Friday, May 23, 2003
Friday, May 23, 2003
Love never ends. But as for prophecies, they will come to an end; as for tongues,
they will cease; as for knowledge, it will come to an end.
Sometimes, he goes on to comment, it seems the love of a mother knows no limits. The last
time he saw his mother, she was lying in a hospital bed in an intensive-care-unit, acting out the
last scene in a drama called cancer.
He held her hand and told her once more that he loved her. A breathing tube prevented her from
speaking, so she squeezed his hand. Hard. He is convinced that she was trying to send him a
message. Her middle-aged son had come to comfort her, but she was comforting him. Even as
she lay dying, she was looking out for her boy. "Mothers are like that," says psychologist Paul
Chance. So are most fathers. So is God. Jesus wanted us to know that God is like a loving
parent.
(1 Corinthians 13.8
NRSV)
A psychologist named Paul Chance wrote about his mother in an article in PSYCHOLOGY
TODAY. He told of watching television with his family back in the days of live broadcasts. A
woman was walking down a staircase carrying what they all thought was a real baby. Midway
down the stairs, she dropped it. Since it wasn't a real baby, and since dropping the baby wasn't
in the script, the actress picked up the doll and finished the scene. Chance says he would have
forgotten that show long ago but for one thing. When that "baby" fell from the actress's arms,
his mother instantly lunged forward as if to catch it. The rest of the family just sat there.
Lord Jesus, I know others love will fail. I thank you for your love that never ends or fads.
Amen.
