A Mother’s Love
The story is told of a sharecropper family who lived in the South shortly after the Civil War. Every year when the crops were harvested, the family’s share was barely sufficient to provide food and clothes for the next year. There was never enough for any luxuries or things that could make life easier or more pleasant.
One year the fields yielded a bumper crop, and after all of the necessities were bought, there was enough money left over to buy something special for the entire family. The only condition was that the purchase had to be approved by every family member. So the mail order catalog was opened and the pages turned slowly. The pages pictured wonderful attractions for various members of the family, but nothing suited the liking of every member of the family until they came to the page featuring mirrors. When they saw the mirrors, the family decided unanimously that a mirror was something they could all use.
Well, the day came when the mirror arrived. The package was quickly opened, and the father beheld his own image for the very first time. At first there was a look of puzzlement, then a smile, and then great laughter as his face displayed the sheer delight of seeing himself in the mirror.
By now the rest of the family members were anxiously waiting their turn, and as the mirror passed from member to member, the response was the same, until it passed into the hands of the youngest member. In a moment the look of anticipatory joy vanished and was replaced by a look of grief and terror, as he saw his reflection for the first time. The family’s laughter ended abruptly as they all realized the little boy’s pain. As a baby he had been burned in a fire, and his face was badly disfigured.
Looking in the mirror, then back at his mother, then in the mirror and back to his mother, he said to her, "Did you know I looked like this?"
"Yes, son," came her response.
Looking again in the mirror and then back at his mother, a tear running down her cheek, he asked, "How could you love someone as ugly as me?"
Grasping the child and holding him close, she looked deep into his eyes and said, "I love you because you’re mine."
The love of a mother that looks beyond her son’s disfiguring burns and says, "I love you, because you are mine," reminds us of God’s love that looks beyond our sins and weaknesses, that grasps us close to His breast with those same words, "I love you, because you are mine."
God loves us so much that He wants us to live with Him in Heaven. He sent Jesus to show us how we must live each day on earth so we can go to Heaven. If you live like Jesus, obeying all the things God asks you to do in His Word, you will be able to see Him one day soon.
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