What is Mother’s Day? What is the significance of mother’s love? I’d like to take a look at what parallels there are between mother’s love, and God’s love. Looking at these parallels will help us understand the depth of God’s love more deeply, the significance of a mother’s love, and gain a more realistic attitude towards our Spiritual Rebirth.

This sermon was given by DEMIAN DUNKLEY at NH Faith Fusion on Mother’s Day

Before we talk about rebirth, let’s start with birth:

Creation took a lot of work. God had the help of angels right? Angels were like God’s staff. His assistants. The midwives of creation. How Long did it take to create the world?…

They say between 12-15 billion years. Certainly it took a really long time. Developing all the elements necessary to support human life! According to the bible the last thing created were humans. It’s as if all of God’s work was done in preparation for Human Beings! You sometimes here people say how self centered it is to place humans at the center of the universe. But actually, humans didn’t invent humans. It’s God’s work. To respect the original value of humanity is to respect God’s work. Frankly it’s selfish to think otherwise.

Actually, the last thing created was Eve, right? God’s daughter was the most precious gem of God’s Creation. So, what part of God’s heart did Eve represent?…

“God loves by investing Himself one hundred percent and more. Something of that nature still remains in the fallen world. It is not paternal love, but maternal love. It remains like a seed fire. If a seed fire is well guarded, it can be used later to kindle another fire. Likewise, salvation is possible only because the seed of God’s original nature still remains in us.” – SMM

So God put everything into the birth of humanity. Let’s look at pregnancy and birth for humans. It’s an incredible time that really makes you invest more than 100% (like God) Mother’s love – life in the womb.

Our First Birth Story:

I remember when I got the call that we were going to have baby. I was the king of the world. All of a sudden this became the most important, the only important thing in the world to me.

Pregnancy is a real experience and a huge investment. My wife seemed to suffer more than average. Frankly I think there were only two out of the nine months that she felt good. She was always feeling sick. I was working, but took on as many household duties as I could. Which was basically everything, or so it seemed.

I shopped, cooked, tried all kinds of recipes that might work for her. It was a lot of work. Funny, because it all seemed to end up in the toilet anyway. I mean, she was really sensitive. It got to the point where she couldn’t even handle the smell of steam. Clean steam!

We were living in Italy at the time. On top of a mountain. The hospital where Timothy was born was on top of another mountain. Everything was new to us. We’d never done this before. One of the things I was most concerned about was the drive to the hospital. I wanted to be absolutely sure of the best route and exactly where to go when the time came. So we rehearsed the journey several times, and a good thing too, because it really isn’t easy navigating mountain roads and medieval cities.

We also had the bags ready by the door, so if at any time of night or day we were ready to make the well practiced journey to the hospital to put ourselves in the capable hands of the italian doctors.

So, the time came! It was four in the morning and Yumiko woke me up to say that her water had broken. I jumped out of bed like lighting. “Ok, honey, don’t worry. We’re fine. This is normal. Isn’t it? This is normal, right? Don’t worry, we’re fine. Don’t panic. We’ll be fine, don’t panic.” I think she said something like, “I’m not panicking, I’m just asking, can you get a towel?”

We grabbed a pile full of towels, got the bag and jumped into the car. It’s dark, all the roads are empty. Plain sailing. All the way. I was driving like crazy, handing Yumiko fresh towels every two minutes. She’s got a pile of wet towels on the floor. All the while and encouraging her not to panic.

We finally got to the hospital. Still dark. Absolutely empty parking lot. Just one car was there. Somehow, even though there was only one car in the parking lot, I managed to hit it. Truth is, I was the one panicking.

We rushed in to the hospital. My heart was racing 1000 miles an hour. But as soon as we got in it was like, “Yeah, it’s okay. Just sit down. For everyone else it seemed like just another day. Of course, they were just doing their job, but to me this was the most important thing happening on the planet! They seemed so detached.

It’s kind of funny, because we eventually were seen by a doctor who got out the ultrasound. He said, “hmm, looking good. The water may break soon.” What? I said. She still has water in there? It already broke! He said, “No, she still has all her water.” What? No wonder Timothy is such a good swimmer. His first nine months were in an olympic swimming pool!

