1
00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:09,760
Hello and welcome today to Trinity Sermons. Here at Trinity Church, Streetsville, we're

2
00:00:09,760 --> 00:00:15,120
a church where we want to love Jesus, live like Jesus and lead others to Jesus. Thanks

3
00:00:15,120 --> 00:00:19,640
so much for listening to our sermon podcast today. Today we are going to be continuing

4
00:00:19,640 --> 00:00:24,560
our sermon series where we have been reviewing Jesus' famous last words and we are going

5
00:00:24,560 --> 00:00:30,080
to be hearing about the time where Jesus on the cross speaks to his mother and says,

6
00:00:30,080 --> 00:00:34,840
Behold your son and speaks to his beloved disciple and says, Behold your mother. We

7
00:00:34,840 --> 00:00:40,520
hope you enjoy the sermon today and find it interesting and inspiring. God bless.

8
00:00:40,520 --> 00:00:49,240
A reading from the Gospel of John chapter 19 verses 25 to 27. Near the cross of Jesus

9
00:00:49,240 --> 00:00:55,960
stood his mother, his mother's sister, Mary, the wife of Clopas and Mary Magdalene. When

10
00:00:55,960 --> 00:01:01,960
Jesus saw his mother there and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to

11
00:01:01,960 --> 00:01:10,160
her, Woman, here is your son. And to the disciple, here is your mother. From that time on, the

12
00:01:10,160 --> 00:01:14,320
disciple took her into his home. The word of the Lord.

13
00:01:14,320 --> 00:01:20,440
I'm pretty sure that all of us at one time or another have uttered these three little

14
00:01:20,440 --> 00:01:26,360
words. They're three little words that just come off of our tongue so, so easily. And

15
00:01:26,360 --> 00:01:32,760
yet they really are. They can be quite hurtful words. And those words, of course, are the

16
00:01:32,760 --> 00:01:39,560
words I don't care. I don't care. I don't care. Now, of course, on the one hand, they

17
00:01:39,560 --> 00:01:44,800
sound like, you know, kind of harmless words. But when you think about it, you know, I don't

18
00:01:44,800 --> 00:01:50,160
care what she thinks. I don't care what he says. I don't care about you. I mean, they're

19
00:01:50,160 --> 00:01:55,200
some of the most hurtful words you could ever imagine. People can even text these words

20
00:01:55,200 --> 00:02:03,780
to each other. They just use the letters I, D, C to say, I don't care. And although we

21
00:02:03,780 --> 00:02:09,400
might use these words all the time, we have to realize that they're hurtful because as

22
00:02:09,400 --> 00:02:15,840
human beings, we relationships are so, so important to us. And if someone says that

23
00:02:15,840 --> 00:02:22,960
they don't care, I mean, we need the care of other human beings, right? We need people

24
00:02:22,960 --> 00:02:28,880
who care about us. So that's why saying I don't care is so extraordinarily hurtful.

25
00:02:28,880 --> 00:02:35,200
You know, it signifies a sense of rejection, right? If someone says, I don't care to you,

26
00:02:35,200 --> 00:02:41,120
it's a way of saying, you know, I don't value you. I don't value you as a person. I don't

27
00:02:41,120 --> 00:02:47,240
put a lot of worth in who you are. I just don't care. You're kind of like useless to

28
00:02:47,240 --> 00:02:52,720
me. It makes you feel unimportant and unwanted. But it's also, it leads to this sense of feeling

29
00:02:52,720 --> 00:02:59,960
disconnected, right? We have this innate need to be connected to community. And if someone

30
00:02:59,960 --> 00:03:06,080
says, I don't care for you anymore, especially if it was someone who you thought did care

31
00:03:06,080 --> 00:03:11,400
for you, man, you could feel isolated and alone. And then of course, thirdly, when someone

32
00:03:11,400 --> 00:03:15,960
says I don't care, there's a kind of a hopelessness that comes along with that because you might

33
00:03:15,960 --> 00:03:20,760
really want that relationship to work or you may really want to fix that relationship.

