"My Mother Taught Me about Faith"

In my previous E-pistle, I shared about the death of my mother and her funeral which was a wonderful celebration of her life. I want to share some of the things my mother taught me, not to be maudlin or overly sentimental, but simply to share those faith lessons which mean so much to me. Somehow writing has always been “therapy” for me, so please be patient with my sharing in such a personal way, or else hit the “delete” button (and I will never know you did not continue reading these thoughts).

Over the years I have preached and written about the faith lessons I learned from Mom, and I am glad to say that she was aware of how much I loved her and appreciated those faith lessons. Several years ago, I preached a sermon entitled “Things My Mother Taught Me,” and I sent her a cassette tape of that sermon (that shows you it was several years ago, before CD’s and DVD’s of sermons became possible). Mother was appropriately both modest and proud to hear that sermon tape, and she even sent me a few suggestions about how to improve it!

The most important faith lesson my Mother taught me (and all who knew her) was what I call “Confident Faith.” Yes, of course, I have preached about that, too, because it so reflects her positive, hopeful, optimistic, confident attitude toward life.

My mother was one of those persons who always saw the best in other people, never expressed negative attitudes about others, and almost never seemed to get “down” or discouraged. Most importantly she had a confident faith that was more than just optimism, it was founded upon a complete and unfaltering faith in God’s presence and goodness.

In my “Confident Faith” sermon, I shared this example of my mother’s positive attitude about road construction: Whenever we as a family were caught in a traffic jam due to road construction, or whenever I simply mentioned to Mother about some road construction issue (usually I was complaining about it), my Mother’s response was the same: “It will be so nice when it is finished.” Her statement became something of a family joke, and most of us in our family have often quoted her to others – especially while sitting in traffic surrounded by those orange cones and “Road Construction” signs. Still today when I find myself getting frustrated with road construction, delays in traffic, or even slow-moving church meetings, I remember my mother’s comments, and I smile.

Mom was right. In fact her basic understanding of the Gospel seems so vivid and true: God loves us just as we are, but God is not finished with us yet. From God’s perspective, we are a life under construction, but God sees what we are becoming, will become, and will be. It is as if God looks at each of our lives and says, “It will be so nice when it is finished.”

When I went to seminary I learned that Mother’s understanding of God is quite Wesleyan. We of the Wesleyan tradition (which includes all the people called Methodist) know that we are saved by God’s grace, and we also know that God’s grace is a sanctifying grace which transforms us and moves us toward perfection.

Knowing the accepting and transforming love of God is what gave my mother such confident faith, her ability to accept others in spite of their flaws, and her willingness to expect the best. She was a woman of confident faith, and I can only hope that my life and faith express some of what I learned from her.