Ministries:
Adult | Teens | Children

Pastor's Pen's:
2008 | 2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004 | 2003 | 2002 | 2001

Sermon Series:
Following Jesus
Earthly Cross
His Name Is
Apostles Creed
Dealing with Feelings
Jonah
Get Real
Promised Land Living

Grace Church
257 Kendall Street
Burlington, WI 53105

(262) 763-3021

Email:
Pastor Scott Carson

Secretary Patti Hall

PASTOR'S PENS 2003

Grace Church of Burlington May 11, 2003 “We’ll do all right if we can capitalize on our mistakes."   Mickey Rivers             Today we are honoring mothers. While we don’t often talk about it, a lot of women become mothers who did not intend to. Some after an act of passion found out that they were expecting. Others, though married, were not quite ready for motherhood. Many a couple has had a "surprise." Others facing the reality of an unwanted and unexpected pregnancy, decided that they did not want to be mothers, terminated the pregnancy, only to discover later how much they regretted that decision. Many were unsaved; most were naive of the full impact of that decision.             Wonderfully, the Lord Jesus takes us where we are, even when where we are is a sinful mess. As we study the Gospels, we cannot help noticing the tenderness with which Jesus treated people with wounds caused by moral failure. A Samaritan woman with five failed marriages, a dishonest tax collector, an adulteress, a prostitute, a disciple who denied Him–all of these received from Jesus forgiveness and reinstatement, not the judgment they deserved. Jesus saw in people not what they had been but what they could be, not their past but their future.             Sadly, we followers of Jesus sometimes do the opposite. A film made in 2002, The Magdalene Sisters, told the tragic story of the "maggies" of Ireland. They got that nickname from Mary Magdalene, a revealing story in itself. The gospels mention only one fact of Mary Magdalene's past, that Jesus had driven seven demons out from her. But a tradition grew that Mary Magdalene must have been the same woman as the prostitute who washed Jesus' feet with her hair. When a strict order of nuns agreed to take in young women who had become pregnant out of wedlock, they dubbed the fallen girls "maggies."             The maggies came to public attention in the 1990's when the order sold its convent, bringing to light the existence of the graves of 133 maggies who had spent their lives working as virtual slaves in the convent laundry. The media soon scouted out a dozen such "Magdalen laundries" across Ireland–the last one closed in 1996–and soon relatives and survivors were spilling accounts of the slave like labor conditions inside. Thousands of young women spent time in the laundries, some put away just for being "temptresses," forced to work unpaid and in silence as a form of atonement for their sins. The nuns took away illegitimate children born to these women to be raised in other religious institutions.             What a sharp contrast between how Jesus treated moral failures and how we His followers often do. Jesus appointed the Samaritan woman as His first missionary (John 4). He defended the woman who anointed him with expensive perfume: "wherever the gospel is preached throughout the world, what she has done will also be told, in memory of her" (Mark 14:9). And Mary Magdalene, she of the seven demons, Jesus honored as the very first witness of the Resurrection–a testimony at first discounted by his more prestigious followers. Where we shame, Jesus elevates.             Maybe you’re a mother and things didn’t start out right. The Lord Jesus loves to take our "mistakes," even our big ones, and use them for His glory. But we have to let Him. We have to admit that we blew it and give our messes over to Him. Maybe you aborted your child. You’re a mother and no one knows it. God’s grace is sufficient. Calvary covers it all! Accept His forgiveness and forgive yourself.             No doubt as a Mom, you have some regrets...things that you’d do differently, if you had it to do all over again. While we cannot change the past, we can take new steps forward in the future. And ask the Lord to take your blunders and turn them into blessings. To use your weaknesses as strengths in the lives of your children.             At some level we’re all maggies and we all need His grace! Our wonderful Savior loves to take our tragedies and transform them in to trophies of His grace. Give Him yours! You’ll be amazed anew at His amazing grace!!