34
00:03:20,760 --> 00:03:24,560
But when someone says, I don't care, it means they're not into it. And their heart isn't

35
00:03:24,560 --> 00:03:32,720
into the relationship like yours is. I just don't care. I'm going to let it go. Now, if

36
00:03:32,720 --> 00:03:38,360
saying I don't care to someone actually hurts so much, then I think the opposite is also

37
00:03:38,360 --> 00:03:44,280
true. Some of the most life-giving and transformative words we can say to another person is I do

38
00:03:44,280 --> 00:03:50,260
care. And one of the most important actions we can take in our relationships is to do

39
00:03:50,260 --> 00:03:57,360
things that show people how much we care. You know, Margaret Mead had this very famous

40
00:03:57,360 --> 00:04:04,440
quote where she said, never believe that a few caring people can't change the world,

41
00:04:04,440 --> 00:04:10,980
for indeed, that's all who ever have changed the world. Caring for each other can change

42
00:04:10,980 --> 00:04:15,160
your life. Caring for each other can change the world. Now, I want to suggest to you,

43
00:04:15,160 --> 00:04:21,960
I think you'd agree, Jesus was the most caring person who ever walked this earth. And yet,

44
00:04:21,960 --> 00:04:26,600
people still looked at him and said, I don't care for this Jesus fellow. And today we see

45
00:04:26,600 --> 00:04:31,600
a situation where Jesus is in a place where I think he's probably feeling the least cared

46
00:04:31,600 --> 00:04:35,960
for as anybody possibly could. He is totally rejected. He is totally disconnected from

47
00:04:35,960 --> 00:04:45,320
his community, totally hopelessly hanging from the cross. And yet, even in that moment,

48
00:04:45,320 --> 00:04:50,040
we hear Jesus utter some of the most famous last words anyone has ever spoken. If we look

49
00:04:50,040 --> 00:04:59,000
at that scene, you will see that Jesus, even now, is so full of care for other people,

50
00:04:59,000 --> 00:05:04,000
compassion and concern for others. You know, very few people seem to care about Jesus in

51
00:05:04,000 --> 00:05:08,520
this moment. And yet, Jesus was still caring for others, which is actually amazing because

52
00:05:08,520 --> 00:05:12,960
if we found ourselves in Jesus' situation, probably the only person we'd be caring about

53
00:05:12,960 --> 00:05:20,460
is ourselves. And yet, here is Jesus still reaching out, still extending care and concern

54
00:05:20,460 --> 00:05:26,520
to those who need it most. And today, I want to suggest to you, as we look at these famous

55
00:05:26,520 --> 00:05:33,160
last words of Jesus, we see Jesus urging us to care and to extend care to three groups

56
00:05:33,160 --> 00:05:37,760
in particular. And I'll suggest to you that today I want to look at how Jesus urges us

57
00:05:37,760 --> 00:05:45,600
to care for women in particular, to care for mothers. And when he gets around to it, what

58
00:05:45,600 --> 00:05:51,120
he's really challenging us to do is to find a brand new way to care for everyone and to

59
00:05:51,120 --> 00:05:56,520
care for each other. There's a lot in these famous last words. Let's begin by taking a

60
00:05:56,520 --> 00:06:02,320
look at Jesus' care for women. You know, women were some of the most marginalized people

61
00:06:02,320 --> 00:06:06,280
in Jesus' day. I mean, if a woman had something to say, if a woman walked into a room, if

62
00:06:06,280 --> 00:06:11,520
she had an opinion, a lot of people in those days would just say, I don't care what you

63
00:06:11,520 --> 00:06:18,240
have to say. You don't belong here. And yet, women were so drawn to Jesus because Jesus

64
00:06:18,240 --> 00:06:25,000
clearly cared for them. Even in this scene when the men had fled for their lives and

65
00:06:25,000 --> 00:06:28,920
they were hiding out to make sure they didn't end up on a cross as well, who was it that

66
00:06:28,920 --> 00:06:33,120
pushed through the crowd to the foot of the cross to be with Jesus as he was crucified

67
00:06:33,120 --> 00:06:40,600
in his last moments? It was women, brave, courageous women. Let's take a look at who

68
00:06:40,600 --> 00:06:46,520
these women are. Who were these brave women? It's a little confusing because they all have

69
00:06:46,520 --> 00:06:51,960
the same name. There were three women there that day. There was a man, John the disciple,

70
00:06:51,960 --> 00:06:55,680
but there were three women and they all have the same name, Mary. Well, first, the first

71
00:06:55,680 --> 00:07:00,360
Mary, let's call her Mary number one, was Jesus's mother, Mary. And this is the Mary

72
00:07:00,360 --> 00:07:06,920
that we know the best, that she was the one who said to the angel, yes, here I am. Let

