X MARKS THE SPOT

Pharaoh's daughter was the first capitalist in the bible - she drew a little prophet out of some rushes...

I suppose that today is really about LURVE! On Mothering Sunday we say thank you to Mother Church for nurturing our faith; we pay homage to Jesus’ mother Mary, who was the model disciple who said yes to God; we remember the way that we nurture people, and of course we remember our Mothers.

Who bought a Mothering Sunday card?

Did you have difficulty finding one which didn’t make you want to be physically sick? Some of the rhymes are quite revolting:
To the World’s Sweetest Mummy
To my Darling Mother
Oh Mother mine, you are so divine... uugghh!

Who MADE a Mothering Sunday card, or bought a BLANK card?

We do seem to have difficulty in expressing our love sometimes - the greetings card industry is testimony to that! We find it difficult to say “I love you” to somebody - so we send a card, or give chocolates, or champagne, or flowers. That’s what happens on Valentine’s Day, and on Mothering Sunday too...

So often we try to Say It With Flowers!

Remember that one liner from the 1970s?: “Say it with Flowers: give her a Triffid...”

We do find it difficult to express our feelings in words - so we get other people to do it, like Helen Steiner Rice, or we try and put our emotions into a well chosen bottle of champagne... or box of chocs or whatever.

When God wanted to show us how much he loves us he didn’t say it with flowers. He said it with nails. The nails that held Jesus to the cross gave us the greatest symbol of love the world has ever seen.

Although we might not see it at once, the cross is a symbol of love that we use very often...

I’d like to tell you a story about Johnny.

Now Johnny was a small boy - a bit like you, except that he wasn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer, and one day he got a postcard from his Aunt Ethel who was on holiday in the Bahamas. It said “Weather is here, wish you were fine” and it had a great big cross on it. Johnny asked his mother - what does that mean? His mum said “It means that Auntie Ethel loves you.”

The very next day Johnny rushed home from school and said “Mummy mummy! My maths teacher loves me! Look!” and sure enough, all over his Maths book were lots of big kisses... She had even written “See me!” on the book too! It must be love!
“Noooooo!” says his mum - “These crosses mean you’ve got it wrong!”

The next day Johnny came in waving the milk bill at his Mum. It had a great big cross through it... “Does this mean you’ve got it wrong, or that the milkman loves you?” he said.

“Nooooooo!” says his long suffering mum - “It means that the bill has been paid - I don’t owe the milkman anything and we’re all square.”

The next day was Sunday and Johnny went to church where he saw a great big cross - this one was a slightly different shape and it had the figure of Jesus hanging on it. Johnny was getting a bit confused by this stage, so he said to his mum “Mummmmmmy... is this cross about love, about getting it wrong, or about cancelled bills?”

“Well...” said his very long suffering mum... “it’s actually about all three... The cross shows us that we got things wrong - we went our own way and ignored God, but it also showed us that God cancelled out our debt (he forgave our sins) because he loves us...”

So that week was a very steep learning curve for Johnny and he realised that a cross can mean many different things, and that the cross of Jesus shows us a lot of things about us, God and God’s love for us.

So there may be lots of different ways of expressing love: cards, flowers, champagne, chocolates etc, but the way God chose was stark and shocking and stands as the greatest reminder of his love: the cross.

Happy Mothering Sunday!

Fr Andrew Perry

Rector, St John the Evangelist, Pevensey Rd, St Leonards on Sea