Mother’s Day, observed every year on the second Sunday in May, means different things to different people. Some may enjoy a special dinner prepared by mother, while others may choose to ignore it. But it is a time to pause for a moment and recognize the importance of mothers and pay tribute to them for their roll in the development of the lives of their children.
For me, Mother’s Day has always been a meaningful, but rather emotional, day. It is a time when I can recall precious memories of my mother and, in one way or another, express my appreciation for that which she, so unselfishly, contributed to my life.
Suddenly and unexpectedly, my mother, as a very young woman, died when I was eight years, four months and 19 days old. Therefore, I grew up in a one parent home without a mother upon whom I could rely. As a result, there was emptiness and loneliness in my heart and life, and my heart ached when I saw the good relationships other children in the neighborhood had with their mothers. There was something significant missing in my life, and I knew it.
As a rather young boy, I was startled on one occasion when I came upon a passage in the New Testament. n that passage, Paul, in one of his letters, reminded Timothy, his young co-worker, of an important legacy that was his: His “sincere faith” came to him from his ”mother Eunice.” When I read that passage, I thought: Eunice? That was my mother’s name. So, I had something in common with Timothy, and I began to think about the legacy my mother left to me.
My mother, a soft-spoken and gentle woman, had a strong faith that shaped her life, and it was evident in everything she did. While she did not, and could not, leave me a legacy that consisted of material things, she did, however, leave me a legacy of faith that shaped my life.