73
00:07:06,920 --> 00:07:12,000
it be to me according to your word. And she gave her life. She sacrificed everything to

74
00:07:12,000 --> 00:07:18,280
bear the son of God, to give birth to Jesus, to raise him, to bring him to adulthood. She

75
00:07:18,280 --> 00:07:23,440
is probably the most favored human being in all of human history, with the exception of

76
00:07:23,440 --> 00:07:28,320
Jesus himself. So Mary, we know that's Mary number one. She was there at the foot of the

77
00:07:28,320 --> 00:07:33,560
cross that day. But there was another Mary there that day. Her name was Mary of Magdala

78
00:07:33,560 --> 00:07:40,360
or Mary Magdalene. And she, we know, Mary number two, she was one of the women who traveled

79
00:07:40,360 --> 00:07:47,480
around and followed Jesus throughout his ministry. Now, over time, this rumor got associated

80
00:07:47,480 --> 00:07:52,320
with Mary that she was somehow a prostitute, but that is almost certainly not true. What

81
00:07:52,320 --> 00:07:56,720
we do know about Mary Magdalene is that she was healed by Jesus of some diseases and that

82
00:07:56,720 --> 00:08:00,960
she then followed him with the rest of her life right up into the end of Jesus's life,

83
00:08:00,960 --> 00:08:05,280
as we can see. So that was Mary number two. But then there's a third Mary there at the

84
00:08:05,280 --> 00:08:11,240
foot of the cross that day. And that is Mary, the wife of Clopas. Now this one's a little

85
00:08:11,240 --> 00:08:15,360
harder. Maybe we haven't heard of this Mary before, but what you need to know is that

86
00:08:15,360 --> 00:08:21,520
Clopas was the brother of Joseph, Joseph, the earthly father of Jesus, Joseph, who took

87
00:08:21,520 --> 00:08:27,840
Mary to be his wife, that Joseph. He had a brother named Clopas. And what we can probably

88
00:08:27,840 --> 00:08:35,640
think happened is that eventually Joseph died, probably when Jesus was a young man. And as

89
00:08:35,640 --> 00:08:40,920
a result, Clopas then stepped in to take care of his sister-in-law, Mary, and Jesus, and

90
00:08:40,920 --> 00:08:46,480
the other children. And you can imagine then that these two women became very close, right?

91
00:08:46,480 --> 00:08:53,320
Mary, the mother of Jesus, and Mary, the wife of Clopas, became very tightly connected through

92
00:08:53,320 --> 00:08:58,560
that relationship. And so there you have it. You've got Mary number one, Mary number two,

93
00:08:58,560 --> 00:09:03,480
and Mary number three standing there in this hostile crowd. And when they're all standing

94
00:09:03,480 --> 00:09:09,480
there together, I think it's a good moment for us just to take a look at how important

95
00:09:09,480 --> 00:09:15,000
women were to the ministry and in the ministry of Jesus Christ. I mean, the place of women

96
00:09:15,000 --> 00:09:20,320
in the first century, first century Rome, and even first century Judaism was not great.

97
00:09:20,320 --> 00:09:26,080
You know, often women were regarded as second class citizens. It was a patriarchal society.

98
00:09:26,080 --> 00:09:30,020
So women were often seen to be the property, the possession of either their fathers or

99
00:09:30,020 --> 00:09:35,760
their husbands. They were marginalized. They were restricted in all sorts of ways, in social

100
00:09:35,760 --> 00:09:42,280
ways, in political ways, even in religious ways. They were restricted. Karen Armstrong

101
00:09:42,280 --> 00:09:48,460
writes that the cultural norms of Jesus's era relegated women to roles of domesticity

102
00:09:48,460 --> 00:09:56,300
and subservience, denying them access to education, leadership positions, and public influence.

