Eddie Lowe
Just A Thought
There are few bonds in life that compare to the bond of a mother and her child. There is no instruction manual for parenthood. For anyone who thinks it is an easy task, think again! However, a mother has a God-given instinct to rely on. My mother was no different. She knew when I was sad or hurt. She would know even when I hid it from others. Her golden words to me were, “What’s wrong with my boy?” No matter my age, I would pour my heart out, and it seemed she already knew.
1. A Mother’s Struggle
It has been said that a woman comes closer to death while birthing a child than at any other point in her life. Motherhood starts out as a struggle. Immediately after conception, the struggle begins as her body changes to nurture. These changes to her body mean it will never be the same again.
Then there is the struggle of delivery. I was blessed to be at the bedside to see the birth of my children, and I’ve never felt more helpless. It was their mom who bore the pain and walked through the shadows of death to give them life.
As we read Genesis, chapter four, we see the ancestral mother of all begin her journey of motherhood. I’d advise you to read what happened in chapter three, and you’ll see the plight that Eve had just overcome. In chapter three, we see the first eviction notice served, with God himself issuing it. Adam and Eve were told to leave the Garden. Where they began their family, it seems, nobody knows.
I look at that from a parental perspective, and that scares me! Imagine the struggle of beginning a family after being evicted! If you read further in Genesis, chapter four, you’ll see that Eve’s first child wasn’t exactly a model child. Tragedy struck when their firstborn, Cain, killed their second child, Abel! Eve could truly say, “The struggle is real!”
2. A Mother’s Strength
In Genesis 4:25, we see Eve’s strength. God blessed them with Seth, which means “appointed.” Eve essentially said, “God appointed me another child after Abel was killed.” Eve shows such underlying power and resilience. We witness her moving on from a tragedy and continuing motherhood.
My mom was a strong woman with a heart of gold. She could be firm, but she was also fair. As a child, I didn’t understand why she was tired all the time. In the evenings, she was there. At bedtime, she’d leave for work. When I got up, a sitter was there until around 4 p.m.
As I grew older, I realized she worked at one hosiery mill on the third shift and at another hosiery mill on the first shift. Not only was she working two jobs, but both involved boarding socks. To understand Mama’s strength, I’d ask you to look up that job in a hosiery mill. In later years, she’d tell me she did it all so we’d have a roof over our heads.
3. A Mother’s Shelter
It is a known fact that a mother hen will cover her chicks in a downpour of hail in an effort to shelter them, even if it means her death. When I was a boy, I saw my mother’s love as a shelter. Even after becoming a man, I found that talking to my mother was the one place where I could “take off the cape,” because it seemed the weight of being an adult required superhuman strength.
4. A Mother’s Swan Song
My mother’s passing was, without a doubt, the hardest moment of my life. Folklore says that before a swan dies, it sings a most beautiful song. As my mother was passing, her wish was to have all her children under her roof once more. Her final wish came true on the September evening she passed. My sisters and I all came home because we knew her time was near. One by one, we entered her room for our final visit and some last words. Upon entering her room, my mind flooded with childhood memories. Here lay the toughest woman I’d ever known, and cancer was about to take her. I longed to curl up in the bed with her as we spoke our final words. With three sisters, I was the only boy—Mama’s boy. Her final words were few, but she and I had an unspoken language. Just being together in silence, our hearts communed.
After her burial, I’d go to her grave, sometimes at night. I’d caress her gravestone and speak to her. Sometimes, tears would flow, and even now when I go, no words need be spoken, for a mother’s love transcends even death. Before her casket closed, I whispered to her, “I’ll see you on the other side.” And, by God’s grace, I will.
