“Behold your son!... Behold your mother!” (Jn.19.26,27) Caring for others was that which first occupied the Lord on the cross. In the same way that He cared for His crucifiers and said, “Father, forgive them”, and that He cared for the Penitent Thief and promised him, saying, “Assuredly I say to you, today you will be with Me in Paradise”, did He also care for His mother, commending her to the care of His beloved disciple John.
The Lord commended His mother who used to carry Him upon her chest, to His beloved disciple who used to lean upon His chest. His mother who stood by His cross, He commended her to the only disciple who followed Him even to the cross. His mother who carried within her womb the burning fire of His Divinity, He commended to the disciple who was later to write a gospel proving His Divinity.
He said to her, “Behold your son!”, “And from that hour that disciple took her to his own house” (Jn.19:27). Thus the Lord gave us an example of how we ought to care for our biological relatives and mothers in particular. He cared for her who had carried Him for nine months, for His mother who had previously cared for Him and to whom He had been obedient (Lk.2:51).
It is normal that the person who is in pain is the centre of others’ concern, but in His sufferings, Christ was the One who was concerned for others. How much more will He now, when He is in His rest, be concerned with us? His first concern was directed to forgiveness of sins, and then His focus was social care, and His first priority
was His mother. Some interpreted Christ the Lord’s stress upon the spiritual relationship, as annulling family care, when He said, “Who is My mother and who are My brothers….whoever does the will of My Father in heaven is My brother and sister and mother”
(Mt.12:40-50). From the cross, Christ the Lord clarified this misconception.
Consecrating oneself to the service of the Lord and preoccupation with the concerns of the large family, the collective church, does not mean neglecting one’s relatives, especially those of one’s household (1Tim.5:8). And it does not exempt a person from honouring his parents or from caring for his own mother.
It was as though there were a predestiny between Christ the Lord and His mother the Virgin Saint Mary. Her pure face was the first face He saw when He came to the world in flesh, and hers was the last face He saw before commending His spirit into the hands of the Father. Hers was the heart of the loving mother seeking after the Son wherever He is and remaining beside Him in His sufferings in love, communing with Him, saying, “The world rejoices as it receives Salvation, but my heart burns at beholding Your crucifixion which You are enduring for the sake of all, O my Son and my God.” And His was the heart of the Son who cares for His mother whilst He is in the depth of His sufferings.
Thus Christ the Lord deemed it necessary to care for His mother and say to her a word of comfort at the moment in which when there was a sword piercing her soul (Lk.2:35). He found it befitting of Him as a Son to comfort His own mother in her grief. He comforted her by three things: by talking to her, by caring for her in managing her life, and by giving her a spiritual son to be a companion for her in her loneliness.
The Lord’s speech from the cross to His mother differed from that to the thief. It was the thief who initiated the conversation and the Lord answered him. But with the Virgin Saint Mary, it was the Lord who began speaking to her. Being His mother, He did not have to wait until she would talk to Him and then reply, He did not have to wait until she complain to Him and then He considers her complaint. The Virgin was accustomed to keeping silent, even by the cross. There was no mention that she was screaming or lamenting, but she was calm and composed in her sufferings, and kept silent. The Lord heard and understood her silence, and knew her feelings and her heart, so He spoke to her without her asking. And she obeyed His word and went with the Beloved disciple to his house.
The Virgin Saint Mary was a blessing to John and a blessing to his household. The Lord gave her to him as a reward for his love. The disciple took her as a precious diamond, far precious than the whole world, and she remained in his house, a valuable endowment until her repose. It was said that John the Apostle did not leave Jerusalem till after the repose of the Virgin Saint Mary. If John’s love reached to the point of following Christ even to the cross and he remained standing by Him, he was worthy of receiving a reward both here and in eternity. Here, he gained the blessing of the Virgin Saint Mary who dwelt with him in his house. All who follow Christ indeed receive from the abundance of His blessings and bounties.
Saint Mary the Virgin took Saint John as her son. The Lord gave her the disciple who had the most affection, love and sincerity. Of all the apostles, it was John the Beloved who spoke the most about love. He was the one who said that God is love (1Jn.4:16). He is the disciple who used to lean in the bosom of
Christ who loved him. He was the best person who could offer to the Virgin an image of her Son.
It was apparent that Christ on the cross owned nothing, not even His clothes which they took and shared among themselves, but He owned John who had given his heart to Christ. And Christ took this heart and gave it to His mother.
Who was it who was caring for the other, the Virgin Saint Mary or Saint John? The Virgin Saint Mary was in Saint John’s house, not to receive provision, but to fill it with grace and blessing and also to further its knowledge of Christ, with a knowledge deeper than all others.
The entrusting of the Virgin Saint Mary to Saint John is indicative of the fact that Saint Mary had no other children, for if she had, they would have had the priority of looking after her and of receiving her blessing above any stranger. The Virgin was alone at that time; she had no children, and Saint Joseph the Carpenter had died a long time previously. Therefore, the Lord Jesus Christ entrusted her to His disciple.
The phrase, “Behold your son”, gives us an idea of spiritual sonship and explains to us the honourable place the Virgin Saint Mary had with the Apostles themselves.