103
00:09:56,300 --> 00:10:01,640
But here's the thing. Jesus's regard for women was so, so different. Jesus's care for women

104
00:10:01,640 --> 00:10:08,980
was so radical. You could even say that the way Jesus treated women in his day was revolutionary

105
00:10:08,980 --> 00:10:15,320
compared to how the society at large regarded women. I'm reminded there was a time when

106
00:10:15,320 --> 00:10:19,760
Jesus in doing some teaching and talking to some of his opponents, he said, Hey, hey,

107
00:10:19,760 --> 00:10:25,520
do you remember that in the beginning God made them male and female? That's from Matthew

108
00:10:25,520 --> 00:10:30,440
19. But, but in that little phrase, what Jesus is kind of saying, Hey, do you not remember

109
00:10:30,440 --> 00:10:36,560
that both men and women are made in the image of God? And for that reason, Jesus saw women

110
00:10:36,560 --> 00:10:42,800
as co-image bearers equal with men. And in fact, Jesus treated women the same that he

111
00:10:42,800 --> 00:10:48,040
treated men. I want to give you kind of a top 10 list of, I just did a little summary,

112
00:10:48,040 --> 00:10:52,320
a little scan. Where do we see Jesus in his relationship with women being elevated? Let

113
00:10:52,320 --> 00:10:58,280
me give you 10 quick examples. One, we are told that many women traveled around with

114
00:10:58,280 --> 00:11:03,360
Jesus, which is important and kind of scandalous because these women were not, it's not like

115
00:11:03,360 --> 00:11:07,720
these were the wives of his disciples. These were, these were other women, women who were

116
00:11:07,720 --> 00:11:13,280
independently going around with him, learning from him like the men did. Secondly, we know

117
00:11:13,280 --> 00:11:17,000
that Hebrew men at the time of Christ were not to speak to women, especially strange

118
00:11:17,000 --> 00:11:23,360
women they didn't know in public directly. And yet Jesus was constantly speaking to women

119
00:11:23,360 --> 00:11:28,180
directly and in public. In fact, one of the longest conversations we have of Jesus having

120
00:11:28,180 --> 00:11:32,480
a conversation with anybody is found in John chapter four, where, where Jesus has this

121
00:11:32,480 --> 00:11:39,000
extended conversation with a woman at a well in Samaria. Thirdly, that woman at the well

122
00:11:39,000 --> 00:11:43,680
actually becomes the very first missionary, if you will, because she gets sent off back

123
00:11:43,680 --> 00:11:50,440
to her people to tell them about what she just experienced hearing from Jesus. Fourth,

124
00:11:50,440 --> 00:11:55,720
in Luke chapter eight, we're also told that women supported Jesus ministry financially.

125
00:11:55,720 --> 00:11:59,600
We don't hear a lot about that, that Jesus ministry had a financial cost to it and he

126
00:11:59,600 --> 00:12:07,760
was funded by many, many women. Five, this is interesting, our fourth person named Mary,

127
00:12:07,760 --> 00:12:12,360
Mary number four, somewhere in the gospels in the gospel of John, we read that this Mary

128
00:12:12,360 --> 00:12:18,800
was found sitting down and listening to Jesus taking on the posture of a student as if she

129
00:12:18,800 --> 00:12:25,640
too were a emerging disciple of Jesus. That was unheard of in those days when Mary sat

130
00:12:25,640 --> 00:12:31,320
at Jesus feet. Six, Jesus was often using women in his illustrations and in his parables

131
00:12:31,320 --> 00:12:36,760
to make points about the kingdom of God, you know, the persistent widow or the woman who

132
00:12:36,760 --> 00:12:42,960
had a lost coin and so on like that. Seven, it was women, a woman rather, who anointed

133
00:12:42,960 --> 00:12:49,800
Jesus feet in preparation for his death. Eight, it was the women as we saw today who were

134
00:12:49,800 --> 00:12:55,480
the ones who were most present at Jesus's crucifixion. Nine, a woman was the first one

135
00:12:55,480 --> 00:13:00,800
at the tomb of Jesus on Easter morning and 10, and this I think is the most important

136
00:13:00,800 --> 00:13:08,440
one. It was a woman who was the first to see the risen Christ and the first to tell others,

137
00:13:08,440 --> 00:13:14,160
which means the first person who ever preached the gospel, whoever preached that Jesus Christ

138
00:13:14,160 --> 00:13:22,920
is risen from the dead was not a man. It was a woman. All this and much, much more leads

139
00:13:22,920 --> 00:13:28,400
us to believe as Amy, Jill Levine says here that Jesus interaction with women demonstrate

140
00:13:28,400 --> 00:13:36,040
a radical inclusivity and a concern for social justice. He elevated their status. He affirmed

141
00:13:36,040 --> 00:13:43,040
their dignity and challenged societal norms that marginalized them. I have to tell you

142
00:13:43,040 --> 00:13:50,040
as a father of four daughters, I like this Jesus. I really like this Jesus to know that