The next two days were exciting, but also agonizing. And through it all, I could never understand how the the staff in the hospital didn’t seem to realize how important this was. Or even understand how much pain Yumiko was in. “Ah, don’t worry about it, she’ll be fine!” It makes me wonder if God was like that at all. So excited to give birth to His/Her children. Almost childlike in anticipation of this most important moment. The culmination of so much effort and sacrifice. Meanwhile all the angels were wondering what the fuss was all about. Just business as usual for them! The heavenly midwives.

The point is, when Timothy was born, It was the first moment I was ever able to get a glimpse of parental love. Again, let’s consider these words.

“God loves by investing Himself one hundred percent and more. Something of that nature still remains in the fallen world. It is not paternal love, but maternal love. It remains like a seed fire.” – Rev. Moon.

When I think about these words, and consider what a mother goes through to give birth to children and love her children in this world, I am really amazed. I can begin to understand the significance of mother’s love. Women have been holding this light, this lantern of God’s love through the shadows of human history.

Women are sensitive to this nature of God, the unconditional sacrificial heart of God. Yet, humankind, led mostly by men, has been separate from the realm of God’s love. This is the significance of Mother’s love. Mothers have been carrying the burden representing a part of God’s heart that is somewhat alien to humanity – until now.

Now is the time when we can understand more deeply about God’s heart. It wasn’t supposed to be this way, but because of the fall the full nature of God’s heart has been alien to us. Spiritually we’ve been dull. Dead. In need of rebirth. No? Can you imagine what God’s heart might be, after all that investment, only to see us die away from Her love? It’s time to liberate God, which is the same as to say liberate women, from being the ones holding onto this light. It is time for us all to be reborn in God’s love.

God’s love has been holding out for us, longing for this time. Our reawakening, to be reborn spiritually and realize the joy that She is longing to experience with us. Throughout history, God, Heavenly Parents have been holding us, praying for us, until we could stand up again.

Even when there are those around us that may not want to see it, God never waivers in Her love for us.

To illustrate this point I’d like to show you this video:

Watching this video, reminds me that rebirth is a process, it’s not one single magic moment where everything is fulfilled. It’s a process, and not necessarily a pretty process either. Just like that baby, we are gasping for our first breaths, and struggling just to keep our eyes open. Sometimes they close, but then open again, our fingers move, our arms try to stretch, like trying to wake up a sleeping body, but sometimes it’s like there is no one around to notice. We may just get trashed. But God’s love, just like those parents’ love doesn’t give up. We have been laying on the beating heart of God’s love all this time.

On mothers day we should honor mothers for all that they do to carry the light of God’s love.

But we all should also recognize God’s effort, love. More than any one mother has suffered and longed for the health of her children, God has been longing for the day when we can wake up, take our first breath, open our eyes and stand up.

And even if we fall, God is there to support us, to pick us up again. No matter what our situation, no matter what we’ve done, no matter how dark, you must know that the time is now, to take a breath.

This whole time, God has been holding us, embracing us, but God needs a body. God needs arms to hold us. We are the arms of God, we are the hands of God. That’s the significance of a good spiritual community that can support us, good family members that can support us. It’s to act together as God’s midwifes, the caretakers to support our reawakening and our spiritual growth.

Even though we may feel inadequate, you should know, without any doubt, that you are called right now, in some unique way, to be a part of God’s embrace. You are ready. God is choosing you to be a part of Her embrace. No child will be left behind.

God’s heart is not satisfied if only one child lives, and the other child dies, right? God’s concern and love is even stronger and desirous for the child who is dead, or dying. No?

From this day on, let’s not just think of mother’s day of our own physical mother, or wife, sister daughter, a day to send a card and maybe buy some flowers, but let Mother’s day, and every day remind us of the incredible sacrificial love of God, that has invested everything in us, to be happy, to be safe, and above all to be the greatest we can be. No matter what anyone thinks, no matter who casts any doubt.

It’s time to stand up, because there is no greater joy for a Mother, than to know her child is alive and well, and able to fulfill our original value.

Happy mother’s day everyone.

This is a guest post by Demian Dunkley