A Beloved Mother

Today is Mother’s Day. In addition to thanking God for my own mother and my own wife (the mother of my four boys) this day, I pray that our gracious Lord would mercifully grant His love, strength, forgiveness, hope, comfort, peace, and joy to the following:

• the woman who, together with her husband, is bringing up their child(ren) “in the discipline and instruction of the Lord” (Ephesians 6:4);
• the woman who longs to have a child, but can’t;
• the woman who gave up a child via adoption;
• the woman who adopted a child not her own to love and nurture as her own;
• the woman who is raising a child alone;
• the woman who ended her pregnancy;
• the woman whose unborn child died in utero;
• the woman whose child was born prematurely;
• the woman whose child was born stillborn;
• the woman whose child was born with some sort of disability;
• the woman who has had to bury a child; and
• any and every other woman not fitting the categories above.

Though every earthly mother is flawed to one degree or another, we have a heavenly mother who is the bride of Christ. To the eyes she is deeply flawed, wrinkled, covered with warts. But by God’s grace she is pure, holy, righteous. Saint Paul writes, “The Jerusalem above is free, and she is our mother” (Galatians 4:26). She gave birth to us in Holy Baptism, feeds us the pure milk of the Word, and sets a table before us with the holy Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ.

If you don’t know this mother yet, get to know her. The Father created her from the Second Adam’s side. The Son loves her and gave Himself for her, that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the Word, so that He might present the Church to Himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. The Spirit works through her and her means of grace to create and nurture children of the heavenly Father.

That’s why my prayer this Mother’s Day is this:

Thank You, dear Father in heaven, for our beloved mother—the only, holy, Christian, and apostolic Church. In Christ, she is beautiful, loving, forgiving, and welcoming. In Christ, she is an endless supply of hope, comfort, peace, and joy. We thank You this day for giving her to us that we might know You, the only true God, and therein be partakers of the forgiveness, life, and salvation Your Son graciously bestows on us in Word and Sacrament. In Jesus’ name. Amen!