143
00:13:50,040 --> 00:13:56,400
that God and Christ have this care and inclusion of women. You know, one of the guys I listen

144
00:13:56,400 --> 00:14:00,560
to a lot, Andy Stanley, he once said he says he thinks every woman should be a Christian

145
00:14:00,560 --> 00:14:05,480
because of the radical compassion and inclusion that Jesus showed to the women of his own

146
00:14:05,480 --> 00:14:13,000
day of his own day, which was very restrictive. You know, there are studies that show how

147
00:14:13,000 --> 00:14:18,440
in most churches there are more women than men and people try to figure out why this

148
00:14:18,440 --> 00:14:24,160
gender gap exists and so on and so forth. But I just wonder if part of it is still that

149
00:14:24,160 --> 00:14:31,480
women feel affirmed and they feel elevated in the presence of Jesus in ways that they

150
00:14:31,480 --> 00:14:38,940
don't feel in their homes or in their workplaces. Perhaps now is a good moment to say I give

151
00:14:38,940 --> 00:14:45,720
thanks to all the women in this church from the youngest of you to the oldest for the

152
00:14:45,720 --> 00:14:53,760
way that like these women you serve and give and faithfully just contribute to the life

153
00:14:53,760 --> 00:14:58,720
of this church. And I also give thanks for all the women on our staff team who week in

154
00:14:58,720 --> 00:15:04,160
and week out. We all benefit from their gifts and their energy and their talents. It is

155
00:15:04,160 --> 00:15:08,440
true. And some of you will say, but Rob, all of Jesus disciples were men. Absolutely. It

156
00:15:08,440 --> 00:15:13,320
was true. Jesus was still in some ways a product of his time. You know, in those days only

157
00:15:13,320 --> 00:15:19,680
men could be rabbis in that way. And so yet Jesus, some of what he did was a sign of the

158
00:15:19,680 --> 00:15:24,900
times. But you've got to see the way he was pushing against the grain and how he recognized

159
00:15:24,900 --> 00:15:31,040
the giftedness and courage and the commitment of women. And I am very thankful that at least

160
00:15:31,040 --> 00:15:35,480
in the Anglican Church, I'm very thankful we live in a day where those kind of cultural

161
00:15:35,480 --> 00:15:39,720
norms are no longer in place today. Some of the most effective preachers and some of the

162
00:15:39,720 --> 00:15:44,400
most effective teachers and some of the most effective leaders in the church are women

163
00:15:44,400 --> 00:15:49,640
and we should rejoice in that because these women, like the women of this church are following

164
00:15:49,640 --> 00:15:56,080
in the footsteps of these biblical women who stood with Jesus during the final hours of

165
00:15:56,080 --> 00:16:01,040
his life. So that is the first thing I think that we see in these famous last words is

166
00:16:01,040 --> 00:16:08,280
in this moment that Jesus is elevating the care that is needed to be given to women.

167
00:16:08,280 --> 00:16:13,680
Now, the second thing I want to say that you can't read this story and not also see the

168
00:16:13,680 --> 00:16:19,280
care that Jesus is giving to his mother. And I think by extension to all mothers, which

169
00:16:19,280 --> 00:16:24,640
are a another group of people who in Jesus day and in our own day need special care and

170
00:16:24,640 --> 00:16:29,200
concern. Now I know that mothers are kind of like a subset of women, but I still, I

171
00:16:29,200 --> 00:16:34,080
want to just say a couple of things. Just this, it's really important to know that as

172
00:16:34,080 --> 00:16:40,680
Jesus hung on the cross, dying in pain, he was concerned and he was caring for his mother.

173
00:16:40,680 --> 00:16:45,120
Even as his life was ebbing away, he wanted to ensure that she was going to be looked

174
00:16:45,120 --> 00:16:50,800
after once he was gone. And so then he said, that's why he turns to John. He encourages

175
00:16:50,800 --> 00:16:56,340
John to take his mother into his care and he encourages his mother to allow John to

176
00:16:56,340 --> 00:17:03,520
provide that care to him, to her. How did this happen? Did it work? Did John take Mary

177
00:17:03,520 --> 00:17:08,680
into his care? The answer I think is yes. We don't really know what that looks like,

178
00:17:08,680 --> 00:17:16,720
but there was this ancient document from the year 431 from the city of Ephesus, where it

