A Mother's Heart

But Mary kept all these things

and pondered them

in her heart.

Luke 2:19, NKJV

Babies are born as a blank canvas, masterpieces yet to be painted.  They are empty vessels ready for filling and use.  They have their entire future ahead of them, unplanned and unpredictable by any except for God.  What a child might be when he or she grows up is anyone's guessing game, and even after the child is grown, life can change on a whim.  Some will be great leaders and thinkers, many will fulfill their dreams, a few may never really reach their potential.  And in their hearts, mothers ponder.

Mothers want their babies to be born healthy, with ten fingers and ten toes and all the rest of the parts in place.  They celebrate the little triumphs of rolling over and foot finding, of focusing and laughter.  They learn to discern the inexpressible meaning behind the cries.  They search for the perfect strained vegetable to nourish their greedy little monster.  They encourage the crawling and the walking and the talking--at least until all that leads to adventure.  Then it's all "No, no, don't do that."

They weep on the first day of school as their little tyke toodles down the sidewalk to meet the bus.  They fret through the days, counting the minutes until their little beloved comes home again.  They sit up nights wondering, and sometimes worrying, what their baby is turning into.  As the years pass, kids trade in their Tonka Trucks for real trucks, and the hand they want to hold isn't Mom's anymore.  Soon it's graduation, college, marriage, careers.  Then grandkids come along, and Mom enjoys the new tykes so much she wonders why she didn't have them first.

Babies are born to live.

But not this one.  After the excitement of labor and delivery, after the surprising visit by the shepherds, after everything was calm and quiet once more, Mary held her swaddled bundle to her breast, eyes closed as her breathing deepened.  Joseph was close by, watchful and weary too.  And as she pressed her lips to the warm forehead of Jesus, Mary had to be wondering what His life was going to be like.

Mary knew she had brought the Son of God into the world.  Her womb had given way to Divine Life.  His arrival had been prophesied with messages of greatness and power, of kingship and glory.  Though every person born to woman makes their mark on the world, this One would change it irrevocably forever.  Heralded by angels and visions and wandering stars, visited by shepherds and later by kings, born in absolute obscurity but destined for ultimate fame, her little Boy had His life all before Him.

But as she pondered it all in her heart, did she have any insight or inkling into what the future held for her tiny Christ child?  Soon she would hear forecasts of swords and sorrow, but on that nativity night, did she know that the cradle would lead to Calvary, that the Bethlehem babe would bear the burden of the world in himself, that he would carry the sins of humanity in his body to the cross?  Did she know that of all the children who were born to live, hers alone was born to die?

And yet through Him, we would all have life, abundant life, and life everlasting.