"Greater love has no one than this..." (John 15:13)
It was the instinct of a mother's heart to protect her own. No time for weighing the consequences. No consideration of the value of one life over another. No time for rational calculations. It was simply the innate response of a mother for her child. It occurred in May of 2008 when the whole earth quivered and pitched in the devastating earthquake in China.
"When rescuers reached the ruins of a young woman's house, they saw her dead body through the cracks. But her pose was somehow strange in that she knelt on her knees like a person was worshipping; her body was leaning forward, and her two hands were supporting an object. The collapsed house had crashed down upon her back and her head. So with many difficulties, the leader of the rescue team put his hand through a narrow gap on the wall to reach the woman's body. He was hoping that this woman could still be alive. However, the cold and stiff body told him that she had passed away for sure.
"He and his team left this house and were going to search the next collapsed building. But for some reason, the team leader was driven by a compelling force to go back to the ruin of the house. Again, he knelt down and used his hand through the narrow cracks to search the little space under the dead body. Suddenly, he screamed with excitement, 'A child! There is a child!'
"The whole team worked together, carefully removing the piles of ruined objects around the body. There was a three-month old little boy wrapped in a flowery blanket under his mother's body. Obviously, the young woman had made the ultimate sacrifice for saving her son. When her house was falling, she used her body to make a cover to protect her son. The little boy was sleeping peacefully when the team leader raised him up.
"The medical doctor came quickly to examine the baby. After he opened the blanket, he saw a cell phone inside the blanket. There was a text message on the screen. It read, 'If you can survive, you must remember that I love you.'" (Published May 26, 2008 by Angel K.Y. Chau)
Jesus raises the bar on loving when He moves it beyond a reaction fueled by a mothering instinct to declare, "Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends." Sacrificing love takes on a whole new dimension when it is a planned, measured, cost-aware, volitional decision to put it all on the line for the needs of another. Knowing full well the price tag and all the implications involved, Jesus chose to love His own to His own death.
It was the instinct of a mother's heart to protect her own. A reflexive response to an unexpected threat. A reaction. An uncalculated move to protect. The reporter continued, "This cell phone was passing from one hand to another. Everyone that read the message wept. 'If you can survive, you must remember that I love you.'" That baby boy miraculously spared by the loving actions of his mommy is just two years old now. I wonder how many times those who care for him have shown him that cell-phone message? How often does someone tell him again, 'You must remember that I love you'?
He put His body between you/me and certain death, just because He loves us! "Greater love has no one than this..."
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