179
00:17:16,720 --> 00:17:21,600
was said that the city of the Ephesians, where John the theologian and the virgin mother

180
00:17:21,600 --> 00:17:30,640
of God, St. Mary lived and are buried, which means it is possible that Mary may have lived

181
00:17:30,640 --> 00:17:36,640
out her days with John in a place called Ephesus, a city called Ephesus, which is in present

182
00:17:36,640 --> 00:17:42,360
day Turkey. In fact, if you go to Ephesus today, there's even a house there that pilgrims visit,

183
00:17:42,360 --> 00:17:47,120
which is said to be the house that John built for Mary and the place where she lived until

184
00:17:47,120 --> 00:17:52,640
the end of her life. So it's interesting. I don't know if it's legit or not, but whatever

185
00:17:52,640 --> 00:17:57,560
was going on, Jesus was clearly trying to live out the fifth commandment of the Ten

186
00:17:57,560 --> 00:18:03,120
Commandments, the fifth commandment, which says you should honor your father and your

187
00:18:03,120 --> 00:18:09,640
mother and surely honoring our mothers and fathers. It means taking care of them in their

188
00:18:09,640 --> 00:18:17,060
old age. You know, Sally and I, we talk about caring for our own parents when they get into

189
00:18:17,060 --> 00:18:21,200
old age. They already are in old age and are they going to need financial help? Will they

190
00:18:21,200 --> 00:18:25,680
need companionship? Will they need medical care? You know, those are some important questions

191
00:18:25,680 --> 00:18:31,560
people ask, especially in Canada. Right now we live in what is called the sandwich generation,

192
00:18:31,560 --> 00:18:37,700
which is where you have an aging population on the one hand, where life spans are increasing.

193
00:18:37,700 --> 00:18:41,400
And yet these very same people with aging parents also have children that they need

194
00:18:41,400 --> 00:18:46,300
to take care of. And so they're sandwiched between these two important relationships

195
00:18:46,300 --> 00:18:51,240
in their lives and they want to care for both sides of it. And managing that care, having

196
00:18:51,240 --> 00:18:56,520
that dual role actually creates some pretty big challenges, relational challenges, financial

197
00:18:56,520 --> 00:18:59,420
challenges. I'm probably preaching to the choir. You guys probably know this better

198
00:18:59,420 --> 00:19:04,640
than I do. You may be living through this right now where you're trying to balance the

199
00:19:04,640 --> 00:19:13,560
care for your parents with the care for your children. Our parents need help when they

200
00:19:13,560 --> 00:19:17,520
get older. That's just the truth of it. Let me show you, for example, there's some studies

201
00:19:17,520 --> 00:19:24,520
recently, just past week, CIBC did a poll that found that 32% of Canadians nearing retirement

202
00:19:24,520 --> 00:19:30,920
have nothing saved for retirement, nothing. How are they going to survive? H&R Block did

203
00:19:30,920 --> 00:19:38,600
another study a little earlier and they found that 52% of Canadians are unprepared for retirement.

204
00:19:38,600 --> 00:19:44,360
So how will our aging parents make ends meet? Many of them will be fine, but there are others.

205
00:19:44,360 --> 00:19:49,080
Today, I was not today. What am I saying? This past week I went for a dentist appointment,

206
00:19:49,080 --> 00:19:54,840
no cavities. Thank you very much. But the dental hygienist who was cleaning my teeth,

207
00:19:54,840 --> 00:20:00,520
she was a retired lady who had come out of retirement and she was taking all the shifts

208
00:20:00,520 --> 00:20:08,280
she could get because she couldn't make ends meet. All that's to say, Jesus is modeling

209
00:20:08,280 --> 00:20:12,440
something for us here. I think that we need to care for our parents. This is something

210
00:20:12,440 --> 00:20:16,200
that has occurred throughout most of human history. Perhaps recent generations have kind

211
00:20:16,200 --> 00:20:20,280
of started to forget about this, but caring for our parents, caring for our mothers, we'll

212
00:20:20,280 --> 00:20:24,680
care for our fathers too. Sure, whatever. But it's really, it's about our mothers, right?

