Where did you learn these things?

The answer is simple -- at my Mother's knee. She instilled in me a legacy of faith, hope, love, and all of the things we associate with Christianity. Her enduring prayer and hope was that the Christ she loved and served would become my Lord and Master too. I learned this from the cradle up.  

I saw her faith in how she lived her life. I can tell you millions of stories about her, but suffice it to say she lived the Gospel and did what she believed the Lord wanted her to do.

I will say, however, that she modeled for me the love of Christ by getting up in the middle of the night, holding my hand, putting a cold towel to my forehead and other important matters when my childhood asthma hit with a vengeance. It seemed that the darkness of the night made my smothering worse, so I would get up, go to the den, turn on the light, and sit on the couch trying to breath. Her motherly intuition was always in top form, and always, inevidably, she would find me in the den struggling to breath. She would go get the medicine the doctor prescribed but the problem was that even though it helped me to breath tremendously, it's side effect was severe nausea. She would sit up with me through all of that, doing whatever she could in spite of the fact that she had a full time job. Finally I would ease off to sleep and as the sun rose through the window I would look over and she would be sitting the chair next to the sofa. She had been there all night long. Sometimes she had nodded off but most of the time she was awake, watching me tenderly to make sure I was alright.

I cannot begin to tell you what that means to me other than to say I am looking forward with great love and anticipation to see her again in that heavenly realm. I want to hug her, hug her neck for a long, long time and tell her how much I love and appreciate her, and that had it not been for her I probably would not have made it through this world. Of course there are many others I want to see. I know I will see Jesus and thank Him for dying for me and for his endless, abiding presence.

The following song puts into words much of what I am feeling. It's by Donna Lewis of Wales, and the song is titled, "Mother."