It is midday on Christmas Day as I write, and I can’t stop thinking about that first one: the day that the Son of God became man—the incarnation. I am particularly thinking of Mary and all she experienced. I am thinking of a mother’s love and of a mother’s heartache.

As I write, my dear wife has been in the States for the past week with our youngest daughter who, for some time, has been undergoing seriously persistent health issues. A mother’s love resulted in a cross-Atlantic trip. If you have seen the video of their reunion at the Louisville airport, you will have seen that the trip was worth it. Sometimes, even adult children need their momma. And somehow mommas know it. Mary did.

As we saw in our study of Luke 2, there is no evidence that Mary’s labour and birth was any different than the majority of mothers throughout history. Being a sinner herself (Luke 1:47) Mary would have felt the pain that accompanied the curse (Genesis 3:16). She would have felt labour pains, and perhaps squeezed Joseph’s hand until he grimaced. It would not have been a “silent night,” but rather a time of painful groans with blood on the ground. And yet Mary’s child was unlike any child ever to be born. He was the promised Son to crush the serpent’s head; the promised Seed to reverse the curse by himself becoming a curse (Genesis 3:15).

Like all caring mothers, Mary swaddled Jesus tightly in strips of cloth, providing both protection from the elements and a sense of security after coming from a familiar womb into a wide, wild, weird, and very wicked world. Just how wicked? Well, at some point Herod would send murderous soldiers to kill her Son (Matthew 2:16–18). Being warned from heaven to flee to Egypt for safety (irony of ironies!), they would remain there until it was safe to return, not to Bethlehem but rather to Nazareth, where Jesus would spend the next nearly thirty years.

We have no record of these years, besides a snippet informing us of Jesus as a twelve-year-old in the temple (Luke 2:41ff). But we can use sanctified imagination to suppose that, during those years, Mary lovingly fussed over her Son. She would have fed him, doctored him when he was ill, and bandaged him when he skinned his knees. Does that sound unreal? It shouldn’t, since Jesus was made in the likeness of sinful flesh (Romans 8:3). The incarnate Son of God would scar his knees, just as his hands, feet, and side would be scarred on the day he died for sinners.

Mother’s love was no different for Mary than any other mother. She would have been concerned about providing safety and security for her child, commencing with the swaddling cloths. And yet she would not be able to completely protect him from the evil deeds of others. Jesus would be vilified, falsely arrested, falsely condemned, beaten, and sentenced to the most humiliating kind of death: a public crucifixion. And Mary would be there to watch, her heart broken to pieces (John 19:26). A mother’s love to the end.

There is much to be gleaned from this reality, but let me point to two truths.

First, Jesus came to be born to live sinlessly in order to die sacrificially. He did not come to live in a bubble of self-protection but rather to give his life as a ransom for all who would believe. Let us never lose sight of this, especially at this time of the year.

Second, be sure to put a human face—a mother’s face—to the truth of the incarnation. Honour Mary for her devoted, sacrificial, and painful mother’s love (see Luke 2:35). And let this lead us to honour our mothers.

Most of us have been blessed with moms who have sacrificially loved us. We should thank God for them; and we should express loving gratitude to them. Take time to phone your mother, or to send her a note expressing your love for her. And if your mom has died, honour her memory by speaking well of her.

And to mothers reading this: God bless you for all you do to show a mother’s love to your children. Many of us see it, but most importantly, God sees and smiles, “Well done.”

Doug