213
00:20:25,560 --> 00:20:34,920
John was asking, Jesus was asking John to care for his mother. All right. So these famous last

214
00:20:34,920 --> 00:20:39,880
words, they impress upon us two things so far. One, the care Jesus had for women. Secondly,

215
00:20:39,880 --> 00:20:44,120
the care Jesus had for his own mother, both of things we have to kind of think learn from,

216
00:20:44,120 --> 00:20:47,560
but many people believe, and this is where we're going to enter. Many people leave that though

217
00:20:47,560 --> 00:20:52,680
the point of these words that are written for us. So the reason they were passed down to us,

218
00:20:52,680 --> 00:20:56,760
the reason we have them is not just to give us a simple instruction about how to care for your

219
00:20:56,760 --> 00:21:01,960
parents or even how to care for women. But what it actually Jesus is doing here is something far

220
00:21:01,960 --> 00:21:08,120
more radical. He's actually trying to teach us a brand new way to care for everyone, a brand new

221
00:21:08,120 --> 00:21:14,280
way to care for each person, pretty radical stuff. But to understand this, you're going to have to

222
00:21:14,280 --> 00:21:18,280
kind of read between the lines of the text. So let me just show you a couple interesting things.

223
00:21:19,000 --> 00:21:26,040
First of all, I don't know if you know this, but in the gospel of John, John never calls Mary by

224
00:21:26,040 --> 00:21:31,240
name. He never uses Mary's name, which is very interesting. The other gospel writers will use

225
00:21:31,240 --> 00:21:36,120
the name of Mary, but not John. You probably noticed this in the reading. There's Jesus said to her,

226
00:21:36,120 --> 00:21:41,800
woman, here is your son. And you might think that's a strange way to address a woman. It's actually

227
00:21:41,800 --> 00:21:45,640
not a strange way to address a woman, right? You could speak that way to a woman. It was totally

228
00:21:45,640 --> 00:21:51,560
acceptable, but that's not the way you would speak to your mom, right? If you were really going to

229
00:21:51,560 --> 00:21:57,640
speak to your mother and if Jesus primarily was trying to say something to his mother, he would

230
00:21:57,640 --> 00:22:05,880
have used a more intimate word that the Greek word or the Aramaic word for mother. But actually

231
00:22:05,880 --> 00:22:12,200
he uses this word woman. And that is because the word woman is kind of expanding who it is we're

232
00:22:12,200 --> 00:22:17,000
talking. We're not just, we're not just talking about Mary. Now we're not just talking about

233
00:22:17,000 --> 00:22:25,480
mothers. Now John is using Mary almost as a symbol, a symbol that's not just about one person. This

234
00:22:25,480 --> 00:22:31,560
is not just about one woman. There's something bigger going on here. He's, he's using her as a

235
00:22:31,560 --> 00:22:36,120
symbol for something bigger. What is the bigger thing? We're going to get to that, right? And then,

236
00:22:36,120 --> 00:22:42,680
and then consider this that we just heard that John took Mary into his own home. But actually,

237
00:22:42,680 --> 00:22:50,760
if you read the Greek, I've told that what he's really saying there is he brought Mary to his own,

238
00:22:50,760 --> 00:22:57,480
to his own, not his own home, but to his own. If I take you into my home, then yes, I'm going to care

239
00:22:57,480 --> 00:23:04,280
for you. But if I take you to my own, well, now it's not just about me being nice to you. I am

240
00:23:04,280 --> 00:23:09,880
actually taking you to my own. I'm creating a new community with you, a new, I'm actually kind of

241
00:23:09,880 --> 00:23:17,240
merging you in with my family, my own life. Now I'm sharing that with you, my own family, my own.

242
00:23:17,240 --> 00:23:22,760
You see what Jesus is doing in these famous last words. He's connecting. He's taking Mary over here.

243
00:23:22,760 --> 00:23:29,000
He's taking John over here and he's connecting them in a new way that they were not connected

244
00:23:29,000 --> 00:23:35,400
before. Jesus is creating a new kind of family. Right now he is. He's creating a new kind of

245
00:23:35,400 --> 00:23:42,760
community. It's a community based on care, right? I found this great quote from Fleming Rutledge.

