever born ... they still gave you YOU!
That's the real honor of it all.
Face it, there would be no Jesus without his mother ... regardless of who is Daddy is.
Same with you and me.
At the end of his life, Jesus has one last encounter with his Mom.
Hanging on the cross, bleary eyed in pain, he looks down at her standing in the crowd and says, "Woman, behold your son."
It's funny he still doesn't call her Mom but "Woman" instead but, I think what he's saying is, "This is what you've given the world ... just me ... right here ... doing what I'm doing."
When all was said and done, Jesus ended up honoring the ol' lady by changing the world and centuries later we're still talking about him ... and her.
So the best thing you can do on this Mother's Day, whether your Mom is still living or not, is to say to her ... "Woman, behold your son" ... "Behold your daughter" ... this is what you've given the world ... ME! ... and the world wouldn't be complete without me ... meaning of course the world can't be complete at all if I weren't here ... but I am ... thanks to you.
Now Mom, it's time for me to LIVE This Mother's Day ... just like it is for me to truly live every day ... being your gift to the world.
