Tuesday, Dec. 31
Luke 2:19
But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart.
I would love to be a Mom. I know that’s kind of a weird and awkward thing to say, but ever since my wife and I had children (technically, my wife had the children while I cheered her on), I have wondered what it would be like to be a Mom.
I wonder what it is like to know that life is growing inside of you; to feel that life begin to move and kick. I know what it is like to see life growing from outside my wife’s body; I have felt the movement and the kicking from outside, but that’s just from an observer’s perspective. I wonder what it is like from a participant’s perspective!
A few weeks ago my wife and I were watching a T.V. show with our two high school aged sons. In one of the show’s scenes a young father was trying to feed a bottle to a newborn baby and it was going rather poorly.
I said to my son, “I used to do that with you guys.”
He said, “What?”
I said, “When you guys were babies, Mom fed you most of the time in the way only Moms can. But I did the middle-of-the-night feeding time. Mom stored up her milk and I would prepare the bottles at 2 or 3 am and sit in the rocking chair of your room and feed you the bottles.”
He looked at me with a kind of surprise and said, “Why?”
I said, “I think because it was as close to being a Mom as I could get.”
He said, “I guess I’ll understand that when I’m a Dad.”
I think this simple verse tucked away in Luke’s rendering of the nativity story captures something of the unique experience of motherhood.
But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart.
What does it mean to “treasure up all these things?”
If you look up the word Luke used here it means “to preserve, to keep safe, to keep close.”
I think most moms know instinctively what it means to “treasure up all these things.”
This is just what a mother does! She treasures up everything about her children; what she felt as she carried them inside her body; what she knew or suspected about their personalities when they were still in her womb; what it felt like to bring them into the world; what it felt like to finally hold her baby in her arms. She treasures up what she feels as her baby nurses; what she feels when her child cries out at night. She treasures a thousand moments from the baby’s first sounds, to first steps, to first words. She treasures up her child’s laughter and tears; she treasures their pains and fears and joys and triumphs; she treasures up her own hopes and dreams for them. Treasuring is what a mother does!
Luke says she also “pondered them in her heart.”
To “ponder” is a bit different than to “treasure.” To ponder is to “weigh carefully; to consider or discuss;” it means to think deeply about the meaning of a thing; to turn it over and over in one’s mind and heart.
What things did Mary treasure and what does it mean that she pondered them in her heart?
I think Mary treasured up those things mentioned earlier that all mothers treasure about their children. She treasured her baby boy from the moment she could feel his life inside her until she watched his life ebb away on the cross some 33 years later; and even then she treasured up everything about him.
But she also pondered about her son. She pondered what it meant God had chosen her. She pondered what it meant that her son would be called the “son of God.” She pondered what it meant that he “reign on the throne of his father David,” and that he would “save his people from their sins.”
Mary treasured her son named “Jesus” and she pondered the deeper meaning of his life.
Perhaps Christmastime for you has been, as it is for so many of us, a season full of fun, laughter and activity. And that’s good!
But Mary reminds us to make sure we take at least a few moments to treasure Jesus and to ponder again who he is.
Pastor Brian Coffey
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