246
00:23:42,760 --> 00:23:50,120
Fleming Rutledge. This says it all, right? The disciple, John, and the woman, Mary, again,

247
00:23:50,120 --> 00:23:55,640
neither one of them are named. They're symbols kind of something big. They are not just individual

248
00:23:55,640 --> 00:24:04,360
people here. They are symbolic. They represent the way that family ties now are being transcended

249
00:24:04,360 --> 00:24:11,640
by the ties of the spirit, the ties of the spirit. He's creating something new. When a church is

250
00:24:11,640 --> 00:24:16,120
working the way that it should, when Trinity Church is working the way that it should, when life groups

251
00:24:16,120 --> 00:24:20,440
are working the way they should, when youth group, when Sunday school, and all these things are

252
00:24:20,440 --> 00:24:25,320
working the way that they should, then what's happening is people who aren't related to each

253
00:24:25,320 --> 00:24:29,240
other, people who have nothing in common with each other, people who may have very different

254
00:24:29,240 --> 00:24:36,840
beliefs from each other in many ways, they're being connected. They're being given to each other.

255
00:24:36,840 --> 00:24:44,520
And the result is Christ is making a new family, a family of care, a community of compassion.

256
00:24:45,560 --> 00:24:52,440
I mean, in our culture, we talk, we talk a lot about independence and autonomy, but in the church,

257
00:24:52,440 --> 00:24:57,240
we're connected. We're connected in a way that's different from the other groups you belong to in

258
00:24:57,240 --> 00:25:02,280
the community, even different from the blood relationships that you have out there. That's

259
00:25:02,280 --> 00:25:11,320
why Jesus calls Mary woman and not mom, because he's setting aside his blood relationship in order

260
00:25:11,320 --> 00:25:19,880
to create a wider family of care, a new family, family that transcends race and transcends,

261
00:25:20,680 --> 00:25:26,840
you know, class and gender and theology and all that stuff. In Trinity, we have this saying,

262
00:25:26,840 --> 00:25:33,240
we say here, we want to be where the whole church is caring for the whole church. You see,

263
00:25:33,240 --> 00:25:39,480
Trinity has these care ministries. Yes, we have a care fund. Yes, we have a care coordinator,

264
00:25:40,120 --> 00:25:46,520
Eric and Elijah, Eric and amazing care coordinator. But the kind of care that we see happening here

265
00:25:46,520 --> 00:25:51,160
or the kind of care where the whole church is caring for the whole church is not when you,

266
00:25:51,160 --> 00:25:55,880
you get to care for your favorite people, but it's when you care for all people. It's not when you

267
00:25:55,880 --> 00:26:01,640
just care for some and say, I don't care for those other people. No, no, no. It's when everyone

268
00:26:01,640 --> 00:26:09,320
is caring for everyone because we're connected through the blood of Jesus. So you see,

269
00:26:10,200 --> 00:26:16,280
these last words, man, they have so much there for us. They're just overflowing with care and

270
00:26:16,280 --> 00:26:23,480
concern as Jesus was in life. So in death, he's caring. And let's just recap. First of all,

271
00:26:23,480 --> 00:26:29,560
he's showing us how to care and have concern for women because in Jesus time, as in our own time,

272
00:26:29,560 --> 00:26:36,440
in many places and situations, women were rejected and they were excluded. And Jesus in both his life

273
00:26:36,440 --> 00:26:42,840
and death shows this amazing care and concern for women. And secondly, in these famous last words,

274
00:26:42,840 --> 00:26:48,760
Jesus is showing care and concern for mothers and parents because in his time, and as I've said,

275
00:26:48,760 --> 00:26:55,480
in our time too, aging parents need special care from their children. And then finally,

276
00:26:56,040 --> 00:27:03,640
and most importantly, in these famous last words, we see Jesus calling into being a new spiritual

277
00:27:03,640 --> 00:27:12,360
family, the church, if you will, where people take each other to their own. And this means as you look

278
00:27:12,360 --> 00:27:16,920
around this room today, you don't just see strangers, you see mothers and fathers,

279
00:27:16,920 --> 00:27:23,960
brothers and sisters, sons and daughters, people we've taken into our own. And as such, we're a

280
00:27:23,960 --> 00:27:31,080
family, a family that has been called to care for each other. And that's what Jesus is trying to

281
00:27:31,080 --> 00:27:37,880
press upon us in these famous last words. So thanks be to God. Amen.

282
00:27:39,880 --> 00:27:44,600
Thanks so much for listening to our sermon today, and we hope that you found it inspiring. Make sure

283
00:27:44,600 --> 00:27:49,560
to come back next week as we hear yet another message from the sermon series, Famous Last Words.

284
00:27:49,560 --> 00:27:54,680
Today's sermon was taken from the March 3rd, 2024 service at Trinity Church, Streetsville,

285
00:27:54,680 --> 00:28:15,640
in Mississauga, Ontario.