A Tribute to My Mother
At 6:25 p.m. on Christmas Eve, my brother John called from Dallas to tell me Mother had passed away. After her heart operation just several months ago, John and I thought she would live for years. Complaining of pains in her chest and abdomen, she was taken to the hospital several days before Christmas. At first, we expected this to be a routine gallbladder operation. Then, abruptly, she took a turn for the worst and shortly after that she passed away. She was 84 years old.
When John and I talked to our mother about the Lord, she would tell us about her conversion at age thirteen. She never got involved in a church, nor was she the spiritual influence in our lives, but my mother had an enormous impact on us.
My mother loved her two sons. I have rarely met a mother who loved her children as much as our mother loved us. When I was pastor of the Church of the Open Door, we invited J. Vernon McGee, who had pastored the church for 21 years, back to speak. In his closing prayer, he expressed thanks “for the mother love of the Father God.” The phrase was so striking, the thought so profound, it made an indelible impression on me. My mother was one of the finest examples of mother love I have ever known. Her unconditional love was like the love of our Father God.
Needless to say, my mother’s love has had a huge impact on me. It would not be too much to say that her love was the foundation from which I was launched into life.
My mother was born handicapped. She arrived with one hand. Her left arm was severed at the wrist so that she had a nub instead of a left hand. As far as I know, she never let that bother her. She accepted it as a reality. She had an artificial hand, which she wore to work, but she did not wear it around the house. She did not try to hide, deny, or ignore her handicap.
My mother never would allow me to feel sorry for her. I could be angry with her, but she would not permit me to feel pity. She did not want sympathy because of her handicap—from me or anyone else.
My insistence that we must look the realities of life in the eye, no doubt, began with my mother.
My mother did not let her handicap stop her from anything she wanted to do. As a child, she did not get very far in school. As an adult, she went back to school and got a GED. She was divorced when I was six and my bother was two. She went to work, raised two boys by herself, and did it with great gusto. I remember well the three of us taking a bike ride to Pensacola Beach. That was a twenty-mile trip! (By the way, in those days the three-mile bridge across the Escambia Bay was made of wood.)
My mother was a dedicated, sacrificial mother. I am grateful.
© G. Michael Cocoris, 12/27/2004
When John and I talked to our mother about the Lord, she would tell us about her conversion at age thirteen. She never got involved in a church, nor was she the spiritual influence in our lives, but my mother had an enormous impact on us.
My mother loved her two sons. I have rarely met a mother who loved her children as much as our mother loved us. When I was pastor of the Church of the Open Door, we invited J. Vernon McGee, who had pastored the church for 21 years, back to speak. In his closing prayer, he expressed thanks “for the mother love of the Father God.” The phrase was so striking, the thought so profound, it made an indelible impression on me. My mother was one of the finest examples of mother love I have ever known. Her unconditional love was like the love of our Father God.
Needless to say, my mother’s love has had a huge impact on me. It would not be too much to say that her love was the foundation from which I was launched into life.
My mother was born handicapped. She arrived with one hand. Her left arm was severed at the wrist so that she had a nub instead of a left hand. As far as I know, she never let that bother her. She accepted it as a reality. She had an artificial hand, which she wore to work, but she did not wear it around the house. She did not try to hide, deny, or ignore her handicap.
My mother never would allow me to feel sorry for her. I could be angry with her, but she would not permit me to feel pity. She did not want sympathy because of her handicap—from me or anyone else.
My insistence that we must look the realities of life in the eye, no doubt, began with my mother.
My mother did not let her handicap stop her from anything she wanted to do. As a child, she did not get very far in school. As an adult, she went back to school and got a GED. She was divorced when I was six and my bother was two. She went to work, raised two boys by herself, and did it with great gusto. I remember well the three of us taking a bike ride to Pensacola Beach. That was a twenty-mile trip! (By the way, in those days the three-mile bridge across the Escambia Bay was made of wood.)
My mother was a dedicated, sacrificial mother. I am grateful.
© G. Michael Cocoris, 12/27/2004
